Abroad - In Italy, More Basta Than Bravo for Cultural Diversity - NYTimes.com
... Rome, an ancient magnet for foreigners, is naturally more integrated than most Italian cities and, unlike most of the country, it has taken at least a few steps in recent years to come to terms with its multicultural reality, among them instituting a public library program to reach immigrants and provide Romans with books and lectures about foreign cultures. The question now is whether such efforts will continue. <...> Italian culture certainly isn't diverse now. It subsists on an all-white, all-native, monoethnic diet of Italian game shows, Italian television mini-series, Italian advertisements on cable stations for improbable vibrating contraptions that promise to jiggle fat away, and Italian pop music. Even Roman schoolchildren no longer stray far from a spaghetti-with-ragú diet now that an intercultural city program to serve one international-themed lunch a month has been abandoned by the new center-right government, heeding some Italian mothers, who doubted the nutritional value of falafel and curry. <...> Gabriella Sanna directs a multicultural library program here, which was started on a shoestring budget of about $120,000 in 1997. Today it survives on less, she said. ... She was diplomatic when the conversation turned to the recent election and whether her program would survive. "This is a new experience for us because we've always worked in a favorable climate," Ms. Sanna said. Her dour expression suggested she wasn't optimistic.
... Rome, an ancient magnet for foreigners, is naturally more integrated than most Italian cities and, unlike most of the country, it has taken at least a few steps in recent years to come to terms with its multicultural reality, among them instituting a public library program to reach immigrants and provide Romans with books and lectures about foreign cultures. The question now is whether such efforts will continue. <...>
Italian culture certainly isn't diverse now. It subsists on an all-white, all-native, monoethnic diet of Italian game shows, Italian television mini-series, Italian advertisements on cable stations for improbable vibrating contraptions that promise to jiggle fat away, and Italian pop music. Even Roman schoolchildren no longer stray far from a spaghetti-with-ragú diet now that an intercultural city program to serve one international-themed lunch a month has been abandoned by the new center-right government, heeding some Italian mothers, who doubted the nutritional value of falafel and curry. <...>
Gabriella Sanna directs a multicultural library program here, which was started on a shoestring budget of about $120,000 in 1997. Today it survives on less, she said. ... She was diplomatic when the conversation turned to the recent election and whether her program would survive. "This is a new experience for us because we've always worked in a favorable climate," Ms. Sanna said. Her dour expression suggested she wasn't optimistic.
you are the media you consume.
heeding some Italian mothers, who doubted the nutritional value of falafel and curry.
Well, I doubt the nutritional value of falafel as well. something that looks and tastes like burnt breadcrumbs in glue can't be good for you.
But curry....now there's a food staple. A basic food group. keep to the Fen Causeway
