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Mammas in Italian Migrant Families: The Anglophone Countries

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La Mamma

Part of the book series: Italian and Italian American Studies ((IIAS))

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Abstract

This chapter explores the genesis of the stereotypes of the Italian mamma, stereotypes that developed in Italy and abroad following separate trajectories, only coinciding at certain points. Risorgimento and Catholic models of motherhood were unsuited to the overwhelming majority of those who emigrated, particularly poorer women from the Italian South. Such women developed their own model by different means, linked in particular to migration. The transition of the Italian mamma from archetype to stereotype is illustrated by analysing a range of, mainly northern American, successful novels, films and television series. The family models that emerged in Italian American literary and cinematographic production sometimes faithfully reflected reality and they came to influence behaviour, supplying models for generations of descendants of immigrants in search of an identity.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    On the construction of the image of the mamma and mammismo, see d’Amelia, La mamma.

  2. 2.

    D’Amelia, La mamma, p. 159.

  3. 3.

    L’Orfano, “The Overwhelming Albatross,” p. 138.

  4. 4.

    Tirabassi, “Bourgeois Men, Peasant Women”; Tirabassi, “Making Space for Domesticity.”

  5. 5.

    Campisi, “Ethnic Family Patterns”; Tomasi, The Italian American Family; Yans-McLaughlin, Family and Community, pp. 18–19; Yans-McLaughlin, “Patterns of Work and Family Organization.”

  6. 6.

    Gabaccia, “Italian-American Woman”; Tirabassi, “Italiane ed emigrate.”

  7. 7.

    Barbagli, Provando e riprovando; Barbagli, Sotto lo stesso tetto; Saraceno, Anatomia della famiglia.

  8. 8.

    Tirabassi, “Bourgeois Men, Peasant Women”; Reeder, Widows in White.

  9. 9.

    Inchiesta Jacini, VII, p. 181.

  10. 10.

    Inchiesta Jacini, VII, p. 332.

  11. 11.

    Inchiesta Jacini, VII, p. 35.

  12. 12.

    Inchiesta Jacini, VII, p. 672.

  13. 13.

    Inchiesta Faina, IV, p. 264.

  14. 14.

    Inchiesta Jacini, VIII, p. 385.

  15. 15.

    Inchiesta Jacini, VII, p. 331.

  16. 16.

    Inchiesta Jacini, XII, p. 181.

  17. 17.

    Inchiesta Jacini, IX, fasc. I, p. 120; VII, p. 181.

  18. 18.

    Inchiesta Jacini, IX, fasc. I, p. 214.

  19. 19.

    Tirabassi, Il Faro di Beacon Street, pp. 199–203; Gordon, “Single Mothers and Child Neglect”; Gordon, Heroes of Their Own Lives.

  20. 20.

    Tomasi, The Italian American Family.

  21. 21.

    Messina, “Nine Italian-American Women,” pp. 15–16.

  22. 22.

    Messina, “Nine Italian-American Women,” pp. 15–28.

  23. 23.

    Messina, “Nine Italian-American Women,” p. 19.

  24. 24.

    Banfield, Moral Basis of a Backward Society.

  25. 25.

    Tirabassi, Il Faro di Beacon Street.

  26. 26.

    Gardaphé, “Good Mammas,” p. 172.

  27. 27.

    Nardini, Che Bella Figura!; Ferraro, Feeling Italian.

  28. 28.

    On the tradition of arranged marriages, which continued into the period after the Second World War, see Revelli, Il mondo dei vinti; Revelli, L’anello forte; Scarparo, “Italian Proxy Brides in Australia.”

  29. 29.

    The film Give Us This Day, directed by Edward Dmytryk (GB, 1949), was based on the book.

  30. 30.

    Page numbers for quotations from this and other novels refer to the editions listed in the bibliography.

  31. 31.

    Bona, The Voices We Carry, p. 12. For an analysis of the autobiographies of Italian American men, see Boelhower, Immigrant Autobiography in the United States; Gardaphé, From Wiseguys to Wise Men.

  32. 32.

    Gardaphé, From Wiseguys to Wise Men, p. xiv.

  33. 33.

    Gardaphé, From Wiseguys to Wise Men, p. xii.

  34. 34.

    The book was adapted for the television mini-series The Fortunate Pilgrim (Mamma Lucia in Italy), directed by Stuart Cooper and broadcast in 1988, with Sophia Loren and John Turturro.

  35. 35.

    Ferraro, Feeling Italian, p. 74.

  36. 36.

    For one of many discussions on this topic see Merullo, “Working against Cliché,” pp. 41–43.

  37. 37.

    Talese, “Where Are the Italian American Novelists?”, p. 1.

  38. 38.

    Bona, The Voices We Carry, pp. 11, 13.

  39. 39.

    Tamburri, “Towards a (Re)definition of Italian/American Literature.”

  40. 40.

    Anello, “Fred, il picciotto che insegna la mafia all’università.”

  41. 41.

    Gardaphé, “Good Mammas: The Story of One,” pp. 171–74.

  42. 42.

    Calabro, “The Children of Immigrants,” p. 320.

  43. 43.

    Barolini, Umbertina. See also Barolini, The Dream Book.

  44. 44.

    Serra, “Forme e deformità della famiglia,” p. 164.

  45. 45.

    Ibid., p. 165.

  46. 46.

    The Sopranos, created and principally produced by David Chase (USA: 1999–2007). There is a vast literature on The Sopranos. See, for example, Barreca, A Sitdown with the Sopranos; Gorlier, “The Sopranos.”

  47. 47.

    Muscio, “Tony, Rosa, Vito e Guido,” p. 87.

  48. 48.

    Femminella, “Italian American Family Life,” pp. 56–57.

  49. 49.

    Johnson, “The Maternal Role,” pp. 235, 238.

  50. 50.

    Egelman, “Traditional Roles and Modern Work Patterns,” p. 84.

  51. 51.

    Muscio, “Tony, Rosa, Vito e Guido,” p. 91.

  52. 52.

    Ibid., p. 91.

  53. 53.

    Serra, “Forme e deformità della famiglia,” p. 169; Muscio, “Tony, Rosa, Vito e Guido.”

  54. 54.

    Giunta, “The Quest for True Love.”

  55. 55.

    See Rando, “Mezzo secolo di cinema italoaustraliano,” p. 165.

  56. 56.

    The issue of homosexuality has also been addressed in two American films, Maria Maggenti’s Puccini for Beginners (2005) and Tom De Cerchio’s very successful short film Nunzio’s Second Cousin (1994). See Rando, “Mezzo secolo di cinema italoaustraliano” and “Migrant images.”

  57. 57.

    The film is based on the 1992 novel of the same name by Melina Marchetta.

  58. 58.

    Rando, “La narrativa italoaustraliana.”

  59. 59.

    Giagnoni, “Tony, Ray e gli altri,” p. 224.

  60. 60.

    See, for example, the episodes “Debra made something good,” “Maria’s meatballs,” and “Call me mother.”

  61. 61.

    Golden, “Pasta or Paradigm,” p. 353. See also De Angelis, “Foodways in Italian-American Narrative,” p. 207.

  62. 62.

    See the “floating mother” in New York Stories, where the mother, although dead, continues to follow her son from the sky, enveloped by cloud. As far as I am aware, no comparative analysis of the cinematic or televisual representation of ethnic minority mothers has yet been undertaken.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centro Altreitalie sulle Migrazioni Italiane, Turin, Italy

    Maddalena Tirabassi

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Correspondence to Maddalena Tirabassi .

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  1. School of Modern Languages and Cultures, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, United Kingdom

    Penelope Morris

  2. School of Humanities - History, University of Dundee, Dundee, United Kingdom

    Perry Willson

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Tirabassi, M. (2018). Mammas in Italian Migrant Families: The Anglophone Countries. In: Morris, P., Willson, P. (eds) La Mamma. Italian and Italian American Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-54256-4_7

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