Performing Citizenship, Decolonizing ‘Italianness’: North African Migrants’ Descendants in Italy between Activism and Everyday Life

Citizenship is a central issue in public debate in Italy. In recent years, the 'children of migrants' have played a crucial role in promoting a reform of the law on the acquisition of Italian citizenship, which is seen as anachronistic and discriminatory. However, citizenship is more than a legal issue; it has a lived and performative dimension, embedded in everyday life (Kallio et al., 2020).

This paper presents the first findings of the research project 'Growing old, feeling like citizens?' (PRIN, University of Padua & Milan-Bicocca) - a multi-site qualitative study based on biographical interviews, focus groups and ethnographic observation - which investigates the transition to adulthood of young Muslims of North African origin in Italy and their 'in-between' experiences of identity and citizenship (Besozzi, Colombo, Santagati, 2009; Caneva, 2011).

Drawing on intersectional and decolonial perspectives (hooks, 2020, Lugones, 2010, Vergès, 2019), the study explores the multiple ways in which the descendants of North African migrants in Italy perform citizenship and identity in their everyday lives, navigating through different categories and practices of gender, race, class, religion, etc. These youth have to confront persistent processes of exclusion and racialisation determined by historically constituted power relations (Mellino, 2012). However, in constructing their own sense of 'multiple belongings' (Valtolina, Marazzi, 2006), they are able to mobilise different resources and strategies of resistance, political engagement and cultural activism, creating a wide network of transnational and diasporic connections (Acocella & Pepicelli, 2018; Camozzi et al., 2019; Cingolani, Ricucci, 2014). These strategies often imply the political use of art (Frisina, Kyeremeh 2021; Frisina, Houbabi, 2022) to assert overtly feminist and anti-racist positions (Chiappelli, Bernacchi, 2024). Through these practices, this 'new generation of Italians' is making an essential contribution to rethinking 'Italianness' in a postcolonial sense (Grimaldi, Vicini, 2024).