So 'na Bujanes[a] in Canada: the language & poetry of Concetta Sinibaldi

Abstract

When one considers the history of immigrants in Canada, many of the details get lost. Toronto has had a long history of an Italian presence and community in the city, but most forget that these immigrants began elsewhere, and in particular, it is largely women who are forgotten as social historians put the pieces together. Through a series of extensive interviews with one Italian immigrant woman who arrived in Toronto in 1956 and through an examination of the folk poetry she wrote, this thesis attempts to fill in some of those details of her identity, pre- and post-immigration. Moreover, it also closely considers the importance of the poetry she wrote as it related to her life. -- Concetta's poetry can be defined as "folk" because it played two major roles. The poetry she wrote about her beloved Boiano allowed her to remember a time and place that no longer existed after the Second World War, and when she extended it to her fellow Boianesi in Canada, her poems acted as a mouthpiece for the community as well. The birthday poems she wrote for her family and her friends meant that she could fill her role as the matriarch, the "nonna." These poems, particularly the ones she wrote for her granddaughters, dispensed advice in the safe form of a loving poem. The thesis culminates with a discussion on the poem she write for her 60th wedding anniversary, which combines elements of her Boiano poems and her birthday poems in order to create what was probably her most personal and sophisticated poem.