"Oltre il recinto" / " Beyond the fence - Family stories and other stories
12‘ / 2000
by Susanna Perin
Italian / English subtitles
Observing immigration from the point of view of former emigrants. My aunt Prudenza who left Italy in the 50's and went to Australia, told us how she often jumped the fencing in order to pick fruit, when she was hungry.
Italy, was for years the home of 'sans papiers' from all over the world. Because Italy wasn't a typical immigration country, the immigration policy wasn't policed at all. The Italian government suddenly confronted with this new situation being a new immigration country in Europe legislated 3 times in the last 15 years for illegal immigrants asking for a permanent residence permit. Now the Italian laws are changing and as a consequence of the Amsterdam agreement, introduced in May 1999, the migration policy is getting very repressive, with prison camps for migrants opening in Italy. For hundreds of years Italy has been a typical country of immigrants. I myself come from a family, where migration has been tradition over several generations.
In the region of Italy where I am originally from, nearly 40% of the population have had to migrate. Since the mid 80's Italy has changed from a country of emigrants to a country of immigration. In Rome I was confronted day by day with the progressive changes. Looking at statistical research, many Italians have emigrated for a certain period of their life, most Italians have some relatives abroad. It seems very difficult to understand, that emigration and immigration is the same phenomenon, reflected by a different point of view. Day by day observing the immigrants in Rome, I observed my own personal story and the story of my family by taking another position, a position from outside. The sad result of my observations: history does mean repetition.
A lot of people who has been strangers in other countries, consider the immigrants in there country in a very distant way as the " other, the stranger". So in a time where immigrants are be victimized, where their existence is getting very difficult, the Italian permanent residence permit hard to get, I want to jump back in Italian history, back to the time when Italians were the "others" and the "strangers". The video consists of interviews with my relatives about their experiences as emigrants and their hard live in the 50's, confronted with images of every day life of immigrants in Italy, the manifestation for the residence permit, the cultural associations of immigrants, the dream of a colored world.
