Is the Mediterranean a White Italian–European Sea? The multiplication of borders in the production of historical subjectivity

Abstract

In this essay, I try to view the Mediterranean not only as a sea but also as an excess space of signification. In particular, it is the Black Mediterranean that interests me: the physical and symbolic realms of memory of several diasporas in Europe. Some scholars have shown the simultaneous presence of different Mediterraneans, some of which are located outside its basin. Others have grasped its function as a “middle sea”, a connection space between cultures, societies and economies, so that even a desert can be a Mediterranean. This essay will analyse the Black Mediterranean – the realms of memory of part of the diasporas from the Horn of Africa: those who have followed the Sahara–Sudan–Libya–Lampedusa route.

• diaspora and migrations
• horn of Africa
• Mediterranean
• oral history
• postcolonial

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Notes

1 The project was funded by an ERC Starting Grant awarded to Professor Passerini. This essay is one of the products of the project. For further information, see www.babe.eui.eu.

2 All translations are mine.