California Italian Studies

This article investigates how some white Italian feminists have begun to reckon with the colorblindness and ethnocentrism of their theories and are contributing to the development of a critical white feminism. An examination of key feminist texts from the 1970s will be followed by an investigation into more recent iterations of difference feminism that have critically reengaged and redefined both Marxist theories of social reproduction and cultural practices of female intersubjectivity. In addition to addressing the existence of differently situated gender positionalities and their diverging struggles, this critical white Italian feminism is also attempting to meaningfully incorporate and center feminist perspectives that have been traditionally marginalized. The article will stress the key role that both international antiracist feminisms (intersectional and decolonial) and local transnational feminisms which had already been reimagining the feminist struggle in Italy, have had in redefining white Italian feminist imaginaries.