The Risorgimento and the Italian University: notes between history and current events

Abstract

This essay opens a reflection on the current and future scenarios of the "History of the Risorgimento", focusing on the reasons that in the first decade of the 21st century led to its rapid decline in university classrooms, but also on the timid signs of recovery shown between 2015 and 2019. Present in the historiographical debate and in the broader one of "Public History", the History of the Risorgimento must return central in “protecting” European history and its democratic tradition. To achieve this goal, it would be also necessary to reflect on a new location of the "History of the Risorgimento", and more generally of the history of the nineteenth century. Can it be considered as “early contemporary history”, and therefore become part of Modern History? This is a question that the scientific community should begin to answer.