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The present study comparatively examined the socio-political and economic transformation of the indigenous Sámi in Sweden and the Indian American in the United States of America occurring first as a consequence of colonization and later as a product of interaction with the modern territorial and industrial state, from approximately 1500 to 1900. The first colonial encounters of the Europeans with these autochthonous populations ultimately created an imagery of the exotic Other and of the noble savage. Despite these disparaging representations, the cross-cultural settings in which these interactions took place also produced the hybrid communities and syncretic life that allowed levels of cultural accommodation, autonomous space, and indigenous agency to emerge. By the nineteenth century, however, the modern territorial and industrial state rearranges the dynamics and reaches of power across a redefined territorial sovereign space, consequently, remapping belongingness and identity. In this context, the status of indigenous peoples, as in the case of Sámi and of Indian Americans, began to change at par with industrialization and with modernity. At this point in time, indigenous populations became a hindrance to be dealt with the legal re-codification of Indigenousness into a vacuumed limbo of disenfranchisement. It is, thus, the modern territorial and industrial state that re-creates the exotic into an indigenous Other. The present research showed how the initial interaction between indigenous and Europeans changed with the emergence of the modern state, demonstrating that the nineteenth century, with its fundamental impulses of industrialism and modernity, not only excluded and marginalized indigenous populations because they were considered unfit to join modern society, it also re-conceptualized indigenous identity into a constructed authenticity.

The present study comparatively examined the socio-political and economic transformation of the indigenous Sámi in Sweden and the Indian American in the United States of America occurring first as a consequence of colonization and later as a product of interaction with the modern territorial and industrial state, from approximately 1500 to 1900. The first colonial encounters of the Europeans with these autochthonous populations ultimately created an imagery of the exotic Other and of the noble savage. Despite these disparaging representations, the cross-cultural settings in which these interactions took place also produced the hybrid communities and syncretic life that allowed levels of cultural accommodation, autonomous space, and indigenous agency to emerge. By the nineteenth century, however, the modern territorial and industrial state rearranges the dynamics and reaches of power across a redefined territorial sovereign space, consequently, remapping belongingness and identity. In this context, the status of indigenous peoples, as in the case of Sámi and of Indian Americans, began to change at par with industrialization and with modernity. At this point in time, indigenous populations became a hindrance to be dealt with the legal re-codification of Indigenousness into a vacuumed limbo of disenfranchisement. It is, thus, the modern territorial and industrial state that re-creates the exotic into an indigenous Other. The present research showed how the initial interaction between indigenous and Europeans changed with the emergence of the modern state, demonstrating that the nineteenth century, with its fundamental impulses of industrialism and modernity, not only excluded and marginalized indigenous populations because they were considered unfit to join modern society, it also re-conceptualized indigenous identity into a constructed authenticity.

The present study comparatively examined the socio-political and economic transformation of the indigenous Sámi in Sweden and the Indian American in the United States of America occurring first as a consequence of colonization and later as a product of interaction with the modern territorial and industrial state, from approximately 1500 to 1900. The first colonial encounters of the Europeans with these autochthonous populations ultimately created an imagery of the exotic Other and of the noble savage. Despite these disparaging representations, the cross-cultural settings in which these interactions took place also produced the hybrid communities and syncretic life that allowed levels of cultural accommodation, autonomous space, and indigenous agency to emerge. By the nineteenth century, however, the modern territorial and industrial state rearranges the dynamics and reaches of power across a redefined territorial sovereign space, consequently, remapping belongingness and identity. In this context, the status of indigenous peoples, as in the case of Sámi and of Indian Americans, began to change at par with industrialization and with modernity. At this point in time, indigenous populations became a hindrance to be dealt with the legal re-codification of Indigenousness into a vacuumed limbo of disenfranchisement. It is, thus, the modern territorial and industrial state that re-creates the exotic into an indigenous Other. The present research showed how the initial interaction between indigenous and Europeans changed with the emergence of the modern state, demonstrating that the nineteenth century, with its fundamental impulses of industrialism and modernity, not only excluded and marginalized indigenous populations because they were considered unfit to join modern society, it also re-conceptualized indigenous identity into a constructed authenticity.

Questo dottorato ha avuto lo scopo di utilizzare diversi strumenti messi a disposizione dai software GIS per lo studio e la gestione delle valanghe nel territorio della Regione Autonoma Valle d'Aosta e nel comprensorio sciistico di “Piancavallo” della Regione Friuli Venezia Giulia. Come obiettivo e base di partenza per le successive elaborazioni, sempre oggetto di questa tesi, si è creato il geodatabase del Catasto Regionale Valanghe della Valle d’Aosta, suddiviso in diversi raster dataset, feature dataset e feature class relativi alle valanghe perimetrate sul terreno tramite rilievi GPS, alle valanghe desunte da ricerca storica o da foto-interpretazione, e dalle valanghe che insistono sui centri abitati, per cui è stata fatta una modellazione sulla base dei tempi di ritorno e sulle pressioni d’impatto. Il secondo obiettivo (tutt’ora in corso all’interno del progetto transfrontaliero Italia-Svizzera STRADA “Strategie di adattamento ai cambiamenti climatici per la gestione dei rischi naturali”, con termine nel 2013) è stato quello di trovare delle strategie per la mitigazione della pericolosità valanghiva, che coinvolge il territorio e in primis le amministrazioni locali, regionali e diversi enti gestori del territorio, con particolare attenzione alla gestione della viabilità. Spesso infatti i soggetti preposti si trovano costretti a dover ricorrere alla chiusura preventiva delle strade, lasciando isolate intere valli anche per diversi giorni creando disagi enormi alla popolazione e all’industria del turismo. Inoltre mancano delle direttive certe a supporto di scelte decisionali di apertura/chiusura delle strade, e il peso di una simile responsabilità è notevole. Questo lavoro ha messo a punto una procedura ottenuta interpolando, in ambiente di Geoprocessing e tramite query di selezione, feature relative alle valanghe, alla viabilità, e agli edifici fornendo uno strumento valido per quantificare in prima istanza i siti passibili di interventi di distacco artificiale, 2009/2010