Abstract
The acculturation process’s greatest pitfalls will typically stem from issues of group pride and identity. Although these immigrants were often illiterate, they typically experienced a sense of cultural downfall upon arriving in the United States. How could this be if they had so little culture to begin with and got off the boat smelling of onions and cheese? In the Italians’ case, we must bear in mind that the ancient Roman Empire’s ruins lay virtually everywhere in the old country. The Calabrian shepherd and potential emigrant who may never have set foot inside a school or come within miles of a book had only to pass by an ancient Roman wall, road, or aqueduct to gain an idea of a once mighty civilization. He had only to be in the audience when the local politician, parish priest, or country squire made a speech referring to those ruins to see himself as the descendant of a once great empire. The emigrant may not have known the details of that empire’s history but he had inherited an oral tradition placing his people at the center of their own special universe.
I am an Italian by birth and an American citizen for thirty–five years … nonetheless I am an ardent and conscious follower of Fascism, as conceived and put into practice by Mussolini.
Ettore Patrizi, publisher of San Francisco’s L‘ltalia,” May 27,19371
Do you believe in Free speech? Do you believe in liberty in voting? Do you believe in a free press? Those who are advocates of Fascism in this country and at the same time profess to be good Americans will not indefinitely be permitted to sail under two flags.
Senator William Borah of California, May 27,19372
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Notes
Arthur Lenti, The Founding and Early Expansion of the Salesian Work in the San Francisco Area, From Archival Documents,” Journal of Salesian Studies, 7, No. 2 (Fall 1996), 33 34.
Ettore Patrizi, Come Considero Mussolini (Roma, 1924), 8–21.
Rose D. Scherini, ”Executive Order 9066 and Italian-Americans: The San Francisco Story,” California History, 70, 4(Winter 1991–92), 368–78; Rose D. Scherini, ”When Italian-Americans Were Enemy Aliens,” in Una Storia Segreta, edited by Lawrence DiStasi (Berkeley: Heyday Books, 2001), 20,26.
Angelo de Guttadauro, ”Exclusion Is a Four-Letter Word,” in Una Storia Segreta, edited by Lawrence DiStasi (Berkeley: Heyday Books, 2001), 156–60.
Stephen Fox, The Unknown Internment (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1990), xi-xv, 1–4, 65; Stephen Fox, ”The Relocation of Italian-Americans in California During World War II” in Una Storia Segreta, edited by Lawrence DiStasi (Berkeley: Heyday Books, 2001), 39–52.
Rose Viscuso Scudero, ”Pittsburg Stories: You Can Go Home Now” in Una Storia Segreta, edited by Lawrence DiStasi (Berkeley: Heyday Books, 2001), 57.
Alessandro Baccari Jr. Saints Peter and Paul Church Chronicles 1884–1894 (San Francisco, 1985), 176–79.
Remo Bosia, The General and I (New York, 1971), 26.
Augustus Loschi, “A Momentous Decision,” Sons of Italy Magazine, 15, No. 9 (October 1942), 4.
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© 2011 Sebastian Fichera
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Fichera, S. (2011). Day of Reckoning. In: Italy on the Pacific. Italian and Italian American Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137002068_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137002068_7
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