Gino Moliterno. Encyclopedia of Contemporary Italian Culture

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dz t∫ f v s z ∫ r l . There are two semi-consonants: j w. Stress usually falls on the

penultimate syllable but may occur in any other position and is distinctive, pàpa ‘pope’

versus papà ‘daddy’; càpito ‘I turn up’ versus capìta ‘understood’ versus capitò ‘he

turned up’. Consonant length is also distinctive: between vowels, all but six consonants (z

which is always short and

ts dz ∫ which are always long) may be pronounced short or

long, pala ‘spade’ versus palla ‘ball’; cade ‘it falls’ versus cadde ‘it fell’. Vowel length

depends on these two features: vowels are short if unstressed or followed by a consonant

in their syllable; vowels in stressed, open syllables are long. Stressed syllables are

pronounced roughly twice as long as unstressed syllables. Intonation is also distinctive,

for example, the usual way of turning a statement into a question is simply to use an

interrogative intonation pattern.

Syllables in Italian are centred on a single vowel. All vowels are given their full

phonetic value: aereo ‘aeroplane’ contains four syllables (diphthongs combine a vowel

with a semi-consonant: più [pju], qui [kwi]). Syllable structure is given by (CCC)V(C):

syllables may end in a vowel or a consonant, and may begin with the vowel or up to three

consonants, but usually one or two, as there are severe restrictions on consonant

clustering; for example, the only possible three-consonant groups all have ‘s’ as the first

element.

Italian phonology includes a number of features which cross word boundaries. For

example, elision is the fall of an unstressed vowel at the end of a word when the

following word also begins with a vowel: la Italia>l’Italia ‘Italy’, and truncation, the fall

of a final vowel: dolce fare niente>dolce far niente ‘sweet idleness’. Syntactic doubling

is the doubling of the initial consonant of a word when that word follows one of a

particular set of words; this is not normally seen in writing but appears in certain

historically established forms: cosiddetto ‘so-called’, dimmi ‘tell me’.

Italian is often said to be a ‘phonetic’ language, an inaccurate description which does

however refer to the fact there is a very high degree of correspondence between the

spelling conventions of the language and the sounds. Its reputation as a ‘musical’

language is based on the clear vowel sounds, the paucity of harsh consonant sounds and

of consonant groups, the predominance of vowels in syllable structure and the alternation

of long and short syllables.

The above description is based on the notion of standard Italian, founded on educated

Florentine. From a sociolinguistic point of view, the most striking feature of Italian

phonology, compared to English, is that there is no agreed national standard which is

actually spoken by any one social group. There is no Italian equivalent to English

‘Received Pronunciation’, which is to say that even the social elites in Italy show their

regional origin by their accent.

See also: Italian language; Italian lexicon; Italian morphology; Italian syntax;

language attitudes; varieties of Italian

Further reading

Mioni, A.M. (1993) ‘Fonetica e fonologia’, in A.A. Sobrero (ed.), Introduzione

all’italiano contemporaneo, Bari: Laterza.

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Vincent, N. (1988) ‘Italian’, in M.Harris and N. Vincent (eds), The Romance Languages, London:

Routledge (a comprehensive description with a historical dimension and an eye to future

developments).

JOHN J.KINDER

Italian syntax

The basic structure of the Italian sentence is SVO (Subject—Verb—Object). Whereas in

Latin the grammatical function of the elements in a sentence was shown by the

inflectional morphology of the words, in Italian and the other Romance languages the

functions of, especially, subject and object are identified by their position in the sentence.

Compared to the other Romance languages, however, the morphology of Italian is

relatively transparent; that is, the endings of words convey grammatical information

clearly (and audibly). This permits a wide choice of variations on the standard SVO word

order. Groups of words can be moved from their normal position with great freedom in

order to express emphasis or some stylistic nuance. The word order of Italian is

somewhat freer than the other Romance languages (although less free than its parent

language Latin), and is considerably freer than Germanic languages like English.

The most frequent of the expressive word orders is known as ‘left dislocation’: Le

pizze le compri tu questa volta (The pizzas you buy them this time), but there are many

possible variations on the theme, such as Le compri tu, le pizze, questa volta; Sei tu che

compri le pizze questa volta. Compared to English, we may say that Italian makes greater

use of grammatical variation to emphasize certain elements in a sentence, while English

relies much more on using the voice.

These word orders have to do with the fact that the focus of new or important

information tends to be at the end of the Italian sentence: Rispondo io ‘I’ll get it (the

telephone)’. This sentence also shows how subject pronouns are often used for emphasis

or contrast, although in Italian they are not obligatory since the verb ending shows clearly

who the subject is.

Grammatical freedom also expresses nuances of meaning in the case of adjectives.

Usually they come after nouns (and agree with them): l’enciclo-pedia italiana, le

enciclopedie italiane. But they may come before the noun, if the information they

provide is not crucial to defining the object in question but rhetorical, emotive or

metaphorical. In some cases, the difference in position effects a drastic change in

meaning: in un amico vecchio ‘an old friend’, the adjective refers to the age of the friend,

while in un vecchio amico it refers to the length of the friendship.

In the case of verbs, Italian has a number of compound tenses, formed by the past

participle of the verb and an auxiliary, either avere ‘to have’ or essere ‘to be’. Italian

makes greater use of alternation between the two auxiliaries than the other Romance

languages: the list of verbs which always require essere is long (they are all intransitive),

and in some cases the choice of auxiliary can convey important information: il negozio è

chiuso a mezzogiorno ‘the shop closed at midday (until it reopens)’, il negozio ha chiuso

a mezzogiorno ‘the shop closed down at midday’.

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As for complex sentences, Italian has a rich repertoire of subordinating conjunctions

and strict rules for use of verb tenses and moods in main and subordinate clauses. The

subjunctive mood (alive and well in written Italian at least) allows meaning distinctions

to be made: cerchiamo il ristorante che è aperto ‘we are looking for the restaurant that is

open’; cerchiamo un ristorante che sia aperto ‘we are looking for a restaurant (any) that

is (may be) open’.

See also: Italian language; Italian morphology; Italian phonology; varieties of Italian

Further reading

Sobrero, A.A. (ed.) (1993) Introduzione all’italiano contemporaneo, Bari: Laterza (see R.Simone,

‘Stabilità e instabilità nei caratteri originali dell’italiano’; P.Benincà, ‘Sintassi’).

Vincent, N. (1988) ‘Italian’, in M.Harris and N. Vincent (eds), The Romance Languages, London:

Routledge (a comprehensive description with a historical dimension and an eye to future

developments).

JOHN J.KINDER

Italian-American cinema

Italian-American cinema might be defined as a genre of films made by Italian Americans

about the still evolving Italian-American immigrant experience in the United States. The

Italian-American experience has been depicted in many films made both in Italy and the

United States, by both Italian film-makers and American film-makers of various

nationalities and ethnic origins, but these films, ranging from Giuliano Montaldo’s Sacco

and Vanzetti (1970), Francesco Rosi’s Lucky Luciano (1973), Sergio Leone’s Once Upon

a Time in America (1983) and the Taviani brothers’ Good Morning, Babylon (1986) to

John Huston’s Prizzi’s Honour and Norman Jewison’s Moonstruck, are generally not

considered to be ‘Italian-American’ films. By the same token, over the years many

Italian-Americans have been involved in every aspect of film-making in the United States

although, for the most part, their work was not concerned with the Italian-American

experience. This was particularly true for the directors and actors of what might be

defined as the first generation such as Frank Capra, Vincente Minnelli, Ida Lupino and

others.

It has been the film-makers of the second generation who created what has generally

come to be known as Italian-American cinema: Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese,

and to a lesser degree, Brian De Palma and Michael Cimino. Coppola and Scorsese in

particular have not only dealt extensively, albeit not exclusively, with their Italian-

American heritages in their films, but they have also spoken openly of the importance of

their heritages in their personal lives. The Italian-American films of the members of this

generation (Coppola’s Godfather films, Scorsese’s Mean Streets and Raging Bull, De

Palma’s Wise Guys), deal explicitly with themes, issues, locales, customs and traditions

that may in some way be described as ‘Italian-American’ and thus either function as

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metaphors for the Italian-American immigrant experience or reappropriate an Italian

heritage, be it historical, literary or cinematic. For example, Cimino’s The Sicilian is

based on Mario Puzo’s (admittedly wildly inaccurate) rendition of the life of Sicilian

revolutionary/bandit Salvatore Giuliano; De Palma’s Obsession is loosely inspired by

Dante’s Vita Nuova; and Coppola’s The Conversation and De Palma’s Blow-Out derive

from Michelangelo Antonioni s Blow-Up.

Following the Italian literary and filmic tradition of national self-criticism—a tradition

which may be traced from Dante to Fellini—Scorsese is harshly critical of the maschilist

aspects of the Italian-American heritage while Coppola uses his Godfather epic to create

an Italian-American mythology, to condemn its criminal manifestations and to reveal the

parallels between organized crime and the WASP establishment of the United States. The

parallels between the methods of organized crime and of the government are reiterated in

De Palma’s The Untouchables, while Cimino attempts to destroy the myth of the West in

Heaven’s Gate by revealing the truth about the criminal collusion between the

government and capital.

When the public failed to perceive that organized crime, as depicted in the Godfather

films, was not exclusively an Italian-American phenomenon, Coppola went to some

lengths to show in Cotton Club that organized crime in the United States preexisted the

rise to power of the mafia. De Palma continued and expanded this process by revealing

the advent of new ethnic criminal organizations in Scarf face and in Carlito’s Way.

Cimino might be seen to be making a similar point in Year of the Dragon.

Film-makers of the third generation such as Abel Ferrara, Quentin Tarentino, Stanley

Tucci, Tom Di Cillo, Steve Buscemi and James Merendino have achieved some popular

and critical success in the United States and to a greater degree abroad, but while they

may be perceived as Italian-American in terms of parentage, they have not established an

identity as Italian-American film-makers, as have the exponents of the second generation.

For the most part, their films do not reflect the classical Italian-American concerns and

themes. Even Tucci’s Big Night is, at most, an attempt to describe an Italian immigrant

experience, rather than a specifically Italian-American experience.

The Italian-American women film-makers, Nancy Savoca (True Love, Dog Fight,

Household Saints) and Helen De Michiel (Tarantella) are the only members of the third

generation who would appear to be making films that focus programmatically, albeit

subversively, on the Italian-American experience. While the concern with food and

family continues, organized crime, that mainstay of the second generation, is absent, and

maschilist males are revealed as weak and pathetic.

Italian-American actors, while not always necessarily restricted to ethnic roles, do

seem to be indispensable for the making of Italian-American cinema. Amongst the most

connected with Italian-American cinema one would include Al Pacino, Robert De Niro,

Danny DeVito, Joe Pesci, Paul and Mira Sorvino, Sylvester Stallone, John Travolta and

John Turturro.

Further reading

Casillo, R. (1991) ‘Moments in Italian-American Cinema: From “Little Caesar” to Coppola and

Scorsese’, in A.J.Tamburri, P.A.Giordano and F.L.Gardaphè (eds), From the Margin: Writings

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in Italian Americana, West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 374–96 (comes both to

praise Italian-American film and to bury ‘this twilight of ethnicity’).

Cortes, C.E. (1987) ‘Italian-Americans in Film: From Immigrants to Icons’, Melus 14 (3–4): 108–

26 (a somewhat optimistic study of the evolving representation of Italian-Americans on screen).

Golden, D.S. (1980) ‘The Fate of La Famiglia: Italian Images in American Film’, in R.M. Miller

(ed.), The Kaleidoskopic Lens: How Hollywood Views Ethnic Groups, Englewood Cliffs, NJ:

Jerome S.Ozer, 73–97 (the conflict between the old ways and assimilation).

Lawton, B.R. (1995) ‘What is “Italian American” Cinema?’, Voices in Italian Americana 6 (1): 23,

27–51 (an attempt to identify the key features of Italian-American cinema).

Sautman, F.C. (1994) ‘Women of the Shadows: Italian American Women, Ethnicity and Racism in

American Cinema’, Differentia 6/7:219–46 (an intelligent feminist study of the caricatures of

Italian-American women in American cinema).

Tamburri, A.J., Gardaphè, F.L., Giunta, E. and Bona, M.J. (eds) (1997) Italian/American Literature

and Film: A Select Critical Bibliography, West Lafayette, IN: Bordighera (the best single

source for further reading on Italian-American film).

BEN LAWTON

Italsider

The operating company of the Finsider state participation holding for the steel sector in

the period from 1959 to 1987, Italsider became known as Nuova Italsider in the 1980s

after a restructuring of its operating facilities and debt. Its principal operating plants were

in Genoa, Piombino, Naples and Taranto. The last, Italy’s only greenfield integrated site

built after the Second World War, was initially designed to produce approximately three

million tonnes of crude steel, but was doubled and redoubled again giving it a capacity of

nearly 11.5 million tonnes, thus becoming Europe’s largest integrated facility and one of

the three largest in the world. In 1989, Nuova Italsider decommissioned the Bagnoli

works in Naples. In 1987, a second major restructuring saw remaining holdings being

either privatized or restructured into a new company called Ilva.

Further reading

Masi, A.C. (1987), ‘Nuova Italsider-Taranto and the Steel Crisis: Problems, Innovations, and

Prospects’, in Y.Mény and V.Wright (eds), The Politics of Steel: Western Europe and the Steel

Industry in the Crisis Years (1974–1984), New York: Walter de Gruyter.

ANTHONY C.MASI

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IUAV

The IUAV (Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia, or Venice University

Institute of Architecture) is one of the oldest and most important schools of architecture

in Europe. Under the directorship of Samonà from 1945–71, the liveliest protagonists of

architectural culture in Italy were called to teach there—amongst them Albini,

Belgiojoso, De Carlo, Gardella, Muratori and Scarpa (who became director from

1972–8)—and it achieved prominence as a refuge for restless non-academic intellectuals.

Later, figures such as Gregotti, Aymonino, Rossi, Tafuri (who was director of the

Department of History of Architecture) and Massimo Cacciari also taught there.

The Institute was renowned for the innovative analyses which it developed in an

attempt to refound architectural theory both as an extension and as a critique of

modernism. Its particular concerns remained the areas of the city in history, the

relationship of building to region, building typology, and figuration and drawing.

Further reading

Semerani, L. (ed.) (1985) The Venice School, London: Architectural Design/New York: St.

Martin’s Press (a concise and illustrated review of the School’s scope).

ROSS JENNER

Encyclopedia of contemporary italian culture 436

Jaeggy, Fleur

b. 1940, Zurich

Novelist and translator

Fleur Jaeggy lives and works in Milan. In addition to a number of critical essays on and

translations from De Quincey and Schwob among others, she published short novels such

as Il dito in bocca (The Finger in the Mouth) (1968), L’angelo custode (The Guardian

Angel) (1971) and Le statue d’acqua (The Water Statues) (1980). Childhood and

education, madness and solitude are the recurrent motifs of her narrative characterized by

a clear and aphoristic style. Her novel I beati anni del castigo (Sweet Days of Discipline)

(1989), the story of a female friendship set in a girls’ boarding school in Switzerland, was

awarded the Rapallo prize in 1990 and translated into several languages. With this novel

and her latest collection of short stories La paura del cielo (Last Vanities) (1995),

Jaeggy’s introspective narrative finally won the critics’ recognition and the public’s

favour, both in Italy and abroad.

FRANCESCA PARMEGGIANI

Jannacci, Enzo

b. 3 June 1935, Milan

Singer-songwriter and physician

A bizarre mixture of contrasting talents, Vincenzo ‘Enzo’ Jannacci is both a practising

cardiologist who holds a black belt in karate and one of Italy’s most respected

songwriters and cabaret performers. He began singing in clubs at night while studying

medicine in Milan in the 1950s, and soon formed a comic duo with Giorgio Gaber called

I due corsari (The Two Buccaneers). In the 1960s, often using the Milanese dialect, he

further developed his particular brand of surreal humour in songs such as ‘El purtav i

scarp de tennis’ (He Wore Tennis Shoes) (1964) while at the same time performing

political songs with Dario Fo. In 1968 he achieved national notoriety with a rather

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demented composition titled ‘Vengo anch’io; no, tu no’ (I’ll Come Too; No You Won’t)

and since then he has released over twenty albums to remain one of the most genial and

iconoclastic musical figures in Italy.

A consummate performer who uses mime and the body as well as voice, in 1994

Jannacci instituted a cabaret school in Milan at his own cabaret restaurant, the Bolgia

Umana (The Human Ditch). He has also composed material for other artists, amongst

them Milva for whom he wrote an entire album, La rossa (The Redhead), in 1980.

Further reading

Hughes, H.S. (1983) Prisoners of Hope: The Silver Age of Italian Jews (1924–1974), Cambridge,

MA: Harvard University Press (a general survey of twentieth-century Jewish writing in Italy).

MIRNA CICIONI

Jotti, Nilde (Leonilde)

b. 10 April 1920, Reggio Emilia; d. 3 December 1999, Rome

Politician

Perhaps Italy’s most prominent and respected female politician, Jotti graduated from the

Catholic University of Milan and became a teacher. Under Fascism she was an

underground member of the Italian Communist Party (see PCI) and during the war was

an active member of the Resistance movement, setting up and leading the Women’s

Defence Groups. After the war she was elected to the Constituent Assembly and was

one of the seventy-five members who drafted the constitution. Since 1948 she has been a

member of the House of Deputies (see Parliament) and in June 1979 was elected speaker

of the House, a position she held continuously until 1992. In 1956 she became a member

of the central committee of the PCI and from 1962 onwards was an integral part of the

party leadership. In 1991 she supported the transformation of the PCI, became a leading

member of the PDS; as such, she was again elected to the House of Deputies in the 1992,

1994 and 1996 elections. When she retired in November 1999 due to ill-health she had

served continuously in the Italian Parliament for 53 years.

BERNADETTE LUCIANO

Jovine, Francesco

b. 9 October 1902, Guardialfiera; d. 30 April 1950, Rome

Writer

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