Hollywood's Regressive Stereotypes of Italians | Hacker News Reader

Hollywood's Regressive Stereotypes of Italians

psychologytoday.com

2 points3littlefish8 comments

He was meticulously careful to omit mention of someone who is, though possibly of ambiguous allegiance, an all-time favorite of Italians, patriots, and Roman Catholics in these United States, to the point where many statues were erected... unfortunately, this proved to be temporary.

I did find this gentleman named on the webpage with Ctrl+F... as a major city in Ohio where you can Find a Therapist!!1

Also totally omitted: religious leaders not counting Michelangelo: surely a few popular Popes or Cardinals are good role models: Pope St. John XXIII? Pope St. Pius X?

And don't forget to mention that Stefani Germanotta is totally Italian, so is she complicit in perpetuating her own stereotype, on screen and stage?

Why, oh why did this supposedly Italian writer close his article with a Spanish word? Another stereotype?

Hollywood pffft.

I get my Italian stereotypes from Fellini's Satyricon, Bozzetto's Allegro Non Troppo and Greenaway's Belly of an Architect.

( likely a few other books and films to boot )

( ok, Greenaway isn't Italian, shrug )

Only as a side note, trying to debunk stereotypes about Italians (being uneducated) and closing the (IMHO poor) article with:

Salud!

which is not at all Italian does not help much.

Is "Salud!" something that Italian-Americans (or their Hollywood representations) use?

It's something actual Spaniards say! Perhaps he's trying to shift the blame!

Yeah, like when you sneeze. Or having a toast.

Italians say "saluti!"

Here (in Madrid) when you sneeze they say "Jesus!" Salud for a toast though.

Yeah, I am always reminded that I don't know Spanish if I can't tell the difference between Castellano and Tijuana vernacular.

My Catalonian friend was rather amused/shocked/horrified when she read the signs around town here in "Spanish translation".

Well, not really "say".

Saluti (normally with an adjective like cordiali or distinti) is the standard formula for salutation in correspondence, it is only written (you can actually say saluti, but it is uncommon/intentionally said for some effect).

When someone sneezes or for toasts, salute is used (it means health, it is a different word).

It is very similar to Spanish, salud is health, saludo/saludos are salutations, in Italian they correspond to salute and saluto/saluti.

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