Images of Southern Italy as a place of arrival for migrants of different origins and backgrounds have been proliferating in recent years across Italian media, as well as in contemporary Italian literature and cinema. That presentation represents a major change in the collective imaginary, complicating the longstanding representation of South as the forever “backward” part of Italy. 

This talk arises from Dr Polizzi's forthcoming book, which is one of the first studies to interrogate, through analysis of contemporary literary and cinematic texts, the impact of contemporary migration to the Italian South on the tradition of representation of the region. Informed by translation and transnational theory and by decolonial, queer and feminist critique, this paper traces the emergence of a transnational imaginary of the Italian South and offers useful tools for an urgent reconfiguration of collective and individual identities.

All welcome.