IDS 214 THE ITALIAN-AMERICAN EXPERIENCE
We will look at the experience of Italian-Americans in a comparative fashion focusing on three issues especially: family life, religion (the Italian-American combination of paganism and Catholicism), and social relationships (gender, class and race). We'll pay particular attention to questions of cultural assimilation and historical acclamation, media representation and the gangster trope. We will put these issues in a transatlantic context by reading books such as M. Mazzucco's Vita and Jerre Mangione's Mount Allegro; listening to music by Frank Sinatra and Madonna; and viewing movies such as Emanuele Crialese's Golden Door, Francis Ford Coppola's The Godfather, Martin Scorsese's Goodfellas, Peter Miller's Sacco & Vanzetti, paintings by Ralph Fasanella, and television shows such as Jersey Shore.
Course Types
Civilization; Expression; American Studies Elective
Notes
Counts toward the Italian Studies minor.