Skype

This week I skyped with Ugo. It was the first time I had a chat with him because I’ve always skyped with Kristen. We couldn’t talk about our final project since we are in different groups. That’s why we decided to talk about immigration. We had an interesting discussion since immigration is a very big issue both in Italy and in the USA. I’m very interested in this topic even because in Italy immigration is a quite recent phenomenon while in the USA is deeply rooted.
We focus on different aspects such as immigration policies, illegal immigrants and racism.
I was curious to know if integration is successful or not and if immigrants are perceived as foreigners or Americans. As for Ugo, he asked me something about the Italian situation. We talked about the Lega Nord party and about the consequences of illegal immigration such as the organised crime.
One of the funniest things I heard from Ugo is that American complain about immigrants because they steal the job to the natives… well, it’s the same here in Italy! Of course, Ugo and I believe that is not true.

Immigration

Immigration is a very recent issue in Italy. I don't think it's the same in the USA, that's why our next skype exchange will be very interesting on Tuesday.

There are many aspects I'd like to focus on, for example integration . America has been famous for the "melting pot" system. Today, a buzzword in immigration is "multiculturalism". There are so many books concerning this problem... yes, because immigration is considered a social problem. But these words are meaningless! So even if I've studied all these stuffs in ethnology, sociology and so on, I'm curious to know something about integration in the USA:

- how people live together

- are there any problems connected to immigration?

- do people believe that immigrants steal work opportunites to the natives?

- can immigrants obtain the right to vote? How?

Another interesting aspect I'd like to talk about is the immigration policy adopted by the USA and Italy. Here in Italy immigrants have the right to stay only if they've a job. So immigrants = workers. What about the USA?

Skype exchange

The topic of the last skype exchange has been 'political elections'. We had a great discussion because both in Italy and in the USA we're going to vote.

Our conversation pointed out the differences between the two countries. For example we noteced that in the USA the political campaign is open while in Italy there's no real confrontation. I mean, the American leaders met on TV to talk about their electoral programmes, for example. On the contrary, in Italy, Veltroni and Berlusconi do all their best to avoid a face-to-face confrontation. This is strange, isn't it?
Besides, we talked about the media and the press. We noticed how in America there's more attention towards the families of the candidates than in Italy, where the first ladies stay behind the scenes.
Finally I noticed that we (Italian students) were much more informed about American elections than the American peer was about Italian ones.

As a conlusion I'd like to report my post published in 'blogginenglish1' about my intention to vote or not:

"I’m fed up with politics but I’m going to vote!
Yesterday evening I watched BBC and I felt very embarrassed. There was a reportage on Italian elections. The journalist gave a perfect report of the Italian situation: a farce! He even named the elements of this farce:
-there are always the same politicians: one travels by bus far and wide, the other one thinks to be God … “Per fortuna che Silvio c’è…”
-there is no confrontation between the different fronts but just a tit-for-tat through press releases
…
…
I perfectly agree with this journalist. But, in spite of everything I’m going to vote because if you renounce the right of vote, you renounce democracy."

Let me know what do you think...

... Culture!

photo by @Lupinthethird
Hello everybody!

This week I started to think about my final project. I have to choose a topic concerning an aspect of American culture to be compared with the Italian one. But... what is culture?!? Fortunately, last semester we have already discussed about it; culture involves everything: food, religion, habits, music, language, values. That's why it's quite hard for me to choose a topic because I'm interested in a lot of things.

By the way, the most curious aspect I'd like to focus on is the educational system. Before starting the skype exchange, I decided to visit Dickinson site. Here you are the link www.dickinson.edu/ . I was really impressed because it's quite different from our university and the idea of university I have. This different organisation has many consequences, the most important one is the following: American students have the opportunity to experience University life. (I think, for example, at my American peer Kristen: she's from California and she moved to study there...)

In my final project I'd like to make some comparisons between Italian and American universities. Maybe it's a banal topic but there are many reflections I can do which involves not only the educational system, but life in general.