Symposium on Ann Morning’s and Marcello Maneri’s An Ugly Word: Rethinking Race in Italy and the United States

This symposium brings together four critical commentaries on Ann Morning’s and Marcell Maneri’s An Ugly Word: Rethinking Race in Italy and the United States (Morning and Maneri 2022). This is a book that is organized around a comparative study of how race, or more specifically descent-based difference, is understood in Italy and the United States. In particular, Morning and Maneri seek to explore whether there are significant differences between how Italians and Americans think about differences based on descent. Arguing against what they see as the taken-for-granted assumption that there are significant differences between Italy and America Morning and Maneri use their research to argue that in practice underlying beliefs about descent-based differences are relatively similar. While they accept that there are differences in how people talk about group differences, they use their empirical research among young people in Italy and the United States to explore the substantial similarities across the Atlantic.

In order to explore the broader context of the issues covered by the book, we invited four scholars to address the core arguments outlined in An Ugly Word. The four commentaries highlight the original contributions of the book and the value of empirically grounded comparative research in this field. But they also provide critical insights into key themes that are covered in the book. The first commentary by Adrian Favell focuses in particular on how the book engages with the complex question of how transatlantic translations of race and racialization work out in practice (Favell 2023). Favell’s account provides a suggestive insight into how questions about race are addressed across the Atlantic and highlights the need for an ongoing conversation about the key issues addressed in An Ugly Word. This is followed by Gaia Giuliani’s commentary, which addresses questions about the silence of race in Italy (Giuliani 2023). Giuliani suggests that in looking at how young people in Italy talk about descent-based differences it is also important to explore more fully how ideas about whiteness have been constructed and re-constructed both historically and in the present. The third contribution by Camilla Hawthorne draws on her own experiences of doing research in Italy to engage with the core themes in the book (Hawthorne 2023). She suggests that in the contemporary environment, an engagement with critical race studies has helped to question the silence about race in Italy. In addition, she suggests that comparative studies such as this one can help to push scholarly debates forward in both Italy and the United States. The final commentary is by Mackda Ghebremariam Tesfau’ and draws on her research and policy experience to suggest that there is a need to connect research with policy perspectives that help to shape how questions about race are framed and talked about (Ghebremariam Tesfau 2023).

The symposium is rounded off by a rejoinder from Ann Morning and Marcello Maneri that engages with the main points that are raised in the four commentaries (Maneri and Morning 2023). They argue forcefully that while they see value in the use of the category of race in comparative research, they see the need to be more specific about how we use ideas about race in studying the meanings attached to difference. In engaging with the key arguments raised by Favell, Giuliani, Hawthorne and Tesfau’ they also seek to explore possible avenues for future research agendas in this field.