Italian+stereotypes


 * A stereotyped country**

How are the Italian seen abroad? Over the past decades many stereotypes about the Italian men and women have come into being. Some of them are just funny jokes over which the Italian themselves refrain not from laughing. For instance, the Italian are mostly seen as either "Latin lovers"or "voluptuous women", depending on the sex; so, as remarkably promiscuous. Think also about the stereotyped image of the old Italian man playing a mandolin with women in the whereabouts screaming at marketplaces: "Fresh fish! Fresh fish!". On the other hand, very often in the past the Italian have been discriminated against because of particular hearsay. In America, for example, in the 1920s Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti (doble click to listen to [|Joan Baez singing Vanzetti' s last words to his family in Italy], or [|an italian traditional] with its [|script]), two Italian anarchists, experienced prejudice and ultimately death due to their Italian ancestry and extreme political views. Though not lynched, Sacco and Vanzetti were subject to a mishandled trial, and most historians agree that the judge, jury, and prosecution were extremely biased against the Italian immigrants. Sacco and Vanzetti were eventually put to death, convicted of robbery and murder despite the lack of evidence against them. In addition, Italy is mournfully renowned for the Mafia association, outspread in southern Italy above all. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Mafia association became diffuse in America, too. Hence, the image came into being of the Italian Mafioso, also thanks to films like "The Godfather", starring Marlon Brando in the role of a criminal boss from Sicily, and "Scarface", loosely based on the life of Al Capone, an American gangster born to Neapolitan emigrants, played by Al Pacino.

Other Stereotypes:

The football addicted man

The voluptuous woman

The Italian "Mammoni"

By: Nicola, Elisa, Valentina, Laura