Narrating refugees at sea: Remediated memories of migration in the Italian media

Abstract

Italian media often use stereotypical images and metaphors to report narratives on migration. This shadows the complexity and the single stories of refugees who arrive in the country. This article analyses how an Italian current affairs TV programme, titled Il cavallo e la torre ( The Knight and the Rook ), reported the tense negotiations between the newly elected Italian government led by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and three NGO ships saving refugees at sea. In the arc of 7 days between October and November 2022, the programme narrated the installation of Meloni’s right-wing government. At the same time, the show exposed the government’s refusal to allow three NGO ships with numerous shipwrecked refugees on board to dock safely in one of Italy’s harbours. Drawing on memory studies and narrative theory, I analyse two episodes of the programme, and I show how the TV programme defies the migration tropes that both the media and the newly elected Italian government employ. It does so by using multiperspectivity and the externalization of individual memories of migration, as theorized by Aleida Assmann. Moreover, it makes use of the ability of narrative journalism to communicate information and create immersion for the audience, which Marie Vanoost calls the informative and immersive dimensions of narrative journalism. In this way, the programme offers a different and more nuanced perspective on Italy that can positively affect cultural memory on migration.