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In Don De Lillo���s Cosmopolis (2003), Eric Packer is a young multi- billionaire who inhabits a homogenising landscape turning individuals into urban waste. Driving safely across New York City into his white stretch limo, he has replaced both his body and personality with hyperreal and luxurious simulacra; he inhabits a self- referential cosmos reflecting a polis where human beings are discarded as active and sensible actors. However, Eric seems ready to renounce his luxurious but aseptic reality and to return to a more human condition; in this novel, an old barbershop becomes the point of departure to restore humanity and fight back the overwhelming urban wasteland. Eric���s journey back to his truer self is doomed to fail, as he will be killed by his alter ego, Benno Levin. A former employee of Eric, Benno was first demoted then fired by Eric. The two characters are therefore presented as the two sides of the same coin, in fact two self-made outcasts of globalization: they are both playing a role in the new e- capitalism, they are both responsible for what they have become and must face the consequences. Their final epiphany is here turned into a nemesis that translates into their final loss, their final defeat. There is no way out of globalised capitalism., Anglistica AION: An Intersciplinary Journal, Vol 19 No 2 (2015): Wastelands: Eco-narratives in Contemporary Cultures in English

JAm It! (Journal of American Studies in Italy), No 4 (2021): Disentangling the American Patchwork Heritage

The essay introduces the philosophy and main goals of the "WeTell – Storytelling and Civic Engagement" as a research project promoted and supported by the University of Bologna to encourage civic and social engagement among students in a variety of areas of studies within Higher Education by way of researching and exploiting the potentiality of storytelling as an empowering performative practice, using different media and forms of communication. WeTell proposes to boost social innovation starting from a new understanding of the role that the humanities can play at a time of deep cultural change. In particular, it emanates from some core areas that intend to gain (or regain) a functional use within our evolving and complex ecosystem: philology, literary studies, sociolinguistic. The project is conceived in the wake of the UNESCO Global Citizenship Education Guidelines (2014, 2015), starting from a renewed role of Higher Education today. As per UNESCO, “The role of education is moving beyond the development of knowledge and cognitive skills to the building of values, soft skills and attitudes among learners. Education is expected to facilitate international cooperation and promote social transformation in an innovative way towards a more just, peaceful, tolerant, inclusive, secure and sustainable world” (UNESCO GCE, 2014, 11). Consistently, this project translates into examples of good practices to foster social engagement and inclusion, as well as awareness of intercultural successful strategies to forge a new consciousness of what it means to inhabit a global and globalized world. Against such a context, core disciplines within the Humanities become strategic tools for reconsidering free will and civic awareness, reassessing the place that a more conscious and performative storytelling can and must play within our heterogeneous societies. The project has lead to the establishment of a Summer School that addresses some precise questions. How can our students be prepared to face the challenges of a complex society if they are trained only to practice their specific disciplinary knowledge with no real awareness of the richness and diversity already existing within their educational contexts? Should we frame the study of social inclusion and civic engagement only within specific university programs, or should we consider that a horizontal skill to be shared no matter the specific field of study? How can core areas in the Humanities pursue social (and also academic) innovation through a ground-breaking approach to performative storytelling? What is, in fact, performative storytelling but a fertile dialogue across areas of studies that want to go beyond notions and trigger action? Hence, WeTell approaches storytelling as a way to overcome a closed approach to methodological issues, considering method more a tool than a truth.

This essay investigates the role that literature can play in ‘preserving green’ by contributing to situate the idea of green against a broader context, the one of politics, economics and law. Literature can help us to preserve not just a fact, but the many ways old and new historical facts inhabit our cultural memories and combine with aspects of our cultural heritage, which, in turn, pervade our private and collective identities inside an evolving global/globalised society. These ideas are discussed through an investigation of Janice Kulyk Keefer’s long narrative poem 'The Waste Zone', published in the literary quarterly Exile in the spring of 2002 with a photo reportage by Goran Petkovski covering the protests in Quebec City during the 2001 Summit of the Americas. Strategically re-writing T.S. Eliot’s 20th century classic 'The Waste Land', Kulyk Keefer’s work turns a moment in our recent history into a shared narrative which not only helps us to ‘remember’ the facts of Québec City 2001, but also elevates that event into the still-shot or iconic event which cannot but project a different idea of civic engagement also in the green and peaceful land of Canada.

Non di rado, istituzioni governative nazionali o sovranazionali sembrano imporre alle comunità decisioni politiche ed economiche, escludendole di fatto da una riflessione partecipata, accessibile e condivisa. In questo contesto, anche la letteratura può giocare un ruolo importante nel preservare un approccio ecologicamente corretto al nostro essere cittadini del mondo. Wikileaks o gli archivi di Snowden hanno fatto scalpore per avere rivelato ciò che qualcuno voleva rimanesse segreto; ma quando la letteratura gioca un ruolo simile ci dà, oltre all’informazione, anche l’ispirazione per affermare la nostra differenza e originalità come cittadini capaci di pensiero indipendente. Con questo scopo, la scrittrice canadese di origine ucraina, Janice Kulyk Keefer ha riscritto un classico del Novecento (La terra desolata di T.S. Eliot) non solo per ricordare e rileggere gli scontri accaduti nella città di Québec in occasione del terzo Summit delle Americhe (aprile del 2001), ma anche per stimolarci come cittadinanza attiva. La sua Zona desolata, che molto deve anche alla Disobbedienza Civile di H.D. Thoreau, aiuta così, partendo dal particolare, a riflettere su questioni ecologicamente universali che riguardano con urgenza e da vicino tutti.

Marshall McLuhan è conosciuto soprattutto come studioso dei media, ora recuperato anche nell’ambito degli studi letterari che indagano il divenire di nuove forme di narrazione ‘digitale’. Questo contributo intende, però, recuperare Marshall McLuhan e la sua scrittura a mosaico come ‘soggetti letterari’, suggerendo come le radici della comunicazione del critico canadese (e, di conseguenza, di tutte le sue esplorazioni nel campo dei media e della tecnologia) risiedano nel suo essere stato, prima di tutto, Professore di Letteratura. La formazione umanistica tradizionale acquisita negli anni Trenta del secolo scorso durante il dottorato all’Università di Cambridge, UK, è il terreno sul quale McLuhan innesta le sperimentazioni degli autori modernisti a lui cari: Joyce, Pound, Lewis, Eliot, Ford suggeriranno a McLuhan nuove euristiche capaci anche di illuminare sui nuovi processi culturali a lui coevi. Il ‘mosaico’ di McLuhan si configura così come scrittura ‘digitale’ ante litteram, suscitando l’interesse di autori e artisti delle nuove avanguardie di metà secolo: da Harley Parker, a Wilfred Watson, a Sorel Etrog. La forma interattiva e performativa della scrittura mcluhaniana, sviluppata a partire da sonde verbali paratattiche, sollecita una partecipazione attiva del lettore attraverso dinamiche multisensoriali e sinestetiche. Recuperare McLuhan e il suo ‘mosaico’ quali soggetti letterari aiuta a cogliere il potenziale che la ricerca umanistica può e deve continuare ad avere in epoca di grandi trasformazioni tecnologiche e sociali., Marshall McLuhan is known mostly as a media guru, now famous also among literary critics exploring the making of new digital forms of storytelling. However, this essay retrieves McLuhan and his mosaic-like form of writing as ‘literary subjects’, by suggesting that the roots of his thought (as well as the roots of all his explorations of media and technological environments) are to be found in his training and role as a Professor of Literature. The humanistic tradition that he studied when at Cambridge University, UK, in the 1930s, constitutes in fact the ground that McLuhan cross-pollinated through the experimental achievements of the Modernist writers he loved so much: Joyce, Pound, Lewis, Eliot, Ford offered to McLuhan new heuristics capable to enlighten on ongoing cultural processes. McLuhan’s mosaic is, therefore, a digital form of writing ante-litteram, attracting the new Avant-guard authors and writers of the 1960s: from Harley Parker, to Wilfred Watson to Sorel Etrog. McLuhan’s interactive and performative form of writing moves from paratactic verbal ‘probes’ and triggers an active participation from the readers through synesthetic and multi-sensorial dynamics. Reclaiming McLuhan and his mosaic as literary subject contributes to grasp the potential that humanistic research can and must have at a time of great technological and societal change.

In Don De Lillo’s Cosmopolis (2003), Eric Packer is a young multi-billionaire who inhabits a homogenising landscape turning individuals into urban waste. Driving safely across New York City into his white stretch limo, he has replaced both his body and personality with hyperreal and luxurious simulacra; he inhabits a self-referential cosmos reflecting a polis where human beings are discarded as active and sensible actors. However, Eric seems ready to renounce to his luxurious but aseptic reality and to return to a more human condition; in this novel, an old barbershop becomes the point of departure to restore humanity and fight back the overwhelming urban wasteland. Eric’s journey back to his truer self is doomed to fail, as he will be killed by his alter ego, Benno Levin, one of Eric’s first demoted than fired employees. Benno and Eric are here presented as the two sides of the same coin, in fact two self-made outcasts of globalization: they are both playing a role in the new e-capitalism, they are both responsible for what they have become and must face the consequences. Their final epiphany is here turned into a nemesis that translates into their final loss, their final defeat. There is no way out of globalised capitalism.

This essay approaches Flexi’s paintings as ‘imaginary postcards’ designing an ideal map of a certain Canadian collective identity, in fact a ‘cultural cliché’. Conceived for the market and for a series of customers (both locals and travellers), Flexi’s paintings hanged in a variety of places (restaurants, diners, people’s homes, hotels and more) and grew into a peculiar landscape themselves: they became part of an everyday scenario reminding people of what Canada should (ideally) be. Brought together for the first time in the form of an exhibition, these paintings reveal a more complex reality and even convey a reversed message: they show us what Canada in fact, never truly was, if not in imagination or myth-making. One of Marshall McLuhan’s laws of media postulates that each medium pushed to its extreme flips into its reverse. Pushing the Canadian picturesque to its extreme by repeating it almost ad infinitum, Flexi’s imaginary postcards of his paradise on earth flip into an uncanny geography that distracts us and, therefore, hides much from our vista. They create a simulacrum at once pretty and strange, and unfold a fascinating narrative enlightening on our way of reading, interpreting or even simulating a given reality.

Book Review of the Volume "Landscape and Memory in Post-Fascist Italian Film: Cinema Year Zero", by Giuliana Minghelli

This essay introduces the question of how a questionable translation can lead to lasting scholarly misunderstandings, modify the reception of specific discourses and change the focus of the original text. The case studies here concerns the Italian translation of Marshall McLuhan's classic book "Understanding Media: The Extensions of Men".

The present age (the age of social media) is probed through our cultural and technological (not too far) past. The way others use some of McLuhan’s terms to define our own present digital age are challenged. Today’s religion is viewed through the lens of the current networked digital environment in which we live. It is concluded that we live, as a result of social media, in ‘an extremely religious age.’ It is also suggested that we can better appreciate the environmental patterns characterising the age of social media if we set aside McLuhan, the media guru, for a moment, and retrieve, instead, his own approach to Christianity.

Il saggio propone una riflessione sull'opera di E. Morin come 'sfida al pensiero della complessità' partendo dallo studio della letteratura come strumento utile a capire i meccanismi meno visibili di quello che i critici hanno chiamato 'Il villaggio globale'. Il volume raccoglie riflessioni sul ruolo delle scienze umane in epoca contemporanea. Le crisi dell'economia, della politica, della cultura e dell'ambiente che da tempo investono l'umanità e il pianeta invocano altrettante riforme che traggano origine da una rigenerazione del pensiero, della conoscenza e dell'umanità dell'uomo. Per affrontare problemi che intessono di complessità il nostro mondo è necessario un pensiero che sia in grado di concepirli nella loro complementarietà e nella loro diffusione mondiale, adottando l'inedita prospettiva di un umanesimo planetario. L'Umanesimo, nozione un tempo astratta e ideale, è infatti oggi resa concreta dalla condivisione delle medesime questioni vitali e mortali da parte di una autentica comunità di destino nella quale di fatto sono uniti ormai tutti gli individui e tutti i popoli nell'umanità e l'umanità stessa ecosistema della sua patria terrestre. I saggi in questo volume affrontano i nodi della complessità e dei nuovi umanesimi dando nuova linfa agli studi letterari come strumento di lettura e comprensione del mondo contemporaneo.

Writing Our Way Home is an important contribution to literary studies. “Italian-Canadian writers are not just Canadian writers, but world writers,” states literary critic Elena Lamberti in the introduction to Writing Our Way Home. “They write from Canada with an original point of view on multiple (hybrid) identities and have something to tell the whole world …” A unique volume of creative and critical texts, Writing Our Way Home features contributors from Canada, Italy and the United States: Annalisa Bonomo, John Calabro, Michele Campanini, Licia Canton, Maria Giuseppina Cesari, Pietro Corsi, Domenic Cusmano, Marisa De Franceschi, Mike Dell’Aquila, Alberto Mario DeLogu, Delia De Santis, Gil Fagiani, Nino Famà, Venera Fazio, Frank Giorno, Gabriella Iacobucci, Elena Lamberti, Maria Lisella, Ernesto Livorni, Darlene Madott, Michael Mirolla, Caroline Morgan Di Giovanni, Linda Morra, Oriana Palusci, Gianna Patriarca, Maria Cristina Seccia, Maria Tognan, Osvaldo Zappa, Jim Zucchero.

One hundred years after Marshall McLuhan’s birth, Elena Lamberti explores a fundamental, yet neglected aspect of his work: the solid humanistic roots of his original ‘mosaic’ form of writing. In this investigation of how his famous communication theories were influenced by literature and the arts, Lamberti proposes a new approach to McLuhan’s thought.Reconnecting McLuhan with his literary past, Marshall McLuhan’s Mosaic is a demonstration of one of his greatest ideas: that literature not only matters, but can help us understand the hidden patterns that rule our environment.

El año 2011 marcó el centenario del nacimiento de Marshall McLuhan. Esta ocasión, sin duda, trajo una renovada atención tanto a su persona como a su obra, la reevaluación de sus teorías y su papel como intelectual durante el siglo XX. El conjunto de eventos internacionales a nivel institucional, académico, universitario y público ofrece ahora una gran oportunidad para reconsiderar a McLuhan como un todo. Esta situación ha sido fuertemente alentada por la etapa tecnológica: la Era Electrónica, que McLuhan empezó a explorar a partir de la década los 60, se ha convertido en nuestra era digital y ha pasado a ser comprendida como un entorno, tanto es así, que hoy en día es más fácil para nosotros acceder a las ideas de McLuhan, que para aquellos que leían sus libros o lo escuchaban en tiempo real. El texto que sigue (análisis de cómo la literatura y las artes influyeron en sus teorías sobre los medios) explora un aspecto poco estudiado de su obra: las raíces de su ‘método mosaico’ y su particular manera de escribir.

Nel 1924, Ford Madox Ford, scrittore che con Joseph Conrad sviluppò l’idea di ‘impressionismo letterario’, fondò a Parigi "the transatlantic review". Veterano di guerra, Ford sperava che la nuova rivista, pubblicata in contemporanea nella capitale francese, a Londra e a New York, potesse contribuire a creare una nuova Repubblica Internazionale delle Lettere capace di unire le nazioni attraverso la condivisione delle arti e della buona letteratura. Si sbagliava: la rivista non cambiò il futuro delle nazioni appena uscite dal conflitto mondiale, non riuscì a modificare il corso degli eventi che, da lì a pochi anni, portarono nuovi regimi totalitari a dominare in diverse realtà europee e a nuove terribili guerre. Eppure quella rivista ebbe un ruolo importante per il divenire culturale europeo e internazionale: aprì l’Europa all’America. O, meglio, contribuì a dare visibilità e solidità a un passaggio di consegne ormai nell’aria: Ernest Hemingway ed Ezra Pound, rispettivamente vice-direttore e collaboratore della transatlantic review, in pochi mesi, trasformarono l’impresa fordiana nello sbarco letterario della giovane America in Europa. John Dos Passos, Djuna Barnes, George Antheil, Mina Loy, William Carlos Williams, insieme a Hemingway, Pound e Gertrude Stein sono solo alcuni degli autori che contribuirono a rendere la transatlantic review, nelle parole del critico Americano Franck MacShane, la rivista “che traghettò l’America in Europa.”

Più di altre città del Canada, Toronto è divenuta nel tempo l’emblema del mosaico canadese. Chinatown, Cabbage Town, Little Italy, Little Lisbona, sono solo alcuni dei nomi che hanno connotato, nel tempo, aree urbane battezzate a partire dalla variabile etnica. L’evoluzione di tali aree, inscritte nel mosaico torontino, è stata paradigma utile per ricerche in ambito sociologico, antropologico e culturale (si pensi, ad esempio, allo studio dei movimenti migratori italiani verso il Canada portato avanti attraverso l’analisi della formazione di tre diverse Little Italies). Pur nella sua vivacità, il multiculturalismo urbano torontino si è tradotto nella definizione di aree urbane ‘etniche’, facilmente riconoscibili e contigue, caratterizzate da poche zone, per così dire, ‘miste’; in parallelo, per tutto il secondo novecento, Toronto è cresciuta soprattutto orizzontalmente, aggregando nuove realtà e dando vita alla ‘Great Toronto Area’, mosaico multietnico esteso ad alcuni borghi periferici. Il modello ‘a mosaico’ della Toronto del ventesimo secolo è però messo ora in discussione. Negli ultimi dieci anni, infatti,Toronto ha avviato una serie di trasformazioni importanti che riflettono il divenire di nuovi modelli culturali ed etnici che rispecchiano non solo una nuova realtà urbana ma anche una nuova idea di Canada: la ‘nuova Toronto’ ha verticalizzato il centro connotandolo rispetto alla periferia, ha attirato stararchitetti e ha avviato nuove forme di sponsorizzazione corporate che hanno reso alcuni luoghi meno simili al mosaico e più simili al crogiolo americano.

The essay discusses Marshall McLuhan's "The Gutenberg Galaxy" in the light of his humanitic roots and literary scholarly background. In particular, it emphasises the role played by Modernist literary experiment in shaping McLuhan's probing and writing techniques. Literature is, in fact, approached as functinal to the construction of the Canadian media theorist's investigative strategy and storytelling. McLuhan's mosaic is also approached as both a hypertext and a hyperlanguage developed by a humanist acting inside the electric age, pursuing an eclectic approach to knowledge and actuality, collecting materials from various fields and cultural languages. The essay proves that McLuhan's holistic and inclusive approach to mobile situations aimed to reveal new social patterns, that is, to point to the various larger figures in the carpet.

Il saggio decostruisce l'immagine-cliché di Marshall McLuhan quale 'media guru' per recuperarne la formazione umanistica e letteraria. Il saggio propone uno studio sulla scrittura 'a mosaico' di McLuhan ora letta alla luce della variabile tecnologica e letteraria analizzando il passaggio dalla linearità alla dimensione acustica. La dimensione interattiva del linguaggio mcluhaniano è poi utilizzata quale paradigma per rivedere il cliché che vede lo studioso canadese vestire i panni dell'oracolo dell'età elettrica, parodiato in diverse produzioni cinematografiche. Lo smascheramento del Dr Oblivion (dal celebre personaggio del film di David Cronenberg, 'Videodrome') porta, infatti, al recupero dell'archetipo: McLuhan quale professore di letteratura, capace di utilizzare l'immaginazione per esplorare, con cognizione di causa, il suo presente.

A conference promoted by the Istituto Italiano di Cultura, Toronto, in collaboration with: the European Union Centre of Excellence (EUCE) at the Centre for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies, university of Toronto; the University of Bologna; the Canadian Centre for German and European Studies at York Univesity, and with the supporto of EUNIC in Canada. The themes of memory studies and the problem of identity were addressed by invited speakers: Prof. Julia Creet, Prof. Shelley Hornstein; Prof. Andreas Ktzmann, Dr Elena Lamberti, Prof Claudio Magris. in a time of global migrations after 20th century wars, how does cultural memory strenghten or undermine social and political coehesion. The points of departure for this discussion were two books: "Memories and Reprsentations of War: The Case of World War I and World War II" ( E. Lamberti, V. Fortunati, eds, New York/Aserdam, Rodopoi 2009) and "Memory and Migration - Mutidisciplinary Approaches to Memory Studies" /J Creet, A. Kitmann eds, Toronto, University of toronto Press, 2010). Both collections of essays explore the complex cultural identity/ies of the peoples of Canada and the European Union member states and the bonds between the two political entities thrugh individual, institutional and artistic expressions of cultural memory.

"Counterblast" is one of the Canadian media philosopher's most radical yet relatively under-explored works. Two very different versions of this text exist, the full 1969 edition produced in collaboration with Harley Parker, and the biting never-before published manifesto McLuhan distributed as a hand-made 'zine' in 1954. On the occasion of the 'McLuhan in Europe 2011' network initiative, with the kind permission of The Estate of Corinne McLuhan and in collaboration with the Gingko Press (Hamburg) transmediale publish a special hardcover 'limited edition' facsimile of the original 1954 'COUNTERBLAST'. Featuring an introduction by McLuhan biographer Terrence Gordon and an afterword by literary scholar Elena Lamberti.

This chapter explores Frank MacShane's definition of the 'translatlantic review' as 'essentially the bringer of America to Europe'. Notwithstanding Ford's original intentions (to establish an 'International Republic of Letters'), the 'transatlantic review' was not a new English Review bringing various traditions together and talent scouting new would-be writers; similarly, it was not an outstanding literary review mirroring what was blooming in Paris at the time; it was the one which bore witness to the dawning Americanisation of the twentieth century. Following Pound's suggestion, Ford took on Hemingway as his assistant editor and Hemingway performed that role by fully embracing the spirit of the 'wondering Yankee' whose praise is sung by Lt. Pinkerton in Puccini's famous opera, Madama Butterfly. The American shock waves overwhelemed Ford's editorial strategy to te extent that the 'tr' became the torchbearer of the new American literary and artistic Risorgimento.

The introduction explains how, in the volume, authors have placed a particular emphasis on some case studies which were considered particularly useful to bring to light uneasy questions, such as the one of contested memories; in particular, the case of Italy and of Germany have offered an emblematic ground to further investigate the controversial and often painful idea of ‘reconciliation’. Moving often from the study of cultural memories of the two World Wars in these national realities, the authors have become more and more convinced that to acknowledge the existence of these contested memories is the first step to take to encourage the negotiation of a truly shared ethic of memory. Therefore, the introduction addresses uneasy and troubled questions: do winners and losers, victims and executioners, share the same right to remember? Are all executioners the same? Or can you distinguish among them? And is it ethical or moral to distinguish among them? And can you apply the same arguments to the winners? Are they all good? Needles to say, to ask these questions does not mean to revise history, it does not mean to be ‘revisionists’ or, even worst, to deny and to refuse to acknowledge what happened: condemnation of nazism cannot but be unquestionable, the exterminations camps stay as a historical fact and a shame, and you cannot absolve the dictators of the 1920s, 1930s and later years in Italy, in Germany, Spain, Portugal or the former USSR. Similarly, the partisan wars must be remembered as founding experiences deeply pervaded by national and transnational values of freedom and independence. All these memories must stay as lasting and untouchable values. And yet, this does not exempt us from the responsibility to remember also the shadows, to retrieve what, in time, has been removed, sometimes unconsciously, sometimes strategically; we have to face the uneasy debate on the dangers pervading the preservation of an idea of memory suffocated by all rituals and detached from historical sense, that is the dangers embedded in a strictly codified, even sanctified memory.

The chapter tries to define a few functional guidelines for a comparative reading of American narrative during and about WW1 and WW2, some more closely linked to America itself, others having a wider scope, centered on the new way of writing about war proposed by western literature since the end of WW1. In the celebrative war novel genre, the experience of war is, as a matter of fact, told to confirm the “mythical” quality of war experience. The anti-rhetorical novels of the first post war period reveal this very crisis, and, in this way, force on the reader to reflect on the fact that, after this very war, the world, and those who inhabit it, are going to be different. American authors, similarly to European ones, will feel the need to bear witness to war, will admit the difficulties in finding a voice to give it, because this new war annuls all preceding categories of identification, makes language lose its meaning; they will produce a formal reconsideration that on the one hand, will be in debt of the new avant-gardes, and on the other of the new forms of communication. This last is, in fact, a very important element, particularly if put in relation to the fact that many American authors who eventually wrote novels on war came to Europe as war correspondents. New Journalism, radio transmission, photography and, later, cinema start being tools that characterize the new way in which war is described and have an impact on the new narrative forms.

The essay discusses the issue of European Cultural Memory in the light of both the historical debate and literary criticism of the last twenty years. Memory studies can offer an interesting ground for observing the making of the new Europe, especially if one considers that the memory-power nexus is crucial to understand how memory has been subject to manipulation and exploitation by egemonic states. In particular, the cross-investigation of memory in the humanities and literary studies has marked the breakdown of disciplinary barriers, giving rise to a renewed comparison among disciplines such as history, philosophy, social sciences, anthropology. This essays points out the dynamic and positive aspect which links memory studies to a series of politcal issues which today underpin the moulding of a European scenario, as they can help to sort out new strategies for assessing controversial memories of the same time; a process which constitute a fundamental passage for the full achievement of 'reconciliation', inside the same country and across countries.

The essay comes as a response to a challenging question that a group of scientists based in Bologna posed to a broader academic community in the occasion of an interdisciplinary workshop which took place in the summer 2005: is complexity a paradigm useful for other disciplines? The hidden goal was, in fact, to encourage people from both the humanities and the sciences to work together in order to explore new ways to interface knowledge. The exploration was not at all an easy one, ‘complexity’ being a concept leading to many situations in the various domains; and yet, what the different approaches seemed to have in common, be it in the humanities or in the sciences, was the fact that the term ‘complexity’ was understood not simply as the object of a given research, but mostly as a term which forced to reconceptualise the modes of investigation. As a consequence, to explore the idea of ‘complexity’ as a ‘useful paradigm’ triggered a series of speculations on the various methodologies pertaining to the various areas of study, in turn encouraging a deep analysis of given ontological patterns which, in some cases, could even lead to the breaking of traditional disciplinary statutes. Given those premises, the essays introduces some speculations on ‘Complexity & Humanities/Literary Studies’ taking into account three main issues: 1) Complexity as a useful paradigm for humanities & literary studies; 2) Side-Effects of Complexity on Literary Studies; 3) From Avant-Garde Experiments to Laws of Media: ‘field approach’ to a case study.

Il saggio ricorda le donne di origine ebrea imprigionate nel lager di Teresin durante la seconda guerra mondiale. Le strategie di sopravvivenza messe in atto da queste prigioniere vengono lette come forme di resistenza e come "arte dell'umanità", alla luce della idea di "patrimonio di sofferenza dell'umanità" di Warburg. lo spunto di riflessione viene dato da un 'memoir' scritto da una vittima di Teresin, "In Memory Kitchen", e giustappone i concetti di memoria privata e memoria collettiva per ricollocare una certa idea di 'arti domestiche' nell'ambito di un percorso di resistenza umana capace di lasciare traccia indelebile e diventare esperienza collettiva fondante.

Il saggio prende in esame memoirs e romanzi scritti da 'Japanese-Americans' che, all'epoca della sconda guerra mondiale, vennero rinchiusi in campi disumani, di volta in volta definiti ‘di transito’, ‘di assembramento’, di ‘ricollocamento’, ‘di internamento’ . L'internamento viene imposto all’intero nucleo familiare a partire dal 19 febbraio 1942 per effetto dell’Executive Order 9066, firmato dal Presidente Roosevelt. Si tratta, dunque, di una discriminazione etnico-razziale che, implicitamente, porta ad una sorta di tipizzazione del ‘nemico’ fondata sulla costruzione di una idea di alterità (razziale) e di pericolosità funzionale più alle politiche interne dell’establishment americano che giustificata dalla realtà della situazione nordamericana di quegli anni, anche dopo Pearl Harbour. Per interpretare il segno lasciato sulla società americana dalle tracce letterarie scritte dai Japanese-Americans dopo Pearl Harbour, si utilizza la controversa teoria del sociologo americano J. Alexander, secondo la quale, nel secondo novecento si assiste alla universalizzazione del dramma dell’olocausto nel mondo occidentale, un processo che connota la costruzione e la definizione di bene e di male e, implicitamente, di moralità, così come pure illumina sui meccanismi che controllano la costruzione simbolica che trasporta e fissa tali concetti nell’immaginario e nella memoria dei singoli e dei gruppi sociali.

MediaBreve introduzione alla sezione 'Media' del volume in oggetto, con particolare riferimento al cinema, alle nuove tecnologie, al giornalismo, alla pubblicità e al digitale. L'approccio è basato sull'idea i 'ecologia dei media', mutuata da Postman e McLuhan e porta ad un dialogo tra studiosi della tradizione europea e studiosi della tradizione nordamericana.

Discussione dell'opera dell'autore canadese Wyndham Lewis e del suo approccio al tema del primitivo, con particolare riferimento alle teorie sulla razza degli anni trenta. Il saggio prende in esame i libri di viaggio in Marocco e il romanzo di ambientazione canadese, "Self-Condemned", per riesaminare la posizione di Lewis nel periodo 1925-1939; la riflessione sul concetto di primitivo si combina a quella sulle nuove forme di civiltà urbana, a loro volta connesse allo studio della società di massa, da Lewis considerata come punto osmotico tra primitivi e civilizzati.

Il saggio ripercorre i processi legati al farsi di nuovi costrutti sociali in rapporto all’adozione di nuove tecnologie della comunicazione, incoraggiando una riflessione sui processi culturali complessi che condizionano, nel tempo, il senso storico, l’idea di appartenenza, le questioni identitarie di gruppo (comunità, Stato, nazione, confederazione) e individuali (il self). Poiché la scrittura, che privilegia un’idea di memoria statica, non annulla tout court l’oralità, fenomeno essenzialmente relazionale, dinamico, emozionale e partecipatorio, diventa interessante sovrapporre i due mmenti e fare interagire nel tempo le due diverse forme della comunicazione come altrettanti fattori fondamentali per la messa a punto di memorie ufficiali e di contro-memorie. I processi artistici possono costituire un punto di osservazione privilegiato per la riflessione incrociate e rivelare cio che, nel tempo, è stato rimosso, in modo consio o inconscio. Fondamentali restano, a questo proposito, gli studi di Marshall McLuhan. La riflessione si complica negli ultimi anni del XX secolo, quando nuove tecnologie della comunicazione si costituiscono a partire da una commistione ragionata di oralità e di scrittura, portando su uno stesso piano forme che, fino a quel momento, coesistono, ma preservano una loro autonomia. Diventa di grande attualità, nell’ambito degli studi sulla memoria, l’idea antica di arte/teatro della memoria in relazione al farsi di nuove tecnologie della comunicazione; un’idea in sé problematica che mette insieme i concetti opposti (o complementari) di artificio/espediente per la costruzione della memoria e tecnica/téchne della memoria.

The essay discusses the work of Canadian ‘media guru’ Marshall McLuhan moving from his humanistic background and education. The essay investigates his media theories in relation to his knowledge of Pre-Socratic and Patristic tradition, as well as his knowledge of the arts of trivium as expressed in his PhD dissertation on “The Place of Thomas Nashe in the Learning of His Time”. The goal is to prove that McLuhan’s developed his famous Laws of Media moving from a precise literary tradition, and that literature offered him a series of powerful heuristic tool to approach the new media induced environment.

This essay explores in depth the literary ground (and grounding) of Marshall McLuhan’s media theories, revealing en route much that is new about his approach to and insights into media studies. The essay offers a wide-ranging study of McLuhan’s modernist ascendancies, taking in the history of knowledge, rhetoric, and media from the middle ages to the present. The essay demonstrates that it was McLuhan’s literary training in Renaissance literature and rhetoric, and his engagement with Modernist writers, that gave him the conceptual framework and the language with which to analyze contemporary media. Reading these modernists in terms of McLuhan’s ideas works towards a new history of media studies, and provides a new understanding of his creative use of language and style.

McLuhan’s great novelty in the "Mechanical Bride" is the application of the method of art analysis in order to give a critical evaluation of society. The novel eschews both the ‘essay format’ and the ‘true’ literary genre, and the author starts from the idea that environment is an effect derived from overlapping experiences. These can be better understood through an artistic perception which facilitates a special estrangement, an aloofness that McLuhan often uses for comical purposes. The idea of ‘vivisecting’ society has an illustrious antecedent: James Joyce. McLuhan takes Joyce’s "Ulysses" and "Finnegans Wake" as models of the shift that is taking place in the contemporary concept of sensibility due to the development of new techniques of communication and therefore of a new shaping of society. The scholar studies carefully Joyce’s puns and aphorisms and comments on how Joyce has created a new aesthetic by combining ancient rhetorical strategies with the possibilities offered by the new forms of mass communication. McLuhan’s technique of the juxtaposition, a device practised also by many Modernist artists, is aimed at revealing the process of manipulation of the human mind which seems to transform individuals into well-oiled cogs of a collective machinery.

This dissertation discusses contemporary Anglophone children’s literature representing the Holocaust and it claims that, through the reading of historical novels, children can acquire a specific kind of postmemory, which I call ‘attitudinal postmemory’. The works analyzed have been written by ‘non-related’ authors, meaning writers who are not witnesses nor their descendants. Attitudinal postmemory is based on the readers’ establishment of a personal-emotional link with the Holocaust by means of narrative empathy towards the characters; it is an ‘active’ kind of memory because it will hopefully convert into an informed, respectful attitude towards peers that opposes the Nazi ideology. The dissertation is structured into two main parts. Part One provides an overview of the origins and development of Holocaust memory in Western countries. Chapter 1 introduces two major historiographical-literary debates and the following chapter discusses three main issues concerning the representation of the Holocaust (naming, the need to represent, and the ‘right to’ represent) while considering the forms and genres traditionally used and considered ‘appropriate’. Focusing on the scope of literary narratives, Chapter 3 explains how the presence of a personal-emotional link is essential to acquire Holocaust postmemory and, in particular, attitudinal postmemory. The criteria adopted with regard to the case studies are described in Chapter 4. Part Two discusses the process of interweaving historical truth with fiction and how historical fiction helps child readers acquire attitudinal postmemory. After a brief overview of the genre in Chapter 5, Chapter 6 probes how it is possible to meet the two main expectations of historical fiction while avoiding a disrespectful stance towards the Holocaust. Chapter 7 discusses the idea of empathy and some issues in the representation of Nazi evil, while Chapter 8 offers a comparative analysis of the case studies proposed, including authors from the UK, Ireland, Australia, and the USA.