The projects listed in this section are based on participatory methods and on using the practice of self-representation as tools for sharing and coming to awareness of the condition of migrants in Italy. Through training or performance projects carried out in universities, schools or cultural centres and associations, the Archive seeks to leave traces of memory and to diffuse field- and reception practices by recording participants’ voices and stories, sharing the results of its meetings and interactions with a wider public by way of animations and audiovisuals.
The Horizon 2020 – ITHACA. Interconnecting Histories and Archives for Migrant Agency: Entangled Narratives Across Europe and the Mediterranean Region project aims to analyze narratives of migrants both in the past and the present, starting from the 15th century until today and create a rigorous historical framework based on them. The project’s idea is based on the creation of the ITHACA Platform, which digitalize all narratives,“Multimedial Diaries by Migrants” is an Italian life story prize designed to collect and give publicity to stories by people from foreign countries who either live or have lived in Italy. The award has a double objective: as well as collecting and preserving a cultural heritage in danger of being lost, it aims at contrasting anti-migration stereotypes through the stories of people with a personal experience of migration.The Migrant Memories Networks Collection (FRMM) in the Central Institute for Sound and Audiovisual Heritage contains audiovisual material on memories of immigration in Italy. The idea of setting up a network of migrant memory archives originated in the conviction that Italy is ready to include in its own collective memory cultural traces of the experiences of migration, on the increase in our country.Why have a prize for foreign filmmakers in Italy? For foreign or Italian filmmakers of migrant origin living in Italy it is almost impossible to find funding for their work. The Mutti Prize for foreign and Italian filmmakers of migrant origin was created in 2008 with the double aim of promoting new forms of self-representation through films and documentaries and of stimulating the development of more inclusive cultural policies.Young professional and non-professional film-makers of any nationality, aged between 18 and 35, can compete for the Prize through a public call for applications: just submit the project of a short film, with a maximum duration of 15 minutes, which includes the use, even partial, of the film material of the Aamod Foundation, the partner archives or other archives. Among the projects, a jury composed of five personalities of Italian cinemaFive short films written, shot and directed by immigrant girls and boys in Italy. A mosaic of small stories united by the search for an internal look at the migrant condition and, together, a composite portrait of Italy and its reception system reflected in the eyes of those arriving. The authors of the film come from a wide variety of countries and were selected regardless of their having any experience in the audiovisual field.The theoretical intuition that gave the title to the research is that the condition of immigrants is crossed by a series of reversals that it is necessary to be able to think together to account for the complexity of the migratory experience. The spaces where these reversals have been investigated are the places of life, work and care: desire for “normality” that affects immigrant families, struggling with transformations“Diari Multimediali Migranti” is a national competition based on the life stories of migrantion. In order to embrace new languages and countries, the initiative expands to other Mediterranean contexts with a second competition, “DiMMi International – ITHACA Diary Contest,”. Developed in collaboration with the European research project ITHACA – Interconnecting Histories and Archives for Migrant Agency: Entangled Narratives Across Europe and the Mediterranean RegionPaola Monzini was a brilliant and passionate researcher, who chose to devote herself to the study and understanding of complex and uncomfortable phenomena, and she did it with great rigor and at the same time with profound humanity and participation. From this inspiration was born in 2022 the Prize in memory of Paola Monzini, with the aim of transmitting her passion and her rigor to other young researchers
