UCLA UCLA Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Women's Voices in Italian Postcolonial Literature from the Horn of Africa Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/1bm0v5tv Author Lavagnino, Claire Genevieve Publication Date 2013 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles Women’s Voices in Italian Postcolonial Literature from the Horn of Africa A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Italian by Claire Genevieve Lavagnino 2013 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Women’s Voices in Italian Postcolonial Literature from the Horn of Africa by Claire Genevieve Lavagnino Doctor of Philosophy in Italian University of California, Los Angeles, 2013 Professor Lucia Re, Chair This dissertation analyzes works by two African Italian women writers of Somali descent, Ubax Cristina Ali Farah and Igiaba Scego, with a particular focus on representations of the voice and the body. Ali Farah and Scego, two of the most prominent authors of Italian postcolonial literature, address Italy's historical amnesia in their works through the personal stories/testimonies of their characters. The voices of Ali Farah’s and Scego’s protagonists narrate the intertwined histories between Italy and Somalia from Somalia’s inception as an Italian colony in 1908 up to more recent events of civil war, piracy, and famine. The dissertation examines how multimodal storytelling in these authors’ works helps capture the complexity of such histories, especially in the context of the Somali diaspora, which often requires a multitude of narrative modes in order to maintain personal bonds with a pre-civil war Somalia and with the ii people who have been killed or dispersed by war. The voice is also examined as a counterpoint to the voiceless representations of East Africans that span from Italy’s beginnings as a nation to today in literature, visual media, and journalistic reports in Italian. Drawing from Adriana Cavarero’s A più voci. Filosofia dell’espressone vocale [For More Than One Voice: Toward a Philosophy of Vocal Expression] (2003), the dissertation explores the interplay between orality and vocality, language and speech in two short stories and a novel by Ali Farah—“Rapdipunt” [Punt Rap] (2005), “Un sambuco attraversa il mare” [A Dhow Is Crossing the Sea] (2011) and Madre piccola [Little Mother] (2007)—and a short story and autobiographical novel by Scego—“Identità” [Identity] (2008) and La mia casa è dove sono [Home is Where I am] (2010). The “mashup,” the process of layering/mixing together two or more narrative modes to transcend conventional meaning, is also considered as a narrative framework. iii This dissertation of Claire Genevieve Lavagnino is approved. Claudio Fogu Thomas Harrison Dominic Thomas Lucia Re, Committee Chair University of California, Los Angeles 2013 iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction………………………………………………………………………………1 Chapter 1………………………………………………………………………………...28 Ubax Cristina Ali Farah Voicing body and personhood: Vocal resonance in diaspora Chapter 2………………………………………………………………………………104 Igiaba Scego Mixed tapes and postcolonial mashups Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………..152 Appendix Interview with Ubax Cristina Ali Farah……………………………………...…………156 “Identity” by Igiaba Scego………………………………………………………….…..176 Bibliography………………………………………………………………….………..206 v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to acknowledge: Professor Lucia Re, for the unrelenting support and patience, for the rigorous coursework to shape me as a scholar, and for motivating me to do more than I thought possible. Professors Thomas Harrison and Claudio Fogu, for the much-needed encouragement and challenging critiques and for your genuine concern for my well-being. Professor Dominic Thomas, for putting me to task and inspiring me to be better. Professor Alessandra Di Maio, for reminding me what my purpose is, for freely sharing advice, and for the courses you taught at UCLA. My UCLA Department of Italian colleagues, especially Melina Madrigal and Carmen Gomez, for taking an interest in my work and for showing me true camaraderie. vi VITA 2003-2004 Academic Year Abroad, Bologna, Italy 2005 B.A., Italian Studies University of California, Santa Cruz Santa Cruz, California 2008 M.A., Italian University of California, Los Angeles Los Angeles, California 2007-2011 Teaching Assistant/Teaching Assisant Consultant/ Technology Teaching Assistant Consultant/ Research Assistant Department of Italian University of California, Los Angeles 2012 Lecturer Romance, German, Russian Languages and Literatures California State University, Long Beach Lecturer International Studies and Languages Pepperdine University Malibu, California PUBLICATIONS AND PRESENTATIONS Lavagnino, Claire. “Mapping City and Home in Igiaba Scego’s La mia casa è dove sono.” California Interdisciplinary Consortium for Italian Studies (CICIS) Conference, Claremont College. 11 February 2012. ——. “Foodways of Desire: Food, Gender, and Diaspora in Igiaba Scego.” Across the Borders of Desire: Italy as Land of Destination and Departure, Princeton University. 31 March-1 April 2011. ——. “Literary Blackness in F.T. Marinetti’s Mafarka il futurista and Il tamburo di fuoco.” American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA), New Orleans. 1- 4 April 2010. ——. “Rap di punti intrecciati: Migrant Youth in Ubax Cristina Ali Farah’s ‘Rapdipunt.’ ” La Fusta Vol. 26 (Fall 2008): 1-11. ——. “What about the Half That's Never Been Told? Italian Violence from Ethiopian vii Perspectives.” California Interdisciplinary Consortium for Italian Studies (CICIS), UC Santa Cruz. 1 March 2008. ——. “Rap di punti intrecciati: Migrant Youth in Ubax Cristina Ali Farah’s ‘Rapdipunt.’” (P)Ages of Youth Conference, Rutgers University. 19 October 2007. ——. “Gabriella Ghermandi: Author and Performer with a Native Soul.” The African Tribune. May 2007. ——. Rev. of Neotarantismo: pizzica, transe e riti dalle campagne alle metropolis by Anna Nacci. Annali d'Italianistica Vol. 24 (2006): 430. ——. “Dialect and Language in Italian Hip Hop.” First Annual Ethnomusicology Undergraduate Student Organization Conference, UCLA. 20 May 2006. viii Introduction The topic of Italian colonialism still remains somewhat of a rarity in Italy—let alone outside of the boot—despite historians’ greater accessibility to colonial archives, increased immigration to Italy from or via former colonies (for example, Libya), the international media’s attention to civil war, piracy, and famine in East Africa, scholars’ relentless work in the field of Italian postcolonial studies, and, not least of all, the migration and postcolonial narratives in Italian that have grown exponentially since the early 1990s. From its very inception as a nation, Italy made colonial pursuits: first in Eritrea in 1890, followed by Somalia (1908), Libya (1912), Dodecanese Islands (1923), Ethiopia (1936), and Albania (1939). My first encounter with the subject of Italian colonialism happened as an undergraduate student in an intermediate Italian language class at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Giulia Centineo had the class read an article about contemporary migration to Sicily and deemed it important to give some background on how it connected with Italy’s colonial past. Besides a vague understanding of Mussolini’s occupation of Ethiopia, I attributed my ignorance of Italian colonialism to the fact that I did not grow up in the Italian education system. So, when I went to Bologna, Italy, to study abroad for a year (2003-2004), I thought for sure I would be able to discuss the matter more in-depth with the Italians I would meet. To my surprise, many of my Italian peers knew less than I did. Occasionally we even got into arguments about Mussolini’s “harmless” acts. The dismissive nature of many of the people with whom I approached the topic only increased my drive to learn more. It was through the study of Italian colonial and postcolonial literature at UCLA that I was able to delve into the matter more deeply. Professor Lucia Re’s courses on Italian colonialism, futurism, fascism and the notion of il confine/confino [border/control] in 1930s Italian literature, as well as courses on Italian postcolonial and 1 migration literature taught by visiting Mellon Fellow Alessandra Di Maio, made it clear that Italy’s colonial history has shaped a large part of Italian national identity. This dissertation is a result not only of intense curiosity—it humbly seeks to contribute to a significant effort to scrutinize Italy’s past and present racism in the hope to transform it. Literature certainly holds an important place in this scrutiny. Even the labels applied to the literature and authors that deal with such history are not without their prejudices. In a way, they are reminiscent of the distancing techniques employed in some of the first conversations I would have with Italians about their country’s colonial history. Migration literature, migrant literature, second-generation literature, scrittore migrante [a writer who migrates], and migrante scrittore [a migrant who writes] have taken on different connotations according to the point of view of the literary critic. The question of whether authors who write in Italian yet were not born in Italy or who were born in Italy to parents not ethnically Italian are actually authors of Italian literature still hangs in the air. Juggled around in the mix are the notions of postcolonial literature in Italian and Italian postcolonial