“Family Is Really All Over the Place:” Ethnic Identity Formation Within a Transnational Network
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“FAMILY IS REALLY ALL OVER THE PLACE:” ETHNIC IDENTITY FORMATION WITHIN A TRANSNATIONAL NETWORK ABRIL MARTINA LIBERATORI A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY GRADUATE PROGRAMME IN HISTORY YORK UNIVERSITY, TORONTO, ONTARIO DECEMBER 2017 © ABRIL MARTINA LIBERATORI, 2017 Abstract This dissertation explores the process of ethnic identity formation of immigrants from the Campania region of Italy who settled in Ontario (Canada) and Buenos Aires (Argentina) after the Second World War, exploring the transnational nature of their social and family networks. It centres on the collection of twenty-five original testimonies from narrators from the Campania who travelled from Italy to Ontario and Buenos Aires between 1949 and 1979. These testimonies are complemented by ethnic newspaper archives and a diverse collection of archival materials from Canada, Argentina, and Italy. Campani understood their ethnic identities not via national boundaries, nor by a hyphenated or binary relationship; they did so using a shared imagined space that formed part of a multi-directional and transnational network, a mental map that included nodal points across the globe. This project acknowledges the existence of formalized ethnic associations of Campani, but argues that the identity of Campani depended less on them and more on informal networks of family to develop a sense of identity. Focusing on this unorganized and understudied group offers an intriguing perspective on how immigrants develop ethnic identities in situations where regional ties or formalized institutions are not strong enough to adhere to as a viable source of ethnic identity. Women were a vital part of these transnational networks, and this dissertation explores how networks of transmission work within this category of analysis. Language, food, and music are some of the means of forging and affirming ethnic identity that operate within the transnational network. Campani around the globe engaged with global foodways to explain, contextualize, and transmit the immigrant experience. They negotiated the numerous languages at their disposal to navigate the different realities they experienced upon immigration. Lastly, Campani employed popular music from home and abroad to define themselves as ethnic or to foster a common group identity across borders. Hyphenated identities are unsatisfactory, since they rely on a linear connection between two places and obfuscate the existence of other nodal spaces in identity formation. Instead, Campani turned to other identifiers for constancy, such as the family network. Discussions of identity centre on the family or use familial terms to describe that tension. This project acknowledges that Campani had multiple identifiers at their disposal, and that they adopted them strategically to navigate the situation at hand. It complicates the presence of hybrid or hyphenated identities by considering the vast but understudied transnational network that provided Campani with a domain for ethnic identity formation. It explores immigration as a process of non-linear mobility that transcends borders by creating nodes of settlement and streaks of movement that together create a picture of what and how identity is defined. ii Dedication For Nonno iii Acknowledgements This dissertation was born and flourished at kitchen tables around the globe. Its most impressive and enduring achievement, I hope, is its engagement with the incredible life stories of so-called ‘ordinary’ people who have had rather extraordinary lives. I always knew that such an undertaking would be an enormous professional feat, but I never expected it to affect me personally in the ways that it has. I am grateful to those who disseminated my flyers, published my call for participants, passed on the word, and forwarded names to me. To the individuals and associations who contributed to this ambitious project: this dissertation would not exist without you. Above all, I am eternally grateful to the generous narrators in Ontario and Buenos Aires who opened up their homes and histories to me and to this project. You have become a part of who I am, and it is my sincere honour. I am incredibly grateful to have worked with a committee of brilliant, engaging, and supportive professors who, individually and as a unit, stimulated and inspired me to do my best work. Gabriele Scardellato’s astounding expertise challenged me to deepen my knowledge, and Carolyn Podruchny’s unique perspective and pointed questions encouraged me to broaden it. Lastly, Roberto Perin served as a coach, advisor, fact- checker, critic, editor, proofreader, cheerleader, chef, and counsellor, among others. For this and so much more, I am so grateful. I am indebted to the members of the Immigration History Reading Group who read and provided constructive insights on parts of this work. I am also thankful for the monthly meetings that provided a warm and safe space in which to debate, develop, and inspire ideas that have found their way into this dissertation. The staff at libraries and archival institutions in three countries were an immense help in navigating a research question that was not easily answered in archives alone. They pointed me to little-known collections that provided context and depth to my developing arguments. Thank you to staff at the Biblioteca Nacional Mariano Moreno (Buenos Aires) and at the Toronto Reference Library (Toronto). Special thanks to Otilia da Veiga (Academia Porteña del Lunfardo, Buenos Aires), Libertad Marilef (Sociedad Argentina de Autores y Compositores de Musica, Buenos Aires), Theresa Lombardi (CHIN Radio, Toronto), Marc Lerman (Archdiocese of Toronto), Amancio Rodriguez (Biblioteca Nacional del Maestro, Buenos Aires), Irineu Zotti (Centro de Estudios Migratorios Latinoamericanos, Buenos Aires), Antonietta Tosoni (Biblioteca Centro Studi Emigrazione, Rome), Cathy Leekam and Pasang Thackchhoe (Multicultural History Society of Ontario, Toronto), and to Matteo Sanfilippo. My thanks to Isabel Mansione and Liliana Haydee-Zuntini for endless valuable resources, and for their generous and stimulating approach to collaboration. The financial costs associated with such an undertaking were offset with very generous funding from the Ontario Graduate Scholarship Program, the Graduate Program in History at York University, the Faculty of Graduate Studies at York University, and the Mariano A. Elia Chair in Italian-Canadian Studies. Lastly, this dissertation would not have been possible without a family who fostered an unquenchable thirst for knowledge and provided an unending network of support. My thanks especially to Shawn and Ellis, who are in every single page. iv Table of Contents Abstract ii Dedication iii Acknowledgements iv Table of Contents v Chapter 1: Introduction 1 Chapter 2: Building Transnational Networks 50 Chapter 3: Hybridized Femininities 78 Chapter 4: Language Use and Identity Negotiation 109 Chapter 5: Ethnic Foodways 142 Chapter 6: Music and Popular Culture in Buenos Aires 172 Chapter 7: Music and Popular Culture in Toronto 207 Conclusions 235 Works Cited 254 v Chapter 1: Introduction1 Antonio Casale was born in Naples in 1927. As a young man, he immigrated to Brazil in 1955 inspired by his father’s seasonal migrations there. In 1967, with a Spanish wife and Brazilian children, he immigrated yet again to Toronto. He has one brother in Rome, and another in Sao Paulo. He has cousins in Buenos Aires and in Montreal, and although he has never visited either of them, they communicate frequently. His immediate family speaks English, Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese interchangeably. In recounting his life stories, Antonio pays very little attention to the transnational nature of his family. It is quite simply a part of him, woven as a de facto element of his life.2 People from the small villages of the Campania region in Italy have been travelling abroad for centuries. Most of them have done so as part of a wide interconnected web of family networks. Today, descendants of these families are widespread across the urban centres of North and South America. Campani understood their ethnic identities not via national boundaries, nor by a hyphenated, linear, or binary relationship; instead, they conceptualized and formulated their ethnic identities using a shared imagined space that formed part of a multi- directional and transnational network, a mental map that included nodal points across the globe. This project acknowledges the existence of formalized ethnic associations of Campani and that they represent a component of ethnic identity, but argues that the ethnic 1 I thank Daniele Dimaro, one of the Campani who shared his testimony with me, for the passing remark that unwittingly became the title of this dissertation. 2 I employ the term ‘immigrant’ or ‘immigration’ to denote a relationship with a settlement society (i.e. immigration to Canada), one generally marked by permanence and settlement. In circumstances where I am discussing broader systems of multi-lateral movements that do not rely on permanence or on a relationship to a particular place, the term ‘migrant’ or ‘migration’ is used instead (i.e., a network of migration). 1 identity of Campani and this mental map depended less on them and more on informal networks of family and kin to develop their sense of identity. Ontario and Buenos Aires were two significant nodal points in this mental map. Those who left did so for reasons that