Naples and the Nation: Image, Media and Culture in the Second Republic

This project explores contemporary cultural representations of Naples, a city often marginalised in discussion of Italian 'national' culture but central to state-of-the-nation discourses. It interrogates how cultural products addressing Naples represent the city and its relationship with Italy, and asks what the view from Naples reveals about the nation-state, its workings and its discourses. It further explores the wider implications of the shifting balance of power between cities and nation-states in recent decades, in light of weakening state power and the growing freedom of cities to build, brand and promote themselves independent of the nation-state (Clark and Moonen, 2016).

The introduction of direct mayoral election in Italy coincided with the reformulation of the state as the 'Second Republic' to create a 'Republic of Cities' (Bassolino, 1996). The prominence of Naples in this period makes it a privileged site for the study of the contemporary relationship between city and nation. Hailed as a beacon of urban citizenship and good governance during the 'Neapolitan Renaissance' (c.1993-2001), the city subsequently descended into extreme dysfunction, as organised crime wars and an urban waste crisis made headlines worldwide. The radical oscillation in the city's fortunes spawned an extraordinarily rich corpus of cultural production. While individual examples - Elena Ferrante's 'Neapolitan Novels' (2011-14), Roberto Saviano's Gomorra (2006) and its screen adaptations (2009; 2014; 2016; 2017) - have enjoyed enormous success and detailed critical analysis, the wider field of media and cultural representations remains largely unexplored.

My research maps that wider field and highlights the role played by cultural production in shaping understandings of the relationship between Naples and the Italian nation-state. It interrogates how national identities and discourses play out in the context of Naples - how they are negotiated, refracted, challenged or made concrete in the microcosmic context of the city and its representation. I counter a tendency in existing criticism to reinforce conventional perceptions of Naples as an exceptional urban and cultural reality, unrelated to or deviating from a national norm. I highlight instead how cultural products attest to continuities between Naples and the Italian nation-state and critique national discourse and practice. In uniting analysis of cultural products and news media constructions of the city, my book will furnish a more comprehensive account of cultural engagement with Naples than has been offered to date; it will also deliver a model for an integrated cultural studies approach to the study of city and nation in other contexts.

The project is underpinned by a multidisciplinary cultural studies approach. It unites close analysis of texts (news reports, literary works, film and TV series) with exploration of the wider history of cultural discourses pertaining to Naples and its relationship with Italy. It is underpinned by postcolonial theory as applied to the Italian south (Cassano 1996; 2010; Chambers 2007); it provincializes the 'northern view' of the city and repositions it at the centre of discussion about the nation-state and its effects. It thus exemplifies the relevance of applying postcolonial critique to appropriate Western contexts.

The fellowship will enhance my standing as a leader in modern Italian cultural studies. It will allow me to lead and manage an important and timely study that will reframe our understanding of Naples, its cultural representation and its relationship with Italy. It will enable me, through the organisation of an international conference and the creation of a scholarly network, to effect a wider reconceptualisation of the contemporary relationship between city and nation. I will engage with interested publics throughout and collaborate with teachers of Italian to produce teaching materials for the new A-Level syllabus.

In seeking to provide a comprehensive and detailed understanding of how cultural representations of Naples speak to contemporary issues in Italian society, politics and culture, this project provides a unique insight into the ways in which Italian national discourses, policies and identities play out in the context of Italy's fourth-largest city. Given the high national profile and the international success of cultural production addressing Naples in contemporary Italian culture, the research will be of relevance and benefit to a range of non-academic beneficiaries with an interest or investment in Naples and Italian culture, as well as the relationship between city and nation broadly conceived.

1) The research findings will be of potential benefit to those interested in or affected by the current configuration and understanding of the relationship between city and nation. Urban festivals, urban think-tanks and members of the public with an interest and investment in cultural articulations of urban identities and will benefit from the Naples-based case-study of the relationship between city and nation. The project's emphasis on cultural production as a barometer of public sentiment and as a vehicle for negotiating, interpreting and countering media discourses relating to the city will be especially relevant to policy makers and practitioners of urban governance, especially those involved in mediating between municipal and national concerns. I will propose a panel on city and nation for the Bristol-based Festival of the Future City in 2019 and make contact with the Centre for Cities to identify new audiences and collaboration opportunities arising from the project and its findings.

2) Members of the public, especially those with an interest in Italy and Italian culture, will gain cultural enrichment and educational benefit from the wide range of public activities and events at which I will discuss my research findings on Naples and the Italian nation-state. These will include public festivals ('Pint of Science') and knowledge exchange events (Anglo-Italian Society) and para-academic news fora (e.g., The Conversation). They will also include film-showing-and-talk events in Bristol and London which will be of particular interest to people of Italian heritage and to the new generation of Italians living and working in the UK (London is twinned with Naples and host to the largest Italian community in the UK).

3) Educational policy-makers will benefit from the development of an accessible, 2-page policy briefing paper outlining the rationale for and the implications of moving away from the contentious and outmoded concept of the North-South divide and towards a more sophisticated understanding of the diversity at play within Italian culture, society and economy. While primarily targeting educational stakeholders (EdExcel and DoE), the policy briefing will be made more widely available via the PolicyBristol and Society of Italian Studies websites to members of the public.

4) Teachers and students of A-Level Italian in UK secondary schools will benefit from the development of a theoretical framework and appropriate learning materials relating to the topic of the 'North-South divide' on the new EdExcel A-Level syllabus. In the absence of a set A-Level textbook, my collaboration with the network of Teachers of Italian in the UK to elaborate an appropriate framework for the interpretation of the topic and to co-produce teaching materials integrating linguistic skills with cultural analysis will be of immediate and direct benefit to educators and pupils working towards examination by the EdExcel exam board. The material will be made available to the public via The Italian Teaching Resources Website, a collaborative enterprise and open platform for the exchange of teaching ideas and dissemination of teaching materials and resources.