Zitelle e zitellacce. Prejudices and scorn in the perception of widows and single women in Italy in the 19th century

Abstract: Living alone in the pre-industrial world often created more complications for women than for men. The main source of this discrimination was a widespread prejudicial and hostile attitude towards unattached women and widows in general. Past societies have generated both pejorative and celebratory words to describe women who have never been married or were widowed. Expressions such as “old maid”, “vecchia zitella” or the slightly more benevolent expression “poor widow” have become commonplace. The aim of this paper is firstly to highlight the negative prejudices suffered by single women and widows in past centuries. Secondly, it hopes to demonstrate the considerable change in society’s attitude towards unmarried women that accompanied the rise of the bourgeois society and that transformed the semantic sense of the otherwise neutral word zitella to the pejorative one it has today. Despite focusing on the particular case of Italy, it will also seek to give a brief overview of the situation in the rest of Europe.Key words: Widows, single women, zitella, prejudices, stereotypes, ItalyRésumé: Vivre seul dans le monde préindustriel a souvent créé plus de complications pour les femmes que pour les hommes. La principale source de cette discrimination était une attitude préjudiciable et hostile envers les femmes seules et les veuves en général. Les sociétés du passé ont généré de nombreux mots péjoratifs pour décrire les femmes qui n’ont jamais été mariées ou qui étaient veuves. Combien de fois avons-nous entendu des mots tels que «old maid», ou bien «vieille fille» ou encore l’expression apparemment bienveillante “pauvre veuve”. Le but de cet article est de mettre en évidence les préjugés négatifs qui ont été employé au cours des siècles passésafin de décrire les femmes célibataires et les veuves et de montrer comment l’attitude de la société envers les femmes célibataires a considérablement changé avec la montée de la société bourgeoise qui a transformé le sens sémantique du mot “zitella” originairement neutre en un terme au sens aujourd’hui péjoratifact francese. L’article se concentrera sur les cas de l’Italie, mais il cherchera aussi à donner un bref aperçu de la situation dans le reste de l’Europe.Mots-clés: Veuves, femmes célibataires, vieille fille, préjugés, stéréotypes, zitella doi: https://doi.org/10.20318/revhisto.2017.3703

Self-Rated Health Among Italian Immigrants Living in Norway: A Cross-Sectional Study

Background: Most studies on immigrant health focus on immigrant groups coming from extra-European and/or low-income countries. Little attention is given to self-rated health (SRH) in the context EU/EEA migration. To know more about health among European immigrants can provide new insights related to social determinants of health in the migration context. Using the case of Italian immigrants in Norway, the aim of this study was to (i) examine the levels of SRH among Italian immigrants in Norway as compared with the Norwegian and the Italian population, (ii) examine the extent to which the Italian immigrant perceived that moving to Norway had a positive or negative impact on their SRH; and (iii) identify the most important factors predicting SRH among Italian immigrants in Norway. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was conducted among adult Italian immigrants in Norway (n = 321). To enhance the sample's representativeness, the original dataset was oversampled to match the proportion of key sociodemographic characteristics of the reference population using the ADASYN method (oversampled n = 531). A one-sample Chi-squared was performed to compare the Italian immigrants' SRH with figures on the Norwegian and Italian populations according to Eurostat statistics. A machine-learning approach was used to identify the most important predictors of SRH among Italian immigrants. Results: Most of the respondents (69%) rated their SRH as “good” or “very good”. This figure was not significantly different with the Norwegian population, nor to the Italians living in Italy. A slight majority (55%) perceived that their health would have been the same if they continued living in Italy, while 23% perceived a negative impact. The machine-learning model selected 17 variables as relevant in predicting SRH. Among these, Age, Food habits, and Years of permanence in Norway were the variables with the highest level of importance, followed by Trust in people, Educational level, and Health literacy. Conclusions: Italian immigrants in Norway can be considered as part of a “new mobility” of high educated people. SHR is shaped by several interconnected factors. Although this study relates specifically to Italian immigrants, the findings may be extended to other immigrant populations in similar contexts.Self-Rated Health Among Italian Immigrants Living in Norway: A Cross-Sectional StudypublishedVersio

ARIANNA: A research environment for neuroimaging studies in autism spectrum disorders

The complexity and heterogeneity of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) require the implementation of dedicated analysis techniques to obtain the maximum from the interrelationship among many variables that describe affected individuals, spanning from clinical phenotypic characterization and genetic profile to structural and functional brain images. The ARIANNA project has developed a collaborative interdisciplinary research environment that is easily accessible to the community of researchers working on ASD (https://arianna.pi.infn.it). The main goals of the project are: to analyze neuroimaging data acquired in multiple sites with multivariate approaches based on machine learning; to detect structural and functional brain characteristics that allow the distinguishing of individuals with ASD from control subjects; to identify neuroimaging-based criteria to stratify the population with ASD to support the future development of personalized treatments. Secure data handling and storage are guaranteed within the project, as well as the access to fast grid/cloud-based computational resources. This paper outlines the web-based architecture, the computing infrastructure and the collaborative analysis workflows at the basis of the ARIANNA interdisciplinary working environment. It also demonstrates the full functionality of the research platform. The availability of this innovative working environment for analyzing clinical and neuroimaging information of individuals with ASD is expected to support researchers in disentangling complex data thus facilitating their interpretation

ebola virus disease case management in the institute of infectious diseases university hospital of sassari sardinia italy

Since the onset of the worst epidemic of Ebola virus disease in December 2013, 28,637 cases were reported as confirmed, probable, or suspected. Since the week of 3 January 2016, no more cases have been reported. The total number of deaths have amounted to 11,315 (39.5%). In developed countries, seven cases have been diagnosed: four in the United States, one in Spain, one in the United Kingdom, and one in Italy. On 20 July 2015, Italy was declared Ebola-free. On 9 May 2015, an Italian health worker came back to Italy after a long stay in Sierra Leone working for a non-governmental organization. Forty-eight hours after his arrival, he noticed headache, weakness, muscle pains, and slight fever. The following day, he was safely transported to the Infectious Diseases Unit of University Hospital of Sassari. The patient was hospitalized for 19 hours until an Italian Air Force medical division transferred him to Rome, to the Lazzaro Spallanzani Institute. Nineteen people who had contacts with the patient were monitored daily for 21 days by the Public Health Office of Sassari and none presented any symptoms. So far, neither vaccine nor treatment is available to be proposed on an international scale. Ebola is considered a re-emerging infectious disease which, unlike in the past, has been a worldwide emergency. This case study aimed to establish a discussion about the operative and logistic difficulties to be faced and about the discrepancy arising when protocols clash with the reality of facts

Abuso del diritto tributario, concorrenza e mercato

The paper analyses the recent Italian regulation concerning the anti-abuse taxation (art. 10 bis Law n. 212 of the 27 July 2000) through the perspective of the interest of law. The analysis is mainly focused on that part of the rule which consider, as abusive, all the operations in the absence of economic substance and non compliance with the "normal market conditions". The concept of "normal market conditions", and then the concepts of "market" and "competition" give an axiological relevance to the rule. The principle of market means that each economic operation should be realized in accordance to constitutional principles such as solidarity, equality and free private economic initiative. All private interests, which may be referred to those who makes economic operations, are strongly linked to a public one which is the interest to maintain a competitive market in order to grant to all citizens the same tax treatment.L'autore si propone di esaminare la recente normativa in tema di abuso del diritto tributario (art. 10 bis della legge 27 luglio 2000 n. 212) attraverso il prisma dell'interesse giuridico tutelato. Viene data rilevanza a quella parte della norma che ritiene abusive le operazioni prive di sostanza economica dove l'indice di mancanza di sostanza economica è costituito dalla non conformità dell'utilizzo degli strumenti giuridici a normali logiche di mercato. Viene così analizzato il sintagma "normali logiche di mercato" e da tale indagine emerge che i concetti giuridici di "mercato" e "concorrenza" colorano indelebilmente la lettera della norma conferendo a questa una significativa rilevanza di carattere assiologico. Il primato del mercato postula che le operazioni economiche si realizzino secondo regole di comportamento conformi ai principi costituzionali di solidarietà, eguaglianza sostanziale e libertà di iniziativa economica. Gli interessi patrimoniali che fanno capo ai soggetti che realizzano le operazioni economiche benché interessi privati sono intimamente connessi ad un interesse pubblico che è l'interesse al mantenimento di una struttura di mercato concorrenziale ove sia assicurata anche la parità di trattamento di tutti i consociati sul fronte del riparto del carico pubblico

Stereotypier, diskriminering og slåssing. Italiensk innvandring til Norge. [Stereotypes, discrimination and fightings Italian immigration to Norway]

Italienerne var blant de første innvandrerne til Norge på 1950-tallet. Årsakene til at italienerne flyttet til denne avsidesliggende delen av Europa skilte seg ut fra de som drev den italienske migrasjonen rettet mot andre europeiske land i samme periode. Migrasjonsstrømmene ble kanalisert langs ruter som ofte ble forbundet med en lang felles historie: den sirkulære mobiliteten til oldtidens regimer (ancien régime). Til tross for at antallet italienske innvandrere skulle vise seg aldri å bli særlig stort, utgjorde de likevel den største gruppen av sydeuropeiske innbyggere i Norge. Nordmennene for sin del var ikke vant til disse nye utlendingene, og det tok ikke lang tid før mistilliten mellom de to gruppene kom til uttrykk. På 1960-tallet var flere anti-italienske fordommer utbredt. I denne perioden var det – for å bruke ordene til flere norske aviser – snakk om ekte «rasediskriminering» rettet mot italienske innvandrere

Los criados y la tierra en la Cerdeña del siglo XIX

This article analyses the institution of rural servants in a small Sardinian community during the nineteenth century. In Sardinia it was quite common for poor families to send their children to serve with well-off families in the community. In Ghilarza, employment as a servant in most cases represented a limited period in Iife, generally in the years before marriage. Through this job servants attempted to save money to establish their own independent family or, in cases of extreme poverty, just to survive

¿Qué pasó en el Norte? Sirvientes y trabajadores rurales en Noruega

El objetivo del presente artículo consiste en estudiar las condiciones de los sirvientes rurales en Noruega desde el período preindustrial hasta la industrialización de mediados del siglo XIX. Se describe la evolución del papel y de las tareas de los sirvientes prestando atención a las transformaciones y el cambio que se produjo desde una sociedad rural a una sociedad industrial. Al mismo tiempo se atiende a la importancia respecto de las actividades de servicios desde una perspectiva demográfica. Además, se abordan los roles de género, las tasas de masculinidad, las diferencias entre sirvientes y sirvientas y las diferencias en el trato que éstos recibieron. Se contextualiza el caso noruego con otros ejemplos de Europa y se investiga si hubo similitudes o diferencias