'An Ugly Word': Race in Global Perspective

NYUAD Institute

Race and racism are often considered problems particular to the U.S., with little relevance elsewhere. When sociologists Ann Morning and Marcello Maneri interviewed young Italians, they found that mention of race regularly elicited the reaction, “Che brutta parola! What an ugly word!” as well as the insistence that it played no role in contemporary Italy. Yet in probing further, they discovered that these Italian youths held ideas about racial difference that were very similar to those of their peers in the U.S. In An Ugly Word: Rethinking Race in Italy and the United States, Morning and Maneri draw on the transatlantic comparison to build a new framework for exploring concepts of difference worldwide. Speaker Ann Morning, Author, "An Ugly Word: Rethinking Race in Italy and the United States" (Russell Sage Foundation, 2022); Professor of Sociology, NYU