Dr. Matteo Brera will deliver a public lecture at Dickinson College titled Paper Whiteness: The Italian Press and the Racialization of Identity in the US South. The talk will examine Italian-language newspapers published in Louisiana and Alabama from the late 1800s through the Second World War, focusing on how these communities sought to position themselves within the racial hierarchies of the American South.
Drawing from his ongoing Marie Skłodowska-Curie Global Research Fellowship project, A Darker Shade of Whiteness, Dr. Brera will explore how ethnic media construct narratives of belonging and exclusion, often by reproducing anti-Black prejudice. His lecture invites reflection on the broader intersections of migration, race, media, and power—issues that remain strikingly relevant today.
The event is co-sponsored by the Italian Department, the Film and Media Studies Program, the Philosophy Department, and the Popel Shaw Center for Race and Ethnicity at Dickinson College.
