Module Description: 

Around the world, over 80 million people claim full or partial Italian ancestry. This enormous diaspora is the result of over two centuries of population movements away from the Italian peninsula, whether across the Alps to France or Great Britain, across the sea to Africa or across the ocean to the Americas. In this module, we will explore the beginnings of Italian emigration from the early 19th century when the diaspora consisted mainly of nationalist exiles and elite groups and trace its development into a mass phenomenon that gathered pace from the 1870s onwards as millions of Italians sought new opportunities abroad, creating a complex ‘informal empire’ of emigrant communities around the world. We will examine the motivations behind the different phases of Italian migration from the 19th to the 21st centuries and will explore the global lives of Italian migrants, both male and female, and their reception in their destination countries. We will also study the interaction between migration flows and issues such as colonialism, race, Fascism and post-war economic development. 

 

Aims and Learning Outcomes: 

The aim of the module is to offer students an insight into the history and evolution of Italian migratory patterns from the 19th to the 21st centuries. They will also acquire skills in historical research, essay writing, and oral communication. 

 

By the end of this module, students will be able to demonstrate:  


	an understanding of the key developments and patterns in the history of Italian migration from the 19th to the 21st centuries; 
	
	
	engagement in critical analysis of a range of primary sources; 
	
	
	the ability to assess and analyse key scholarly literature on the subject; 
	
	
	formulate and communicate well-informed arguments both in writing and orally. 
	
 

Suggested Reading: 

Indicative Bibliography 

 

Aliano, David, Mussolini's National Project in Argentina (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2012) 

 

Baily, Samuel L., Immigrants in the Lands of Promise: Italians in Buenos Aires and New York City, 1870–1914 (Cornell University Press, 1999) 

 

Baldoli, Claudia, Exporting Fascism: Italian Fascists and Britain's Italians in the 1930s (Berg, 2003) 

 

Ballinger, Pamela, The World Refugees Made: Decolonization and the Foundation of Postwar Italy (Cornell University Press, 2020) 

 

Battisti, Danielle, Whom We Shall Welcome: Italian Americans and Immigration Reform, 1945-1965 (Fordham University Press, 2019) 

 

Bourne, Richard, Garibaldi in South America: An Exploration (Hurst, 2020) 

 

Cannistraro, Philip V., Blackshirts in Little Italy: Italian Americans and Fascism, 1921–1929 (Small Press, 1999) 

 

Cinel, Dino, The National Integration of Italian Return Migration, 1870–1929 (Cambridge University Press, 1991) 

 

Cinotto, Simone, ed., Making Italian America: Consumer Culture and the Production of Ethnic Identities (Fordham University Press, 2014) 

 

Colpi, Terri, The Italian Factor: The Italian Community in Great Britain (Mainstream, 1991) 

 

Cresciani, Gianfranco, The Italians in Australia (Cambridge University Press, 2003) 

 

Choate, Mark, Emigrant Nation: The Making of Italy Abroad (Harvard University Press, 2008) 

 

Connell, William J. and Stanislao G. Pugliese, eds., The Routledge History of Italian Americans (Routledge, 2018) 

 

Di Paola, Pietro, The Knights Errant of Anarchy: London and the Italian Anarchist Diaspora (1880–1917) (Liverpool University Press, 2013) 

 

Gabaccia, Donna R., Italy’s Many Diasporas (Routledge, 2003) 

 

Gabaccia, Donna R. and Franca Iacovetta, eds., Women, Gender and Transnational Lives: Italian Workers of the World (University of Toronto Press, 2002) 

 

Gabaccia, Donna R. and Fraser M. Ottanelli, eds., Italian Workers of the World: Labor Migration and the Formation of Multiethnic States (University of Illinois Press, 2001) 

 

Isabella, Maurizio, Risorgimento in Exile: Italian Émigrés and the Liberal International in the Post-Napoleonic Era (Oxford University Press, 2009) 

 

Pergher, Roberta, Mussolini's Nation-Empire: Sovereignty and Settlement in Italy’s Borderlands, 1922–1943 (Cambridge University Press, 2018) 

 

Reeder, Linda, Widows in White: Migration and the Transformation of Rural Italian Women, Sicily, 1880-1920 (University of Toronto Press, 2003) 

 

Riall, Lucy, Garibaldi: Invention of a Hero (Yale University Press, 2007) 

 

Ugolini, Wendy, Experiencing war as the 'enemy other': Italian Scottish experience in World War II (Manchester University Press, 2011) 

 

Vellon, Peter G., A Great Conspiracy Against Our Race: Italian Immigrant Newspapers and the Construction of Whiteness in the Early Twentieth Century (New York University Press, 2014) 

 

Zanoni, Elizabeth, Migrant Marketplaces: Food and Italians in North and South America (University of Illinois Press, 2018) 

 