[PDF] The Essence of Italian Culture and the Challenge of a Global Age

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Cultural Heritage and Contemporary Change

Series IV, West Europe, Volume, 5

The Essence of Italian Culture and the

Challenge of a Global Age

Edited by

Paulo Janni

George F. McLean

The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy

Copyright © 2003 by

The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy

Gibbons Hall B-20

620 Michigan Avenue, NE

Washington, D.C. 20064

All rights reserved

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication

The essence of Italian culture and the challenge of global age / edited by Paolo Janni and George

F. McLean.

p.cm. (Cultural heritage and contemporary change. Series IV. West Europe; vol. 5)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. National characteristics, Italian. 2. ItalyCivilization20th century. 3. ItalianForeign

countriesEthnic identity. I. Janni, Paolo. II McLean, George F. III. Series.

DG455.E77 2002 200254967

305.851dc20 CIP

ISBN 1-56518-177-8 (pbk.)

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

George F. McLean

Part I. Italicity and the Emergence of Culture in Our Time

Chapter I. Italicity: Global and Local 13

Piero Bassetti

Chapter II. Hermeneutics of Culture: Local and Global 25

George F . McLean

Chapter III. Globalization and Italian Culture 53

Robert Royal

Part II. Italians in America

Chapter IV. Italian Cultural Identity and Migration: Italian Communities 69 Abroad and Italian Cultural Identity through Time

Maddalena Tirabassi

Chapter V. Identical Difference: Notes on Italian and Italian American Identities 93

Fred L. Gardaphe

Chapter VI. The Essence of Italian Culture and the Challenge of the Global Age: 113

Italian Cultural Identity and Migration

Michael Barone

Chapter VII. The Making of Identity in a Globalizing World: An Overview of 119 the Italian American Business Community

Consuelo Corradi

Part III. America and Its Italians

Chapter VIII. Italian Americans in a Pluralistic America 137

John Kromkowski

Chapter IX. The Religious Challenge of a Globalizing World for Italian 177 Cultural Identity: Lessons from the American Experience in Public Education

Robert A. Destro

Part IV. Italicity in a Global Age

Chapter X. Locality, Nationality, Globality: The Possible Contribution of Italianness in the Age of Globalization 189

Mauro Magatti

Chapter XI. Civic Identity without National Identity? Political Identity in a New 217 and Changing Global Context

Vittorio Emanuele Parsi

Chapter XII. Globalization, Religion and Culture: Beyond Conflict, beyond Sovereignty 249

Maryann Cusimano Love

Index 281

Introduction

George F. McLean

The Heritage

The Western World looks with gratitude and pride to its roots in the Mediterranean. The development of philosophy and democracy in Greece was translated by the Romans into a system

of law which acted as a broadly civilizing force; this enabled peoples to live together throughout the

Mediterranean basin in the pax romana. With the emergence of Christianity these elements provided the Church with structure for its work, and in turn were transformed in a deeply humanizing manner.

Augustine, Benedict, Aquinas and others elaborated structures of spirit and of life which transformed

persons from within and reached out to the peoples of Northern, Central and Eastern Europe. This

constituted the first ecumenical era and the initial weaning of a multi-ethnic tradition within the Holy

Roman Empire, East and West.

A fresh elan of cultural creativity emerged in the Italian Renaissance. Its new zest for life and

nature expressed first by Francis of Assisi, provided new ways to look at the cultural creations of the

ancients. It generated intensive, creative interest in geography and astronomy, political structures

and art. Today we still live out the impetus which this "re-birth" gave to the socio-political and the

cultural life of the West. In all these dimensions of time--ancient and medieval, renaissance and modern--the Italian experience contains essential keys for understanding the progress of humankind. For the emerging

nations in Eastern Europe and other parts of the world in search of ways to reconstitute social life in

terms of their distinctive cultural identities, the Italian success in fashioning a nation from many

regions, each with its own rich tradition, provides striking lessons. For the peoples of other regions

of the world who look to the West for models to guide their own development, the Italian genius takes on ever greater importance. of the heritage of humanity and to determine how this can be communicated and lived in the many this volume.

The Collaboration

With the realignment of the bipolar geo-political world into a new global order, the human- izing presence of the Italian peoples must be highly visible and active. This is true above all of

Washington as a focal point where persons and institutes intersect for policy decisions which effect

profoundly the shape of international cooperation and the direction of human progress in our times.

An Italian presence in this context is not a matter of military or economic power; it is rather that

of providing a source of experience and a legacy of wisdom and creativity for shaping modern culture. More than ever, this cultural endowment needs to be engaged in the process of opening fundamental human aspirations, inspiring social dynamics and generating the creativity through which humankind responds to the challenges of our times. The point of contact with this process of shaping our culture is the university, where literary and

artistic criticism is thought through, where social and political structures are modeled and tested in

debate, where new dimensions of human sensibility and insight are evolved and translated into methods of social analysis and response. For this reason, as we proceed into an ever more ominous

XXIst century, it is particularly important that the resources of the Italian experience be made visible

and active in Washington through a university structure. The Catholic University of America (CUA) was particularly suited for this task. - Its identity has made it especially attentive to the classical and cultural traditions of Italy, ancient and modern, with its literature, philosophy and the arts. - Its foundation as a graduate school has given CUA a long tradition of advanced scholarship

with a full range of doctoral programs, not only in the arts and humanities, but also in the social and

natural sciences and in the professions. - Its relation to the Catholic community gives it special access to the Italian heritage and to the experience of the Italian-America community in adapting this cultural heritage to the pluralistic

North American socio-political setting.

- Its location in Washington was chosen for presence to the ongoing process of shaping the

cultural life of this nation--this has become increasingly central as the role of Washington in world

affairs develops exponentially. - It is the home of units deeply involved in issues of culture and change on a national and global basis, viz., a number of Catholic learned societies, The National Center for Urban Ethnic Affairs (NCUEA) and The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy (RVP). This recently has

published three volumes of the Edmund D. Pellegrino Lecture Series on the transformations in Italian

life edited by Paolo Janni. These have now joined together in the CUA Center for the Study of

Culture and Values (CSCV).

For these reasons and circumstances cultural, political and creative -- The CUA Center for the Study of Culture and Values provides a special place where the Italian heritage can be visible and

active in the construction of yet another stage of ecumenical interaction, which at this dawn of a new

world order is now fully global in character.

The Context

The initiation of this joint effort was dramatic. Originally the program had been envisaged for

the Fall of 2001 as a celebration of Italian culture. But that plan was swept aside by the events of

Sept. 11. suddenly it became clear that cultural heritages in the global interchange of the new millennia were not unambiguous and could even be supremely dangerous. Was it time to abandon the distinctive cultures as expressive of the unique creativity of each people in order to envisage the passive peace of an homogeneous and undifferentiated humanity? If such a prospective half life