New Perspectives In Italian Cultural Studies

The application of feminist thought to the study of Italian culture is generating some of the most innovative work in the field today. This volume presents a range of essays which focus on the construction of gender in Italian literature as well as essays in feminist theory. The contributions reflect the current diversity of critical approaches available to those interrogating gender and offer interpretations of prose, poetry, theater, and the visual arts from Boccaccio, Michelangelo, and Galileo to contemporary Italian writers such as Carla Cerati and Dacia Maraini.

New Perspectives in Italian Cultural Studies. Volume 1: Definitions, Theory, and Accented Practices is a collection of essays that identifies a number of different approaches in cultural studies and in Italian cultural studies in particular. It highlights that history of cultural studies and new developments in the field as well focuses on practicing cultural studies with essays devoted to Italian hip hop culture, postcolonial Italy and queer diaspora, Occidentalism in Japan, Italian racism and colonialism.

This is an up-to-date, illustrated introduction to the study of modern Italian culture containing nineteen chapters by specialists in the field of language, politics, religious, ethnic, and gender identities, the mass media, cultural policy, and stars. Adopting a unique and accessible interdisciplinary focus, Italian Cultural Studies: An Introduction presents a variety of new perspectives on modern Italian culture. Each of the four parts explore diverse aspects of culture in Italy. 'Geographies' questions received notions of the Italian nation, the family, the 'South' and corruption; it also looks at anthropological approaches to culture and at Italy's linguistic pluralism. 'Identities' examines gender, religion, politics, and ethnicity as a means with which people define themselves and others. 'Media' explores the press, literature, television, and cinema. 'Culture and Society'brings together historical analyses of cultural policy, stars and style, and popular music. Each part is followed by sample analyses of visual materials and includes guidance in further reading. A chronology of political and cultural events since 1900 is also provided. Drawing on the expertise of leading authorities Italian Cultural Studies will be essential reading for anyone interested in modern Italy and its culture.

Following the more theoretical first installment of New Perspectives in Italian Cultural Studies devoted to Definitions, Theory, and Accented Practices, the second volume of New Perspectives deals with practicing cultural studies by offering articles that are valuable for both scholars of Italian studies and students interested in a cultural studies approach. Divided in four sections, the articles included offer complex approaches to literature, film, the visual arts, and a particular moment in Italian history with which Italians are still coming to terms, fascism. The essays cover about two hundred years of Italian cultures dealing with the construction of national myths, the role of soccer in contemporary debates, the contemporary success of mystery novels, and issues of race and crime in fascist Italy. Contributors look at film through the lens of fashion history and the particular Italian use of dubbing that continues even today. Place and memory are the topics of a number of essays that also allow for an interpretation of Italian culture inAmericans' imagination. This volume contains a multifaceted representation of Italy and invites additional discussion on the complexity of representing cultures

Following the more theoretical first installment of New Perspectives in Italian Cultural Studies devoted to Definitions, Theory, and Accented Practices, the second volume of New Perspectives deals with practicing cultural studies by offering articles that are valuable for both scholars of Italian studies and students interested in a cultural studies approach. Divided in four sections, the articles included offer complex approaches to literature, film, the visual arts, and a particular moment in Italian history with which Italians are still coming to terms, fascism. The essays cover about two hundred years of Italian cultures dealing with the construction of national myths, the role of soccer in contemporary debates, the contemporary success of mystery novels, and issues of race and crime in fascist Italy. Contributors look at film through the lens of fashion history and the particular Italian use of dubbing that continues even today. Place and memory are the topics of a number of essays that also allows for an interpretation of Italian culture inAmericans’ imagination. This volume contains a multifaceted representation of Italy and invites additional discussion on the complexity of representing cultures

Place, Setting, Perspective examines the films of the Italian filmmaker, Nanni Moretti, from a fresh viewpoint, employing the increasingly significant research area of space within a filmic text. The book is conceived with the awareness that space cannot be studied only in aesthetic or narrative terms: social, political, and cultural aspects of narrated spaces are equally important if a thorough appraisal is to be achieved of an oeuvre such as Moretti’s, which is profoundly associated with socio-political commentary and analysis. After an exploration of various existing frameworks of narrative space in film, the book offers a particular definition of the term based on the notions of Place, Setting, and Perspective. Place relates to the physical aspect of narrative space and specifically involves cityscapes, landscapes, interiors, and exteriors in the real world. Setting concerns genre characteristics of narrative space, notably its differentiated use in melodrama, detective stories, fantasy narratives, and gender based scenarios. Perspective encompasses the point of view taken optically by the camera which supports the standpoint of Moretti’s personal philosophy expressed through the aesthetic aspects which he employs to create narrative space. The study is based on a close textual analysis of Moretti’s eleven major feature films to date, using the formal film language of mise-en-scène, cinematography, editing, and sound. The aim is to show how Moretti selects, organizes, constructs, assembles, and manipulates the many elements of narrative space into an entire work of art, to enable meanings and pleasures for the spectator.

Contemporary Italian Diversity in Critical and Fictional Narratives brings together creative literary works and scholarly articles. Both address the changes and challenges to identity formation in an Italy marked by the migrations, populism, nationalism, and xenophobia, and analyze diversity and the affirmation of belonging.