Thursday, August 24, 2006

Bloggers Respond to "Guide to the Italian Mind"

The ANNOTICO Report

 

I always thought Italians were easy to figure out, but when you are an American, with a Beer and Bowling Mentality, naturally The Italians can be a Puzzle, within a Conundrum, wrapped in an Enigma. Italians have 2500 years of Culture, we Americans seem to be  trying to get started. Italians have learned to distrust governments, we Americans are so niave, invoke the word patriotism, and our brain gets short circuited, and we act like sheep being led to slaughter.

 

Of course Italian Americans sort of distort the image of Italians in the minds of Americans.

 

In any event you must read "La Bella Figura: A Field Guide to the Italian Mind"  By Beppe Severgnini.

 

Below are some Bloggers Comments re the "Italian Mind"

 

 

WHEN NOT IN ROME........

 

Dot. Commonweal  

A Blog By the Magazine Editors

Joseph A. Komonchak

August 24, 2006

The New York Times  had a review of   LA BELLA FIGURA: A Field Guide to the Italian Mind  By Beppe Severgnini, on Italy and Italians today. The review began with this paragraph:

In Italy, red lights come in many varieties. A rare few actually mean stop. Others, to the Italian driver, suggest different interpretations. At a pedestrian crossing at 7 a.m., with no pedestrians around, it is a negotiable red, more like a weak orange. At a traffic intersection, red could mean what the Florentines call rosso pieno, or full red, but it might, with no cars coming, be more of a suggestion than a command. It all depends.

This is an approach to laws that most Americans have some difficulty with. People here stop at red lights even though it's 2:00 AM and there's not another car in the county, and would get a ticket from a cop if they didn't stop.

I've heard the difference in culture applied also to Canon Law. "The Italians make the laws, and the Americans keep them."

The Responses were:

 

Posted by Patrick Molloy  
on August 24, 2006, 4:15 pm

It aappears that the book's observations are consistent with another description of Italians: the world's worst organizers and the best improvisers.

 

Posted by Bill Mazzella  
on August 24, 2006, 4:28 pm

The Italians also do not take the church too seriously. In fact they are rather contemptuos of it. I used to argue with my father and grandfather about this. My father said the church was a bunch of racketeers and my grandfather objected to my entering the seminary.

Posted by Joseph F. Gannon  
on August 24, 2006, 5:10 pm

....The NYT reporters in Europe, when nothing else is on their minds, often come up with tales illustrating how comically odd the French, English, Italians, Germans et al., depending on where they are stationed. What they are displaying is often their own ignorance and/or provincialism.

 

Posted by Susan Gannon  
on August 24, 2006, 6:02 pm

I have heard this sort of easy-going attitude referred to as "Romanita",  I think, and have heard it blamed for considerable discomfort given to pious straight-arrow types who prefer having a very few, very reasonable rules they expect to follow. There is a belief, (perhaps a folk belief?) that those with a laxer view of their responsibilities don't mind inventing a proliferation of stringent little rules they can happily ignore, and they find a certain pleasure in driving the straight-arrows predictably crazy with them.

 

Posted by Bill Collier  
on August 24, 2006, 6:08 pm

Reminds me of the story about how to distinguish between Canadians and Americans in Canada: Even if there is not a car in sight, Canadians will not step into a crosswalk until the "cross" signal comes on. Americans, as we all know, are already two blocks away by then.

 

Posted by Scott  
on August 24, 2006, 7:01 pm

In Utah, yellow always means: "Speed up! The light is turning red." A friend from Idaho driving here was once rear-ended by a school bus no less because he began engaging his break and slowing when the light turned yellow.

 

Posted by Bill Mazzella  
on August 24, 2006, 7:55 pm

Luigi Barzini probably wrote the classic on Italians in his 1964 book "The Italians." His explaining of "bella figura" is priceless. Even the prostitutes in Italy were exceptional according to Barzini.  I'll give this book a look but it will have to be something to compare to Barzini.

"Italians have always excelled in all activities in which the appearance is predominant: architecture, decorations, landscape gardening, the figurative arts, pageantry, fireworks, ceremonies, opera, and now industrial design, stage jewellery, fashions, and the cinema." Luigi Barzini, The Italians

 

Posted by Bernard Dauenhauer  
on August 24, 2006, 8:02 pm

About 30 years ago, I entertained a Belgian (Flemish) Norbertine. While driving him around, he asked me what the signs saying "35 Miles" or "45 Miles" meant. When I told him that they set speed limits, he replied: "That's an insult to your intelligence. Surely you know how fast you can safely go." I'm from Louisiana. He's got a point.

Posted by Joseph A. Komonchak  
on August 24, 2006, 8:15 pm

And then there is the difference between Anglo-Saxons and Italians with regard to lines. "Mind the queue" has no Italian equivalent...........And then there is the traffic around the Piazza Venezia in Rome...

 

Posted by Jean Raber  
on August 24, 2006, 9:15 pm

Susan, I hope Roberto Benigni reads your post. I can imagine the movie that might ensure, with him playing both the part of the lax rule-maker having a laugh at the expense of the straight-arrow rule-follower.

 

 

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