Notes of the Passage

Overview

Appunti del passaggio uncovers a counter-history of the “economic miracle” as it traces the trajectories of people on the move between southern Italy and Switzerland at the turn of the 1960s–1970s. Drawing on their accounts, these notes on the passage expose the harsh labor conditions imposed on migrant workers and how they faced widespread discrimination and xenophobia. In a rationale of biopolitical control, their bodies were subjected to intrusive health inspections at the border; officially justified by fears of contagion, “sanitary risks” became a de facto strategy for controlling immigration and legitimizing borders and their violence.