Tradizione, identità, memoria

"The appeal to the roots only leads to confusing private memory with collective memory and anthropology with nostalgia: and even worse with politics, when one shouts to defend the roots just to gain votes by exploiting the problems created by immigration".

In confusing private memory and collective memory, anthropology and nostalgia, history and politics, what we would like for our world is to remain what we have known. We defend ourselves against change. This is why the importance of our cultural roots is always claimed, never of others'. In the "roots" we think of finding authenticity, but cultures are complex and changing, not museums of embalmed remains. A calm reflection to warn us against the recurrent appeals to identity and tradition as instrumental and misleading obsessions.