South-Italian Youth in North-West England: Constructing the “Good Migrant” alongside the “Good Adult”?

Abstract

This chapter explores the identity construction dynamics that take place among young South-Italians living in North-West England: it looks, in particular, at these youths’ processes of becoming and embedding. Based on semi-structured interviews with young South-Italians in Preston (Lancashire), the chapter contributes to the literature on youth transitions and post-2008 intra-European migrations, emphasising the interconnectedness of migration and becoming. The chapter shows how these youths’ emerging adulthood and their embedding in the host society have been shaped by the local field of Italian migration and by the models of “good adult” and “good migrant” circulating within it. South-Italians constructed their identities as “good adults” and “good migrants” in response to the conduct of “other Italians”, who were considered to be bad models of becoming and embedding. Being a “good migrant” and a “good emerging adult” meant displaying a work ethic, an existential sense of purpose, and commitment to the host society: these practices and values contrasted with the alleged immaturity, precariousness, and stagnation of “other Italians”. Such identity construction processes resulted in the diversification and the conflictual reshaping of the local field of Italian migration and produced an ambiguous and contrasted adjustment to the neoliberal order of migration in Europe.