19TH CENTURY ITALY: in search of a national identity

Abstract

The problem to be answered in this research was to understand how Italy's search for a national identity took place. Its time frame is located in the 19th century, specifically, the Risorgimento period. In a general context, this investigation was situated within a series of investigative works that the supervisor has been developing in recent years (some alone, others with supervised students) on the African continent; and, more specifically, it was considered as a strategy for obtaining data that will be used to support other research that we have been developing, dedicated to understanding the problem of national identity in post-colonial Africa. It is, therefore, a question of looking at the historical experience of Italy in the 19th century, in order to obtain elements that would help to have a better understanding of an issue that has been presented to the populations of the African continent since the last decades of the 20th century. It is worth
highlighting that this is a theoretical research whose General Objective was to understand how the search for a national identity, experienced by Italy in the 19th century, is linked to the events of the Risorgimento. In terms of conclusion, we have for example: a) the nation is not something given, natural, but historical; b) in the process of building the Italian nation, the interests of some were imposed on others; c) the question of the Italian nation remains an open problem.