Music and words against racism. A qualitative study with racialized artists in Italy

The present article recognizes the limits of anti-racism in continental Europe and it looks at the emergence of a new form of political anti-racism in Italy developed by racialized youth through rap music and slam poetry. Drawing on Gilroy’s work and on the theoretical framework of “Black Mediterranean”, it explores Black resistance to racism in Italy. Based on a qualitative research study which used mainly in-depth interviews with artists, it shows how Italian artists of African descent enact processes of counter-racialization. One section focuses on Black Italian rappers, who resist racism thanks to their diasporic political imagination; another section discusses the cases of two Italian artists of North African descent who have embraced Black diasporic cultures to fight racism together with Black Italians. Finally, we show how their struggles are connected with the Black Lives Matter global movemen