The present article focuses on the Italian-language press in São Paulo in the early twentieth century. I establish that the press served as a tool that unified Italian immigrants through the development of a collective identity that transcended regional differences: that of social class. In addition to functioning as a binding factor among the Italians residing in the rapidly evolving urban and ethnic landscape of São Paulo of the era, the newspapers incentivized Italians to invest in their communities through education, thereby enforcing a shared goal of collaboration and community empowerment. Ultimately, this literary genre played a role in the unification of São Paulo’s Italian residents and, subsequently, in their upward social mobility.
↧