RACE TALK RACISM, RESISTANCE AND SOCIAL CHANGE FORTHCOMING BOOKS IN THIS SERIES Fire and blood: Violent racism and armed resistance in the early twentieth-century United States: Margarita Aragon The Red and the Black: The Russian Revolution and the Black Atlantic: David Featherstone and Christian Høgsbjerg (eds) Revolutionary lives of the Red and Black Atlantic: David Featherstone, Christian Høgsbjerg and Alan Rice (eds) Black resistance to British policing: Adam Elliott- Cooper Global white nationalism: From apartheid to Trump: Daniel Geary, Camilla Schofield and Jennifer Sutton (eds) Citizenship and belonging: Ben Gidley PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED IN THIS SERIES In the shadow of Enoch Powell: Shirin Hirsch Black middle- class Britannia: Identities, repertoires, cultural consumption: Ali Meghji Race and riots in Thatcher’s Britain: Simon Peplow Race talk Languages of racism and resistance in Neapolitan street markets Antonia Lucia Dawes Manchester University Press Copyright © Antonia Lucia Dawes 2020 The right of Antonia Lucia Dawes to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. An electronic version of this book is also available under a Creative Commons (CC- BY- NC- ND) licence, which permits non- commercial use, distribution and reproduction provided the author and Manchester University Press are fully cited and no modifications or adaptations are made. Details of the licence can be viewed at https:// creativecommons.org/ licenses/ by- nc- nd/ 4.0/ . Published by Manchester University Press Altrincham Street, Manchester M1 7JA www.manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk British Library Cataloguing- in- Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978 1 5261 3847 7 hardback ISBN 978 1 5261 3848 4 open access First published 2020 The publisher has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for any external or third- party internet websites referred to in this book, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Cover image: © Pap Loume Typeset by Newgen Publishing UK Contents List of figures vi Series editors’ foreword vii List of research participants viii Acknowledgements x Note on the text xii Introduction 1 1 Mapping culture and communication 11 2 Talk and the transcultural 38 3 Talking about talk to talk about difference 61 4 Banter, catcalls and racial intimacy 88 5 Multilingual market cries 107 6 Infrapolitical verbal styles 130 7 Speaking back to power 159 8 Rebuilding the Tower 186 References 191 Index 204 v Figures Unless otherwise stated, photos were taken by the author. 1 Via Bologna market (photo by Serigne) 26 2 Elage’s stall 27 3 Gennaro’s stall 29 4 Alfonso’s stall 30 5 Ibra’s stall 31 6 Modou’s stall 32 7 Ku’s stall 33 8 Poggioreale market 34 9 Eddy Pell 35 10 Peppe’s Bags 35 11 Ibra, Giovanni and colleague in front of Giovanni’s shop 75 12 Haggling at Peppe’s Bags 123 13 Kicked out on the street: ‘They’ve set up a market!’ 138 14 Unable to work 146 15 Scanning the road 149 16 The elderly street vendor (photo by Gennaro) 154 17 The ‘interethnic’ market (photo by Gennaro) 155 18 Rubbish and protests (photos by Gennaro) 165 19 Attempted suicide at the CGIL trade union centre (photo by Serigne, 23 May 2012) 166 20 The worker, hung out to dry (25 May 2012) 168 21 The multilingual counterpoetic response (28 March 2012) 180 22 The street vendors gathered in front of City Hall (29 March 2012) 181 23 Elijah takes the mic (29 March 2012) 182 vi Series editors’ foreword John Solomos, Satnam Virdee, Aaron Winter HE STUDY OF race, racism and ethnicity has expanded greatly since the Tend of the twentieth century. This expansion has coincided with a growing awareness of the continuing role that these issues play in contemporary societies all over the globe. Racism, Resistance and Social Change is a new series of books that seeks to make a substantial contribution to this flourishing field of scholar- ship and research. We are committed to providing a forum for the publication of the highest quality scholarship on race, racism, anti-racism and ethnic relations. As editors of this series we would like to publish both theoretically driven books and texts with an empirical frame that seek to further develop our understanding of the origins, development and contemporary forms of racisms, racial inequal- ities and racial and ethnic relations. We welcome work from a range of theoretical and political perspectives, and as the series develops we ideally want to encourage a conversation that goes beyond specific national or geopolitical environments. While we are aware that there are important differences between national and regional research traditions, we hope that scholars from a variety of disciplines and multidisciplinary frames will take the opportunity to include their research work in the series. As the title of the series highlights, we also welcome texts that can address issues about resistance and anti-racism as well as the role of political and policy interventions in this rapidly evolving discipline. The changing forms of racist mobilisation and expression that have come to the fore in recent years have high- lighted the need for more reflection and research on the role of political and civil society mobilisations in this field. We are committed to building on theoretical advances by providing an arena for new and challenging theoretical and empirical studies on the changing morph- ology of race and racism in contemporary societies. vii Research participants HIS IS NOT an exhaustive list of all the people who appear in the book. It Tintroduces the key biographical details of the main research participants I worked with in Napoli. Their lives and experiences are told in richer detail throughout the chapters. With the exception of Omar, Ciro and Titty, all names used are pseudonyms. Via Bologna market Gennaro: a middle-aged Neapolitan man who sold socks and underwear from his stall on Via Bologna. He had run a stall in the Piazza Garibaldi area since the early 1990s, and prior to that he owned a shop. He was politically active in local movements for the unemployed. Alfonso: He had a knick- knack stall next to Gennaro’s stall. He was also an activist. Comfort: She was a middle-aged Nigerian woman who had been running a market stall in the Piazza Garibaldi area since the 1990s and had known Gennaro for a long time. Her stall used to sell wax cloth but, when I met her, she mostly sold Chinese- manufactured clothing. She was also an activist. Elage: A middle-aged Senegalese man. His stall sold Kola Nuts, tea and toiletries for an African clientele. Moussa: A young Malian man who was friends with Gennaro. He shared Gennaro’s storage depot with him. Riccardo: A middle- aged Neapolitan man who owned a souvenir shop on Via Bologna. Serigne: A middle-aged Senegalese man who ran a stall at the market and was its informal market manager. He used to work for Riccardo and had maintained a strong friendship with him. viii List of research participants Sohna: She was Serigne’s wife. She ran a mobile food stall that sold sandwiches to stall holders and market customers. The stall was based outside Riccardo’s shop. Omar: A Senegalese cultural mediator and activist who introduced me to the vendors at Via Bologna and on irregular pitches across the city. Ibra: A Senegalese man in his early thirties who sold Italian designer hats from a cloth on the pavement on one of the main roads in the city centre. Giovanni: He owned the grocery shop behind Ibra’s stall. The two men were good friends. Salvatore: A Neapolitan man in his thirties. He worked as a doorman for the apartment block next to Ibra’s stall. Modou: A Senegalese man in his early thirties. His stall sold contraband designer handbags and wallets. He also shipped packages abroad to Northern Italy and France. Carlo: A Neapolitan man in his early sixties. He lived in the area and had been friends with Modou since he first put his pitch on the street. Ku: A Chinese man in his late twenties. He ran an electronics stall on one of the major roads in the city centre. He was married and had two children. His family (including wife and mother- and father- in- law) ran a shop in Pompei, also selling electronic goods. Poggioreale market Eddy Pell stall Ciro and Titti: They were a married Neapolitan couple that ran a business called Eddy Pell, selling Italian designer branded bags and purses. They had a market stall at Poggioreale, and a shop in the Piazza Mercato neighbourhood of Napoli. Peppe’s Bags stall Alessandro: A Neapolitan man in his thirties who owned this stall with his dad, Peppe. They stall sold Italian designer bags as well as Chinese imports. Peppe: He was Alessandro’s dad. The stall was part of a family business, with a shop in the city centre. ix Acknowledgements HE BOOK OWES a huge debt of gratitude to the wisdom, inspiration, feedback Tand mentorship provided by Paul Gilroy, Suki Ali and Vron Ware. The book’s steadfast focus and determined attempt to bring what is imminent to the surface is down to you. I am also deeply grateful to the scholars based in Italy who supported me in numerous ways with understanding Napoli, organising the project, going into the field and then writing it up: Iain Chambers, Lidia Curti, Gianluca Gatta, Fabio Amato, Nick Dines, Enrica Rigo, Gabriele Proglio, Silvana Carotenuto and Miguel Mellino.