From Prejudices and Marginalization to Social Integration: Some Examples from Italian Immigrant Literature

Abstract

In this paper the aim is to analyse, with an ecocritical reading, Salah Methnani and Mario Fortunato's “Immigrato” and Ingy Mubiayi's "Nascita". The novel “Iimmigrato” represents one of the first examples of the immigrant literature in Italy; it brings us the autobiographical story of a Tunisian who comes to Italy in search for better life conditions. In the society he finds, however, he will have to face prejudices and discrimination which will have as a consequence intolerance, rejection, and marginalization of immigrants. The story is presented as a journey from South to North of Italy, but actually it is a story of the research of identity in the new community. On the other hand, the short story "Nascita" is written by one of the authors whose partents have migrated to Italy and who has been raised in Italy, Ingy Mubiayi. The analysis shows differences of the two texts: in “Immigrato” the consequences of immigration are focalized, i.e. prejudices, racism, and marginalization, while in "Nascita" the attention is drawn to the immigrants who have integrated in the new society. In the analysis, the methodology of ecocriticism is used to discover the examples of discrimination and marginalization of some characters in the text, in order to evidence the so called “vertical society”, which inevitably has as consequences discrimination, racism, and oppression of some of its members. Another aim of the analysis is to find the literary examples of how to overcome discrimination and make possible the building of more equitable society.

DOI: 10.5901/jesr.2014.v4n4p216