Padania

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Padania is an alternative name for Northern Italy, which was sparingly used until the beginning of the 1990s, when the Northern League political party (in Italian, Lega Nord) proposed it as the denomination of a common homeland for northern Italians dissatisfied with the Italian state government. Therefore, since the 1990s the term carries strong political implications in the Italian context.

1 Territory
2 Languages
3 National anthem (as proposed by the Northern League)
4 Popular support for independence
5 See also
6 Notes and references
7 External links

[edit] Territory

In the narrowest sense, Padania refers to the valley of the Po river (in Latin, Padus). The term has been rarely used, since pianura Padana or Val Padana was preferred in most geography textbooks and in atlases. Since the 1960s, the renown journalist Gianni Brera used the term Padania to indicate the territory of Cisalpine Gaul. The Northern League later used the term with a similar meaning since about the 1990s. In this meaning, Padania's boundaries can be approximately defined according to the historical regional languages spoken in the Italian State territory, which divide northern Italy from central-southern Italy along the La Spezia - Rimini line. An alternative definition of Padania's boundaries can be based on Harvard University political scientist Robert Putnam's work Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy, where Italy's "civic North" is defined according to the civic traditions of its inhabitants, which may be related to the historical medieval communes. According to the latter definition, which is frequently used by the Northern League, Padania includes all Italian regions north of and including Tuscany, Marche and Umbria. Putnam's findings are confirmed by sociologists at the University of Newcastle, the United Kingdom, who also found that the border between Padania and the rest of Italy corresponds to a boundary in the population's attitudes on civic issues, and linked the difference to the emergence of the free communes after the first millennium AD.

[edit] Languages

See also: List of Languages of Italy

The dominant language in the area is standard Italian. French, Franco-provençal, Occitan, German, Friulian, Ladin and Slovenian are spoken close to the borders of Italy and officially recognized by the State as minority languages.

The various vernaculars or local languages are not in common use except in closed contexts (families, acquaintances who speak the same vernacular). However, the situation varies depending on the Region and the age group. Veneto is generally considered to be the Region where the local language continues to be used most. Older people are more likely to speak the local language than younger people and also to use a less Italianized version. These so-called dialects are considered to be regional minority languages by the Red Book on Endangered Languages, by UNESCO and by Ethnologue. The various local languages (Lombard, Ligurian, Emiliano-Romagnolo, Piedmontese and Venetian) are to a large extent mutually intelligible with each other, and to a much lesser degree with the Italian language.

A linguist of world-wide repute, Professor Geoffrey Hull of Macarthur University of West Sydney, has shown the original unity of the Padanese group of languages in his thesis entitled: The Linguistic Unity of Northern Italy and Rhaetia (1982). His findings are confirmed by most experts today, which use the term Rheto-cisalpine in place of Padanese.

Hull divides the Padanese group into two sub-groups: highland and lowland. The highland group includes Friulan, Ladin and Rumantsch. The first two have achieved official recognition in Italy, whilst Rumantsch, in the form of Rumantsch Grischun, a compromise variety, is the fourth official language of Switzerland. This sub-group of languages is better known as Rhaeto-Romance languages.

[edit] National anthem (as proposed by the Northern League)

The Northern League political party chose the Va' Pensiero chorus from Verdi's Nabucco as Padania's national anthem. In the Va' Pensiero chorus, the exiled Hebrew slaves lament for their lost homeland. Some dispute this choice because of the myth of Verdi's role in the Risorgimento.

[edit] Popular support for independence

Since about 1989, the Northern League political party called either for secession or larger autonomy of Padania, and defined its flag and national anthem. In 1997, the Northern League also created an (un-official) Padanian "parliament" in Mantua, and held (un-official) elections. These acts, however, were not unanimously accepted even within the party, and spurred even some Parliament members, elected for the Northern League, to leave the party.

While support for a federal versus sharply centrally administered State is high in polls held inside Padania, reaching about 80% in average everywhere north of the Po river, support for independence is more uncertain and less studied. One poll<ref name="Padania secession poll n.1">I.Diamanti. "Il Nord senza Italia? (North without Italy?)", Limes (Italian bimonthly magazine), January, 1996.</ref> estimated that 52.4% of Padanians north of the Po river consider secession advantageous ("vantaggiosa"), and 23.2% both advantageous and convenient ("auspicabile"). Another poll<ref name="Padania secession poll n.2">"poll on Padania's secession", Indipendente (Italian daily newspaper), August 23, 2000.</ref> estimated that about 20% Padanians (18.3% in north-west Italy, 27.4% in north-east Italy) support secession in case Italy is not reformed into a federal State.