Living on the move : belonging and identification among adolescent children of immigrants in Italy

The paper investigates how young children of immigrants in Italy conceive their presence in a globalized world. It explores how – in everyday life – the ideas of belonging, citizenship and identification are continuously transformed in order to fit the changing contexts. Accustomed to get in touch with both global flux of ideas, information, cultural productions and local codes ruling the mundane site of daily life, these youngsters are developing specific skills. They are able to manage difference and equality according to the different situations, producing articulated and fluid meanings of their location in the social world. Instead to be forced into the choice between assimilation and ethnic closure, they develop a tactical ethnicity, layered, adaptable, and ready to take advantage of the circumstances. Their main goal is to avoid being excluded from rewording situations – both global and local. For youngsters growing up in a globalized, changing world, managing ambivalence is more important than coherence: to fit the context in order not to reduce personal chances is more relevant than showing an integrity which is not affected by the situation. Developing a tactical ethnicity, these youngsters deeply transform the ideas of belonging and identification, claiming for a substantive change of the way to understand citizenship and italianness. The data presented are based on 72 in-depth narrative interviews with adolescents, aged between 17 and 22 years old, children of immigrants attending Italian higher secondary school in Milan, northern Italy.