John Galante invites his readers to enter a now almost entirely vanished world, that of the Italian South Atlantic as it existed during the early twentieth century. Immigrants in the three cities he studied—Buenos Aires, Montevideo, and São Paulo—established a variety of ties linking themselves to Italy but also to one another. In fact, Galante has uncovered two Italian worlds in the South Atlantic. One was sponsored or at least encouraged by the government of Italy, based on nationalism, and largely dominated by local notables. The other, led by anarchists, syndicalists, and socialists, opposed nationalistic sentiments and sought to use international ties to advance ostensibly revolutionary political objectives. Italy's entry into the First World War in 1915 turned the whole question of the immigrants' relation with their homeland into an urgent matter, especially because of the Italian government's efforts to oblige its eligible citizens to return to their country of...

You do not currently have access to this content.