Helena Sanson
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780197264836
- eISBN:
- 9780191754043
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197264836.003.0008
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Historical Linguistics
This chapter presents some concluding thoughts from the author. The end of the nineteenth century was a further landmark in women's long battle for the literary, and now also national, language and ...
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This chapter presents some concluding thoughts from the author. The end of the nineteenth century was a further landmark in women's long battle for the literary, and now also national, language and its grammar. The journey started with Nicostrata holding a hornbook and a key to access a symbolic tower (that of learning) from which she herself was excluded. It continued in the Cinquecento with the female addressees of some of the first vernacular grammars and with the refined portraits of women readers, such as Lucrezia Panciatichi and Maria del Berrettaio. In the Settecento they were followed by Pietro Longhi's ‘dame’, so eager to learn and instruct themselves, and with a preference for anything fashionable and French. But alongside these figures, fixed forever in time by the artist's paint and brush or the writer's pen, there were those women for whom, over the centuries and across the peninsula, acquiring even just a smattering of literacy was a small victory.Less
This chapter presents some concluding thoughts from the author. The end of the nineteenth century was a further landmark in women's long battle for the literary, and now also national, language and its grammar. The journey started with Nicostrata holding a hornbook and a key to access a symbolic tower (that of learning) from which she herself was excluded. It continued in the Cinquecento with the female addressees of some of the first vernacular grammars and with the refined portraits of women readers, such as Lucrezia Panciatichi and Maria del Berrettaio. In the Settecento they were followed by Pietro Longhi's ‘dame’, so eager to learn and instruct themselves, and with a preference for anything fashionable and French. But alongside these figures, fixed forever in time by the artist's paint and brush or the writer's pen, there were those women for whom, over the centuries and across the peninsula, acquiring even just a smattering of literacy was a small victory.
Alessandra Giorgi
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199571895
- eISBN:
- 9780191722073
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199571895.001.0001
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Semantics and Pragmatics, Syntax and Morphology
This book considers the syntax of the left periphery of clauses in relation to the extra‐sentential context. The prevailing point of view, in the literature in this field is that the external context ...
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This book considers the syntax of the left periphery of clauses in relation to the extra‐sentential context. The prevailing point of view, in the literature in this field is that the external context does not intervene at all in the syntax of the sentence, and that the interaction between sentence and context takes place post‐syntactically. This monograph challenges this view and proposes that reference to indexicality is syntactically encoded in the left‐most position of the clause, where the speaker's temporal and spatial location is represented. To support this hypothesis, it analyses various kinds of temporal dependencies in embedded clauses, such as indicative versus subjunctive, and proposes a new analysis of the imperfect and the future‐in‐the‐past. The book also compares languages such as Italian and English with languages which have different properties of temporal interpretation, such as Chinese. Finally, analysis of the literary style known as Free Indirect Discourse also supports the hypothesis, showing that it may have a wide range of consequences.Less
This book considers the syntax of the left periphery of clauses in relation to the extra‐sentential context. The prevailing point of view, in the literature in this field is that the external context does not intervene at all in the syntax of the sentence, and that the interaction between sentence and context takes place post‐syntactically. This monograph challenges this view and proposes that reference to indexicality is syntactically encoded in the left‐most position of the clause, where the speaker's temporal and spatial location is represented. To support this hypothesis, it analyses various kinds of temporal dependencies in embedded clauses, such as indicative versus subjunctive, and proposes a new analysis of the imperfect and the future‐in‐the‐past. The book also compares languages such as Italian and English with languages which have different properties of temporal interpretation, such as Chinese. Finally, analysis of the literary style known as Free Indirect Discourse also supports the hypothesis, showing that it may have a wide range of consequences.
Ilaria Serra
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- March 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780823226788
- eISBN:
- 9780823235032
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fso/9780823226788.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Cultural History
The writer Giuseppe Prezzolini said that Italian immigrants left behind tears and sweat but not “words”, making their lives in America mostly in silence, their memories private and ...
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The writer Giuseppe Prezzolini said that Italian immigrants left behind tears and sweat but not “words”, making their lives in America mostly in silence, their memories private and stories untold. In this innovative portrait of the Italian–American experience, these lives are no longer hidden. The book offers the first comprehensive study of a largely ignored legacy—the autobiographies written by immigrants. It looks closely at fifty-eight representative works written during the high tide of Italian migration. Scouring archives, discovering diaries and memoirs in private houses and forgotten drawers, the book recovers the voices of the first generation—bootblacks and poets, film directors and farmers, miners, anarchists, and seamstresses—compelled to tell their stories. Mostly unpublished, often heavily accented, these tales of ordinary men and women are explored in nuanced detail, organized to reflect how they illuminate the realities of work, survival, identity, and change. Moving between history and literature, the book presents each as the imaginative record of a self in the making and the collective story of the journey to selfhood that is the heart of the immigrant experience.Less
The writer Giuseppe Prezzolini said that Italian immigrants left behind tears and sweat but not “words”, making their lives in America mostly in silence, their memories private and stories untold. In this innovative portrait of the Italian–American experience, these lives are no longer hidden. The book offers the first comprehensive study of a largely ignored legacy—the autobiographies written by immigrants. It looks closely at fifty-eight representative works written during the high tide of Italian migration. Scouring archives, discovering diaries and memoirs in private houses and forgotten drawers, the book recovers the voices of the first generation—bootblacks and poets, film directors and farmers, miners, anarchists, and seamstresses—compelled to tell their stories. Mostly unpublished, often heavily accented, these tales of ordinary men and women are explored in nuanced detail, organized to reflect how they illuminate the realities of work, survival, identity, and change. Moving between history and literature, the book presents each as the imaginative record of a self in the making and the collective story of the journey to selfhood that is the heart of the immigrant experience.
Delia Baldassarri
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199828241
- eISBN:
- 9780199979783
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199828241.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Politics, Social Movements and Social Change
Voting distills a complex decision into a deceptively simple action. The electorate faces a messy tangle of parties, leaders, and issues. How is it possible for voters to unravel it all? How do they ...
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Voting distills a complex decision into a deceptively simple action. The electorate faces a messy tangle of parties, leaders, and issues. How is it possible for voters to unravel it all? How do they perceive the political landscape? How, in short, do voters choose? Not only is voting a complex choice, but voters themselves also vary widely in their degree of interest, and involvement in politics. This book provides a new understanding of how voting works by focusing on how choices are made given the cognitive limitations of the human mind and the environment in which decision making takes place. Drawing on recent advances in the study of cognitive psychology, decision making, and political cognition, this book provides a careful empirical examination of the strategies voters actually use to manage the complexity of political choice. Expressly rejecting the prevailing one-size-fits-all, “what a rational voter should do” approach, it distinguishes voters based on the cognitive shortcuts, or heuristics, they use to simplify the decision-making process. Drawing on survey data from the 1990s Italian national general elections, the book identifies four types of voters, classified by how they perceive and organize the political debate—from those who capably rely on nuanced ideological categories to those who, skeptical about all-things-political, prove easy prey for television broadcasters. The typology allows us to grasp the actual differences in political sophistication among citizens and to understand which factors are most important to different types of voters. The book helps us make sense of the various ways in which citizens themselves make sense of—and make “simple”—the complex world of politics.Less
Voting distills a complex decision into a deceptively simple action. The electorate faces a messy tangle of parties, leaders, and issues. How is it possible for voters to unravel it all? How do they perceive the political landscape? How, in short, do voters choose? Not only is voting a complex choice, but voters themselves also vary widely in their degree of interest, and involvement in politics. This book provides a new understanding of how voting works by focusing on how choices are made given the cognitive limitations of the human mind and the environment in which decision making takes place. Drawing on recent advances in the study of cognitive psychology, decision making, and political cognition, this book provides a careful empirical examination of the strategies voters actually use to manage the complexity of political choice. Expressly rejecting the prevailing one-size-fits-all, “what a rational voter should do” approach, it distinguishes voters based on the cognitive shortcuts, or heuristics, they use to simplify the decision-making process. Drawing on survey data from the 1990s Italian national general elections, the book identifies four types of voters, classified by how they perceive and organize the political debate—from those who capably rely on nuanced ideological categories to those who, skeptical about all-things-political, prove easy prey for television broadcasters. The typology allows us to grasp the actual differences in political sophistication among citizens and to understand which factors are most important to different types of voters. The book helps us make sense of the various ways in which citizens themselves make sense of—and make “simple”—the complex world of politics.
Federico Varese
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691128559
- eISBN:
- 9781400836727
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691128559.001.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
Organized crime is spreading like a global virus as mobs take advantage of open borders to establish local franchises at will. That at least is the fear, inspired by stories of Russian mobsters in ...
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Organized crime is spreading like a global virus as mobs take advantage of open borders to establish local franchises at will. That at least is the fear, inspired by stories of Russian mobsters in New York, Chinese triads in London, and Italian mafias throughout the West. As this book explains, the truth is more complicated. The author has spent years researching mafia groups in Italy, Russia, the United States, and China, and argues that mafiosi often find themselves abroad against their will, rather than through a strategic plan to colonize new territories. Once there, they do not always succeed in establishing themselves. The book spells out the conditions that lead to their long-term success, namely sudden market expansion that is neither exploited by local rivals nor blocked by authorities. Ultimately the inability of the state to govern economic transformations gives mafias their opportunity. In a series of matched comparisons, the book charts the attempts of the Calabrese 'Ndrangheta to move to the north of Italy, and shows how the Sicilian mafia expanded to early twentieth-century New York, but failed around the same time to find a niche in Argentina. The book explains why the Russian mafia failed to penetrate Rome but succeeded in Hungary. A pioneering chapter on China examines the challenges that triads from Taiwan and Hong Kong find in branching out to the mainland. This book is both a compelling read and a sober assessment of the risks posed by globalization and immigration for the spread of mafias.Less
Organized crime is spreading like a global virus as mobs take advantage of open borders to establish local franchises at will. That at least is the fear, inspired by stories of Russian mobsters in New York, Chinese triads in London, and Italian mafias throughout the West. As this book explains, the truth is more complicated. The author has spent years researching mafia groups in Italy, Russia, the United States, and China, and argues that mafiosi often find themselves abroad against their will, rather than through a strategic plan to colonize new territories. Once there, they do not always succeed in establishing themselves. The book spells out the conditions that lead to their long-term success, namely sudden market expansion that is neither exploited by local rivals nor blocked by authorities. Ultimately the inability of the state to govern economic transformations gives mafias their opportunity. In a series of matched comparisons, the book charts the attempts of the Calabrese 'Ndrangheta to move to the north of Italy, and shows how the Sicilian mafia expanded to early twentieth-century New York, but failed around the same time to find a niche in Argentina. The book explains why the Russian mafia failed to penetrate Rome but succeeded in Hungary. A pioneering chapter on China examines the challenges that triads from Taiwan and Hong Kong find in branching out to the mainland. This book is both a compelling read and a sober assessment of the risks posed by globalization and immigration for the spread of mafias.
Gianluca Raccagni
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197264713
- eISBN:
- 9780191734847
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197264713.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, European Medieval History
The Lombard League was an association created by the city republics of northern Italy in the 12th century in order to defend their autonomy and that of the papacy in a struggle against the German ...
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The Lombard League was an association created by the city republics of northern Italy in the 12th century in order to defend their autonomy and that of the papacy in a struggle against the German Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa. The League has enjoyed an iconic status, and in the nineteenth century was glorified as a precursor of the Italian struggle for independence in political and historical pamphlets as well as in paintings, novels, and even operas. The League played a crucial role in the evolution of Italy’s political landscape, but it did more than ensure its continued fragmentation. Historiography, in fact, has overlooked the collegial cooperation among the medieval Italian polities and this volume examines the League’s structure, activity, place in political thought, and links with regional identities. Using documentary evidence, histories, letters, inscriptions, and contemporary troubadour poems as well as rhetorical and juridical treatises, the book argues that the League was not just a momentary anti-imperial military alliance, but a body that also provided collective approaches to regional problems, ranging from the peaceful resolution of disputes to the management of regional lines of communication, usurping, in some cases, imperial prerogatives. Yet the League never rejected imperial overlordship per se, and this book explains how it survived after the end of the conflict against Frederick I, one of its most lasting legacies being the settlement that it reached with the empire, the Peace of Constance, which became the Magna Carta of the northern Italian polities.Less
The Lombard League was an association created by the city republics of northern Italy in the 12th century in order to defend their autonomy and that of the papacy in a struggle against the German Holy Roman Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa. The League has enjoyed an iconic status, and in the nineteenth century was glorified as a precursor of the Italian struggle for independence in political and historical pamphlets as well as in paintings, novels, and even operas. The League played a crucial role in the evolution of Italy’s political landscape, but it did more than ensure its continued fragmentation. Historiography, in fact, has overlooked the collegial cooperation among the medieval Italian polities and this volume examines the League’s structure, activity, place in political thought, and links with regional identities. Using documentary evidence, histories, letters, inscriptions, and contemporary troubadour poems as well as rhetorical and juridical treatises, the book argues that the League was not just a momentary anti-imperial military alliance, but a body that also provided collective approaches to regional problems, ranging from the peaceful resolution of disputes to the management of regional lines of communication, usurping, in some cases, imperial prerogatives. Yet the League never rejected imperial overlordship per se, and this book explains how it survived after the end of the conflict against Frederick I, one of its most lasting legacies being the settlement that it reached with the empire, the Peace of Constance, which became the Magna Carta of the northern Italian polities.
Hasia R. Diner
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195134681
- eISBN:
- 9780199848652
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195134681.003.0022
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion
A review of the book, Memories of Migration: Gender, Ethnicity, and Work in the Lives of Jewish and Italian Women in New York, 1870–1924 by Kathie Friedman-Kasaba is presented. Friedman-Kasaba's work ...
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A review of the book, Memories of Migration: Gender, Ethnicity, and Work in the Lives of Jewish and Italian Women in New York, 1870–1924 by Kathie Friedman-Kasaba is presented. Friedman-Kasaba's work turns out to be flat, derivative, and decontextualized. She presents, for example, a good deal of material pertaining to migrations, migration theory, and the formation of class and ethnicity, but does not draw clear connections to her main focus of analysis. Additionally, she does not cite a single work in Yiddish or Italian, indicating that she had no access to the words of the principal subjects of her books. She bases much of her observation on the words of others — often outside observers — and she draws too heavily on the findings of other historians.Less
A review of the book, Memories of Migration: Gender, Ethnicity, and Work in the Lives of Jewish and Italian Women in New York, 1870–1924 by Kathie Friedman-Kasaba is presented. Friedman-Kasaba's work turns out to be flat, derivative, and decontextualized. She presents, for example, a good deal of material pertaining to migrations, migration theory, and the formation of class and ethnicity, but does not draw clear connections to her main focus of analysis. Additionally, she does not cite a single work in Yiddish or Italian, indicating that she had no access to the words of the principal subjects of her books. She bases much of her observation on the words of others — often outside observers — and she draws too heavily on the findings of other historians.
Martin L. McLaughlin
- Published in print:
- 1996
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198158998
- eISBN:
- 9780191673443
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198158998.003.0013
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, 16th-century and Renaissance Literature
This book clearly shows that imitatio is the dominant critical concept in Italian writers from Petrarch to Bembo, and the outcrop of polemics on the subject at the end of the fifteenth century ...
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This book clearly shows that imitatio is the dominant critical concept in Italian writers from Petrarch to Bembo, and the outcrop of polemics on the subject at the end of the fifteenth century confirms the pre-eminent status of literary imitation on the critical agenda of the time. Once Petrarch discovers that imitatio is an integral part of the creative process, his emphasis on both the suitability and the pitfalls of literary imitation ensures that the topic remains in the forefront of literary debates in the next century and a half. The question of imitation thus embraces the major figures in the development of Italian literary history in this period, from Petrarch via Alberti and Poliziano to Bembo. The imitation debate has a theoretical and practical coherence in the period under review, moving from Dante's embryonic notions of imitatio to the complexity and consistency of Bembo's position two centuries later.Less
This book clearly shows that imitatio is the dominant critical concept in Italian writers from Petrarch to Bembo, and the outcrop of polemics on the subject at the end of the fifteenth century confirms the pre-eminent status of literary imitation on the critical agenda of the time. Once Petrarch discovers that imitatio is an integral part of the creative process, his emphasis on both the suitability and the pitfalls of literary imitation ensures that the topic remains in the forefront of literary debates in the next century and a half. The question of imitation thus embraces the major figures in the development of Italian literary history in this period, from Petrarch via Alberti and Poliziano to Bembo. The imitation debate has a theoretical and practical coherence in the period under review, moving from Dante's embryonic notions of imitatio to the complexity and consistency of Bembo's position two centuries later.
Giacinto della Cananea
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2004
- ISBN:
- 9780199248056
- eISBN:
- 9780191601545
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199248052.003.0005
- Subject:
- Political Science, European Union
The Italian permanent representation at Brussels has received very little academic or political attention, and there has been no explicit debate as to how this body should be shaped. Even when the ...
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The Italian permanent representation at Brussels has received very little academic or political attention, and there has been no explicit debate as to how this body should be shaped. Even when the central government decided that it should control all aspects of the formulation of EC policies though delegating to regions their implementation in a number of cases, the permanent representation was not even mentioned in the legislation. It is argued that this neglect is problematic for several reasons, which are discussed. An explanation is advanced for this neglect in terms of the high politics of Italian membership of the European Community. The chapter is organized in five sections: first, a brief examination is made of the broader problem determined by the lack of a central authority to co-ordinate of EU policies in Italy; second and third, the functions and powers of the permanent representation, and its organization and internal functioning are considered; fourth, the division of labour between the central authorities (the Italian government) and the permanent representation is examined; finally, other policy networks that influence Italian European policies are discussed.Less
The Italian permanent representation at Brussels has received very little academic or political attention, and there has been no explicit debate as to how this body should be shaped. Even when the central government decided that it should control all aspects of the formulation of EC policies though delegating to regions their implementation in a number of cases, the permanent representation was not even mentioned in the legislation. It is argued that this neglect is problematic for several reasons, which are discussed. An explanation is advanced for this neglect in terms of the high politics of Italian membership of the European Community. The chapter is organized in five sections: first, a brief examination is made of the broader problem determined by the lack of a central authority to co-ordinate of EU policies in Italy; second and third, the functions and powers of the permanent representation, and its organization and internal functioning are considered; fourth, the division of labour between the central authorities (the Italian government) and the permanent representation is examined; finally, other policy networks that influence Italian European policies are discussed.
Federico Varese
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691128559
- eISBN:
- 9781400836727
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691128559.003.0005
- Subject:
- Law, Criminal Law and Criminology
From the mid-nineteenth century, many Sicilians, including members of the mafia, were on the move. After sketching the contours of the mafia in Sicily in the nineteenth century, this chapter outlines ...
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From the mid-nineteenth century, many Sicilians, including members of the mafia, were on the move. After sketching the contours of the mafia in Sicily in the nineteenth century, this chapter outlines the parallel history of Italian migration and mafia activities in New York City and Rosario, Argentina, and offers an analytic account of the diverging outcomes. Only in the North American city did a mafia that resembled the Sicilian one emerge. The Prohibition provided an enormous boost to both the personnel and power of Italian organized crime. The risk of punishment was low, the gains to be made were enormous, and there was no social stigma attached to this trade.Less
From the mid-nineteenth century, many Sicilians, including members of the mafia, were on the move. After sketching the contours of the mafia in Sicily in the nineteenth century, this chapter outlines the parallel history of Italian migration and mafia activities in New York City and Rosario, Argentina, and offers an analytic account of the diverging outcomes. Only in the North American city did a mafia that resembled the Sicilian one emerge. The Prohibition provided an enormous boost to both the personnel and power of Italian organized crime. The risk of punishment was low, the gains to be made were enormous, and there was no social stigma attached to this trade.
Maurizio Ferrara
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- February 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780199284665
- eISBN:
- 9780191603273
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199284660.003.0006
- Subject:
- Political Science, Political Economy
The chapter discusses the increasing role of sub-national territories as new, distinctive and relatively autonomous “bounded spaces” in certain areas of social protection, notably health care, active ...
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The chapter discusses the increasing role of sub-national territories as new, distinctive and relatively autonomous “bounded spaces” in certain areas of social protection, notably health care, active labour market policies, social services and assistance. This new development is illustrated by reference not only to within-state trends of social protection regionalization, but also to novel forms of transnational regional groupings. The Italian case is presented in detail as an emblematic example of the shift from welfare state to welfare regions.Less
The chapter discusses the increasing role of sub-national territories as new, distinctive and relatively autonomous “bounded spaces” in certain areas of social protection, notably health care, active labour market policies, social services and assistance. This new development is illustrated by reference not only to within-state trends of social protection regionalization, but also to novel forms of transnational regional groupings. The Italian case is presented in detail as an emblematic example of the shift from welfare state to welfare regions.
Maurizio Pisati and Antonio Schizzerotto
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- November 2004
- ISBN:
- 9780199258451
- eISBN:
- 9780191601491
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0199258457.003.0006
- Subject:
- Political Science, European Union
Analyses changes in the Italian social mobility regime over the period 1985 to 1997. First, it is shown that both men’s and women’s absolute rates of mobility have remained substantially stable ...
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Analyses changes in the Italian social mobility regime over the period 1985 to 1997. First, it is shown that both men’s and women’s absolute rates of mobility have remained substantially stable during the period under analysis. Some changes did occur in relative mobility changes: on the one hand, the strength of the barriers separating the urban manual and non-manual classes has increased somewhat; on the other hand, the degree of viscosity of agricultural classes has considerably decreased. Overall, these two changes have brought about a slight increase in the degree of fluidity of the Italian society.Less
Analyses changes in the Italian social mobility regime over the period 1985 to 1997. First, it is shown that both men’s and women’s absolute rates of mobility have remained substantially stable during the period under analysis. Some changes did occur in relative mobility changes: on the one hand, the strength of the barriers separating the urban manual and non-manual classes has increased somewhat; on the other hand, the degree of viscosity of agricultural classes has considerably decreased. Overall, these two changes have brought about a slight increase in the degree of fluidity of the Italian society.
Federico Varese
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198297369
- eISBN:
- 9780191600272
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019829736X.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Russian Politics
This book researches the question of what the Russian Mafia is, and challenges widely held views of its nature. It charts the emergence of the Russian Mafia in the context of the transition to the ...
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This book researches the question of what the Russian Mafia is, and challenges widely held views of its nature. It charts the emergence of the Russian Mafia in the context of the transition to the market, the privatization of protection, and pervasive corruption. The ability of the Russian State to define property rights and protect contracts is compared with the services offered by fragments of the state apparatus, private security firms, ethnic crime groups, the Cossacks and the Russian Mafia. Past criminal traditions, rituals, and norms have been resuscitated by the modern Russian Mafia to forge a powerful new identity and compete in a crowded market for protection. The book draws on and reports from undercover police operations, in-depth interviews conducted over several years with the victims of the Mafia, criminals, and officials, and documents from the Gulag archives. It also provides a comparative study, making references to other mafia in other countries (the Japanese Yakuza, the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, American–Italian Mafia and the Hong Kong Triads). The book has an introduction and conclusion and between these is arranged in three parts: I. The Transition to the Market and Protection in Russia (three chapters); II. Private protection in Perm (two chapters investigating the emergence and operation of the mafia in the city of Perm); and III. The Russian Mafia (three chapters).Less
This book researches the question of what the Russian Mafia is, and challenges widely held views of its nature. It charts the emergence of the Russian Mafia in the context of the transition to the market, the privatization of protection, and pervasive corruption. The ability of the Russian State to define property rights and protect contracts is compared with the services offered by fragments of the state apparatus, private security firms, ethnic crime groups, the Cossacks and the Russian Mafia. Past criminal traditions, rituals, and norms have been resuscitated by the modern Russian Mafia to forge a powerful new identity and compete in a crowded market for protection. The book draws on and reports from undercover police operations, in-depth interviews conducted over several years with the victims of the Mafia, criminals, and officials, and documents from the Gulag archives. It also provides a comparative study, making references to other mafia in other countries (the Japanese Yakuza, the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, American–Italian Mafia and the Hong Kong Triads). The book has an introduction and conclusion and between these is arranged in three parts: I. The Transition to the Market and Protection in Russia (three chapters); II. Private protection in Perm (two chapters investigating the emergence and operation of the mafia in the city of Perm); and III. The Russian Mafia (three chapters).
Ilaria Serra
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- March 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780823226788
- eISBN:
- 9780823235032
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fso/9780823226788.003.0008
- Subject:
- History, Cultural History
This book is proof of the reversal of Giuseppe Prezzolini's 1963 conclusions about Italian immigrant autobiography and his claim that the immigrants did not want to remember ...
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This book is proof of the reversal of Giuseppe Prezzolini's 1963 conclusions about Italian immigrant autobiography and his claim that the immigrants did not want to remember their past and that they left no written word. This book is full of evidence of how ardently these people wanted their memories preserved. Italian American autobiographical material has existed all along, but its study was hampered by the fact that it did not match the heroic claims of greatness that fit with the mid-twentieth-century view of what was worthy material for an autobiography. This group of some sixty Italian Americans who tell their stories here experienced universal struggles shared by everyone, and suffered immigration traumas comparable to those that many ethnic immigrant groups have faced. In this way one can see many universal truths in these examples. These stories of Italian American lives offer local color and cultural detail that isn't provided by immigration statistics, something even more vivid and illustrative than photographs of immigrants.Less
This book is proof of the reversal of Giuseppe Prezzolini's 1963 conclusions about Italian immigrant autobiography and his claim that the immigrants did not want to remember their past and that they left no written word. This book is full of evidence of how ardently these people wanted their memories preserved. Italian American autobiographical material has existed all along, but its study was hampered by the fact that it did not match the heroic claims of greatness that fit with the mid-twentieth-century view of what was worthy material for an autobiography. This group of some sixty Italian Americans who tell their stories here experienced universal struggles shared by everyone, and suffered immigration traumas comparable to those that many ethnic immigrant groups have faced. In this way one can see many universal truths in these examples. These stories of Italian American lives offer local color and cultural detail that isn't provided by immigration statistics, something even more vivid and illustrative than photographs of immigrants.
Carol Bonomo Albright and Joanna Clapps Herman (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780823229109
- eISBN:
- 9780823241057
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fso/9780823229109.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, American, 20th Century Literature
For more than thirty years, the journal Italian Americana has been home to the writers who have sparked an extraordinary literary explosion in Italian-American culture. Across twenty-five volumes, ...
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For more than thirty years, the journal Italian Americana has been home to the writers who have sparked an extraordinary literary explosion in Italian-American culture. Across twenty-five volumes, its poets, memoirists, story-tellers, and other voices bridged generations to forge a body of expressive works that helped define an Italian-American imagination. This book offers the best from those pages: sixty-three pieces — fiction, memoir, poetry, story, and interview — that range widely in style and sentiment, tracing the arc of an immigrant culture's coming of age in America. What stories do Italian Americans tell about themselves? How do some of America's best writers deal with complicated questions of identity in their art? Organized by provocative themes — Ancestors, The Sacred and the Profane, Love and Anger, Birth and Death, Art and Self — the selections document the evolution of Italian-American literature, from John Fante's My Father's God, his classic story of religious subversion and memoirs by Dennis Barone and Jerre Mangione to a brace of poets, selected by Dana Gioia and Michael Palma, ranging from John Ciardi, Jay Parini, and Mary Jo Salter to George Guida and Rachel Guido de Vries. There are also stories alive with the Italian folk tradition (Tony Ardizzone and Louisa Ermelino), and others sleekly experimental (Mary Caponegro, Rosalind Palermo Stevenson), in addition to an interview with Camille Paglia — where the Italian-American takes on the culture at large.Less
For more than thirty years, the journal Italian Americana has been home to the writers who have sparked an extraordinary literary explosion in Italian-American culture. Across twenty-five volumes, its poets, memoirists, story-tellers, and other voices bridged generations to forge a body of expressive works that helped define an Italian-American imagination. This book offers the best from those pages: sixty-three pieces — fiction, memoir, poetry, story, and interview — that range widely in style and sentiment, tracing the arc of an immigrant culture's coming of age in America. What stories do Italian Americans tell about themselves? How do some of America's best writers deal with complicated questions of identity in their art? Organized by provocative themes — Ancestors, The Sacred and the Profane, Love and Anger, Birth and Death, Art and Self — the selections document the evolution of Italian-American literature, from John Fante's My Father's God, his classic story of religious subversion and memoirs by Dennis Barone and Jerre Mangione to a brace of poets, selected by Dana Gioia and Michael Palma, ranging from John Ciardi, Jay Parini, and Mary Jo Salter to George Guida and Rachel Guido de Vries. There are also stories alive with the Italian folk tradition (Tony Ardizzone and Louisa Ermelino), and others sleekly experimental (Mary Caponegro, Rosalind Palermo Stevenson), in addition to an interview with Camille Paglia — where the Italian-American takes on the culture at large.
Richard S. Katz
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780199257683
- eISBN:
- 9780191600241
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/019925768X.003.0006
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
Explores the replacement in Italy of an extremely proportional (hyper‐representative) system by a relatively majoritarian variant of a mixed‐member electoral system. On April 18, 1993, the Italian ...
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Explores the replacement in Italy of an extremely proportional (hyper‐representative) system by a relatively majoritarian variant of a mixed‐member electoral system. On April 18, 1993, the Italian electorate overwhelmingly approved a referendum that altered the electoral system for the national Senate. Unlike the 1993 referendum altering the electoral system in New Zealand (discussed in the previous chapter), which came at the end of a lengthy process including an extensive study and report by a Royal Commission, and which gave final popular approval to put the new electoral regime into effect, the Italian referendum was the catalyst that finally initiated change after long, but apparently futile, debate. Rather than ratifying the selection of one system that had been deliberately chosen over others, the Italian referendum imposed, at least for the moment, the only reform possible, given that Italian referendums can only abrogate existing laws, but cannot impose new ones. The different sections of the chapter are: Background to the Referendum of 1993; Immediate Impact of the Referendum; Ends and Means—to electoral reform; Drafting the New Electoral System in the Chamber; Drafting the New Electoral System in the Senate; The New Electoral System; and Expectations and Predictions.Less
Explores the replacement in Italy of an extremely proportional (hyper‐representative) system by a relatively majoritarian variant of a mixed‐member electoral system. On April 18, 1993, the Italian electorate overwhelmingly approved a referendum that altered the electoral system for the national Senate. Unlike the 1993 referendum altering the electoral system in New Zealand (discussed in the previous chapter), which came at the end of a lengthy process including an extensive study and report by a Royal Commission, and which gave final popular approval to put the new electoral regime into effect, the Italian referendum was the catalyst that finally initiated change after long, but apparently futile, debate. Rather than ratifying the selection of one system that had been deliberately chosen over others, the Italian referendum imposed, at least for the moment, the only reform possible, given that Italian referendums can only abrogate existing laws, but cannot impose new ones. The different sections of the chapter are: Background to the Referendum of 1993; Immediate Impact of the Referendum; Ends and Means—to electoral reform; Drafting the New Electoral System in the Chamber; Drafting the New Electoral System in the Senate; The New Electoral System; and Expectations and Predictions.
Dominic J. O’Meara
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- January 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199285532
- eISBN:
- 9780191717819
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199285532.003.0015
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Ancient Philosophy
This conclusion summarizes the argument of the book, gives some indications of the later history of Neoplatonic political philosophy in Byzantium and in the Italian Renaissance, and discusses the ...
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This conclusion summarizes the argument of the book, gives some indications of the later history of Neoplatonic political philosophy in Byzantium and in the Italian Renaissance, and discusses the differences separating this philosophy from modern views concerning the nature of political philosophy.Less
This conclusion summarizes the argument of the book, gives some indications of the later history of Neoplatonic political philosophy in Byzantium and in the Italian Renaissance, and discusses the differences separating this philosophy from modern views concerning the nature of political philosophy.
Sandro Trento
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780199263677
- eISBN:
- 9780191718373
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199263677.003.0009
- Subject:
- Business and Management, Corporate Governance and Accountability
This chapter argues that the Italian variety of capitalism cannot be viewed as either market-based or relationship-based. Instead, Italy has specific ‘institutional complementarities’, which arise ...
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This chapter argues that the Italian variety of capitalism cannot be viewed as either market-based or relationship-based. Instead, Italy has specific ‘institutional complementarities’, which arise from path-dependent patterns of historical evolution. The main grounds for rejecting the market or relationship characterization of the governance and labour relations systems are discussed.Less
This chapter argues that the Italian variety of capitalism cannot be viewed as either market-based or relationship-based. Instead, Italy has specific ‘institutional complementarities’, which arise from path-dependent patterns of historical evolution. The main grounds for rejecting the market or relationship characterization of the governance and labour relations systems are discussed.
Catherine Kovesi Killerby
- Published in print:
- 2002
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199247936
- eISBN:
- 9780191714733
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199247936.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, European Medieval History
The luxurious spending habits of Italians in the Renaissance are well known. The new luxury, however, was not greeted with universal approval, and chroniclers, poets, churchmen, and statesmen were ...
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The luxurious spending habits of Italians in the Renaissance are well known. The new luxury, however, was not greeted with universal approval, and chroniclers, poets, churchmen, and statesmen were often critical of, and preoccupied by, its effects. The most voluminous and telling evidence of this preoccupation is the body of laws enacted to restrict and regulate all aspects of luxury consumption — the so-called sumptuary laws. This book offers the first comprehensive study of Italian sumptuary laws through a chronological, geographical, and thematic survey of more than three hundred laws enacted in over forty cities throughout the peninsula. It examines the nature of these laws up to 1500 and relates them to the circumstances, the framework of ideas and the habits of mind that gave rise to them.Less
The luxurious spending habits of Italians in the Renaissance are well known. The new luxury, however, was not greeted with universal approval, and chroniclers, poets, churchmen, and statesmen were often critical of, and preoccupied by, its effects. The most voluminous and telling evidence of this preoccupation is the body of laws enacted to restrict and regulate all aspects of luxury consumption — the so-called sumptuary laws. This book offers the first comprehensive study of Italian sumptuary laws through a chronological, geographical, and thematic survey of more than three hundred laws enacted in over forty cities throughout the peninsula. It examines the nature of these laws up to 1500 and relates them to the circumstances, the framework of ideas and the habits of mind that gave rise to them.
Ita Mac Carthy
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780691175485
- eISBN:
- 9780691189796
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691175485.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, World Medieval History
‘Grace’ emerges as a keyword in the culture and society of sixteenth-century Italy. This book explores how it conveys and connects the most pressing ethical, social and aesthetic concerns of an age ...
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‘Grace’ emerges as a keyword in the culture and society of sixteenth-century Italy. This book explores how it conveys and connects the most pressing ethical, social and aesthetic concerns of an age concerned with the reactivation of ancient ideas in a changing world. The book reassesses artists such as Francesco del Cossa, Raphael, and Michelangelo and explores anew writers like Castiglione, Ariosto, Tullia d'Aragona, and Vittoria Colonna. It shows how these artists and writers put grace at the heart of their work. The book argues that grace came to be as contested as it was prized across a range of Renaissance Italian contexts. It characterised emerging styles in literature and the visual arts, shaped ideas about how best to behave at court and sparked controversy about social harmony and human salvation. For all these reasons, grace abounded in the Italian Renaissance, yet it remained hard to define. The book explores what grace meant to theologians, artists, writers, and philosophers, showing how it influenced their thinking about themselves, each other and the world. It portrays grace not as a stable formula of expression but as a web of interventions in culture and society.Less
‘Grace’ emerges as a keyword in the culture and society of sixteenth-century Italy. This book explores how it conveys and connects the most pressing ethical, social and aesthetic concerns of an age concerned with the reactivation of ancient ideas in a changing world. The book reassesses artists such as Francesco del Cossa, Raphael, and Michelangelo and explores anew writers like Castiglione, Ariosto, Tullia d'Aragona, and Vittoria Colonna. It shows how these artists and writers put grace at the heart of their work. The book argues that grace came to be as contested as it was prized across a range of Renaissance Italian contexts. It characterised emerging styles in literature and the visual arts, shaped ideas about how best to behave at court and sparked controversy about social harmony and human salvation. For all these reasons, grace abounded in the Italian Renaissance, yet it remained hard to define. The book explores what grace meant to theologians, artists, writers, and philosophers, showing how it influenced their thinking about themselves, each other and the world. It portrays grace not as a stable formula of expression but as a web of interventions in culture and society.
