Transnational-Cultural Identity Among Immigrant Students in Italy in a Globalized Era

Newly-arrived immigrant adolescents in Italy seem to display a dynamic multi-cultural behavior characterized by their gradual embrasing of the host country’s ways, without entirely losing their own native identity. Students’ multiple be-longing seem to parallel the development of an transnational identity which is fluid and adjustable. This empirical research examines the self-defined identity of 317 immigrant adolescents living in Italy, fifteen years after the creation of the European Union. The study adds new dimensions to previous studies on identity development and blends transnational/intercultural approaches embed-ded in socioconstructivist theory as the ideal interdisciplinary theoretical lenses with which to examine issues of identity of new waves of growing immi-grantion in Italy. The article also references a few studies on immigrant youth’s identity in the United States.