Lewis Lee

Date of Award

2019

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Social Sciences

First Advisor

Zabriskie, Queen

Area of Concentration

General Studies

Abstract

This thesis explores the question of how migrants become colonizers, specifically examining the Italian migration to Argentina from 1870 – 1914. In the context of this particular period, the question is whether or not these migrants unknowingly acted as agents of a larger Italian colonial project by engaging with the Italian government’s created nationality, or italianità. By building a theoretical lens through the theories of Ania Loomba and Frantz Fanon on colonialism, Lorenzo Veracini on settler colonialism, Albert Memmi on the colonizer and the colonized, and Anibal Quijano on the coloniality of power, it is possible to see how these Italian migrants acted as agents of cultural colonization on behalf of the Italian government. Three case studies are presented in support of this theory; the first examining the 1901 Italian Emigration Bill; the second focusing on the Italian schools abroad that received funding to teach italianità; and the third analyzing the text of the Italian National Anthem. Through these examinations, it is shown that the Italian migrants of this period were acting as agents of ethnographic colonization within the Argentinian space.

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