Thrown into the world: The shift between pavlova and pasta in the ethnic identity of Australians originating from Italy

Abstract

Forty-one years on from Huber’s study exploring the assimilation of Italian-Australians, an increasing trend towards ethnic revival can be observed among the third generation of immigrants. Drawing on a case study of a family originating from Calabria in the 1950s and now living in Adelaide, South Australia, I find a widespread intergenerational identification of ethnicity as ‘being Italian’, which has different meanings across the three generations, depending on the individual’s phenomenological perception of being thrown into the world. A pivotal role in this shift of ethnic identity is played by what I refer to as institutional positionality, the individuals’ perceptions of the position of their ethnic ‘being in the world’. By merging sociology of migration, including the Bourdieusian conceptual apparatus of capital, with Heidegger’s existential theory, a reflexive framework is developed that takes into account the relevance of ontology in the field of migration.