the American obsession with Italy
why do we freak out over Italian culture?
When American people hear that I’m living in Italy, their eyes widen and heads swivel, amazed at my good fortune. Popular tv shows like Chef’s Table and Stanley Tucci’s Searching for Italy highlight the amazing food and the friendly people who live with passion, but food alone isn’t reason enough to incite obsession. The reason Italy is so appealing to Americans is because of the complete reversal of values. Americans value individual freedom, convenience, and money above everything else, while Italians value connection, family, and nourishment. Escaping for vacation in Italy gives Americans a chance to slow down and escape the rat race. Here are the values I’ve observed as most important to Italian society.
Daily Socialization
Italian people not only love to socialize, they also love to talk. In liceo classico, the “classics” high school, it is required to study Latin and Greek, and there is a theory that Italians learn how to have a public discourse and “argue” like ancient philosophers. When I walk down the street, it is loud from the cars and motos, but it’s loud from the constant shouting and conversation. People are on the phone, making voice notes and talking to friends and family, or they are striking up conversation with me. I could be shopping and someone asks me their opinion of what to buy, or in a cafe and someone asks me about the new grocery store opening up.
There is also the art of the Italian “passeggiata” - the red carpet, “see and be seen” walk through the neighborhood, culminating in the main squares and piazzas. In my neighborhood, Sunday evenings are the busiest nights of the week, but night or day, Italian cafes are full of people taking a break over a beverage. You will never see a laptop in a cafe. Meeting for a coffee or drink is something people do multiple times per day.
Fresh, High Quality Food
Ensuring others are well nourished is a way of saying “I love you” in Italy. Instead of asking how you are, mothers will instead ask their adult children, “have you eaten”? There are even hand gestures that symbolize “that’s delicious” (pointing your pointer finger towards your cheek and twisting it).
Because people value fresh and high quality food, there is also a culture of daily food shopping at the panetteria and the fruttivendolo. The panetteria is the bread store, and serves hot, inexpensive fresh bread that does not have any preservatives in it. The great part about the panetteria is that they will usually have a really nice prepared foods that are pretty inexpensive. They’ll have things like meatballs in red sauce, eggplant parmigiana, some kind of pasta al forno (like baked ziti or penne), and freshly cooked veggies like pepperoni (roasted peppers and olives), eggplant and tomato, fried squash, or mushrooms.
After the panetteria I normally go to the fruttivendolo. This is a great spot to get veggies and fruit very inexpensively. I will buy what looks good and I try to mix it up from what I know. It amazes me how much cooking must happen with all of this produce shopping. How do they do it? It’s a far cry from the prepared food busy Americans eat during weeknight meals.
I think it’s also important to note here that compared to America, there is way less of a focus on alcohol in Italy. Americans base most social gatherings on drinking. Excessive alcohol usage is really seen as something that takes away from a meal or even a soccer game, and these are two things Italians people are really focused on.
Focus on Family
Perhaps the biggest difference between life in Italy and the US is the focus on family above all else. This starts with elderly independence and respect. Often when I’m in the grocery store, I help elderly people weigh their fruits and vegetables or reach things on high up shelves. They love an opportunity to chat. Once in a restaurant in Rome, a local elderly couple sat next to us and the waitstaff all came up to them, gave them hugs and kisses, asked how they were doing and made sure they were being taken care of. I often see grandkids walking their grandparents around on their errands and helping them. It is part of culture to respect and include grandparents into daily life, as family is the center of everything here in Italy.
Practically speaking, Italy is experiencing a crisis in population. Salaries are so low in Italy that people are waiting until their parents retire to have children so they can reduce childcare costs. When I am walking around town in the mornings I often see babies being toted around in strollers by their grandparents. It’s sweet to observe little kids chattering their grandparents ears off on their walks to school.
Social events are also focused on family. Weekend nights you will see families with little kids out until late in the evening. On Saturday nights, my American friends with kids often have to decline social invitations so their kids can go to bed on their normal schedule.
Inconvenience Culture
The Neapolitan value of “tolerance” is really about putting up with things that don’t work efficiently. In the US, people have little to no tolerance for inefficiency. Convenience is king.
For example, on my Italian errand cycle I often have multiple stops: the lavanderia (dry cleaning), a random store that only sells cleaning products, the profumeria (sells items like feminine products and makeup), the farmacia for prescription or over-the-counter meds, etc. There is no CVS or Walgreens where you can get everything in one stop.
I also walk everywhere or take unreliable public transit. When I first moved here, I was in Napoli’s biggest train station and trying to get home. I asked someone how to get to the metro entrance, and he told me, “it’s over there, but I wouldn’t recommend taking it, because it’s broken and we don’t know when it will be fixed”. That was the day I learned how the bus system works.
I also walk up a lot of hills and steps every day! There is one particular set of stairs that goes down to the main part of the city, and when I walk up them it’s 20 minutes straight up. My step count has gone up enormously, yes, but I can’t imagine how I would get around if I hurt myself or was disabled. America, and especially California, has a car culture linked to our obsession with personal freedom.
The Challenges for Me
Many Americans would love to have the opportunity to live better: with more family support, more time for social lives with friends, and eating higher quality food. The opportunity to “try on” these values as a guest in Italy is certainly very appealing to me. I try to live according to my own personal values, and adopting an environment where the infrastructure is already set-up to “take it easy” is a useful, yet forceful, adjustment.
One challenge for me is that while Napoli is a beautiful city, not having access to nature and quiet really affects my day to day. Also, neither of our families live anywhere near Italy! So being in a culture that’s really focused on family when ours is far is really tough sometimes. I wish I could bring my niece and nephew over here for a snug and show them off to the Italian nonnis!
What do you think? Does Italian culture appeal to you? Let me know in the comments below.
For more reading on cultural values, check out this post from
on the values of Mexico (which I think closely align with Italian values).
This was a brilliant comparison of Italian vs American culture. Also being from NJ, I feel like there's even more fascination with Italy because seemingly everyone you know has ancestry that can be traced back there.
Great article, Brenna! Definitely on point when it comes to the American independence obsession. Oh, and efficientcy. When we first moved to Piemonte, I would leave the house with a list of 5 things to do snd would be happy if I managed to complete ONE 😂. It frustrated me but I had to get used to it because I surely was not going to change the system. Life has its pros and cons everywhere. There's a lot of good in Italy. Thanks for a great read. 🧡