Language layers and threads: Exploring the influence of language on identity

by Vanessa Paciocco

In my previous blog, I reflected on the Greek monuments of Agrigento, seen on a recent summer trip. This time, I want to move beyond the surface, to explore the power of language, and the ways our experiences shape (and are shaped by) the languages we speak.

The language barrier is one of the most challenging aspects  of migration and we know the low literacy rates among Italians that came post-war. Growing up, I was surrounded by layered sounds, dialects folding into standard Italian, then slipping into English, and eventually Australian English. I often wondered how my grandparents navigated this auditory map, blending tongues in ways that felt both instinctive and brave. Both my grandmothers rarely spoke of the prejudice they faced. Perhaps it was pride. Or survival. Either way, their silences spoke volumes, a language of its own.

In the recent film Signorella, part of the Melbourne International Film Festival, we see how women like her faced the hardship of resettlement, learning to survive in a country where racial discrimination was prominent. Many worked in labour industries: textiles, farming, music, or simply in the home. The measure of productivity was usually in the number of garments, some more intricate than others. My nonna used to say that her hands showed her age, a quiet but powerful symbol of a working life as a sarta (tailor). The film portrayed these women as trailblazers of Italianness in Melbourne, building a legacy with strength and dignity. Reflecting on this model of productivity in our economy, it is often the migrant workers that carry many of the labour industries. On the other hand, I do wonder how language is measured as there was no official dictation test - maybe it was based on how many friends our nonni had? How did they receive feedback about their work? Did they understand instructions at the beginning or did their skill lead them to success in the workplace? How did personality contribute to their output of their English? Or perhaps we need to consider that the eye gaze and body language was equally as powerful in establishing meaning.

Reading In Other Words by Jhumpa Lahiri recently brought this legacy into new focus for me. Lahiri, a Bengali-American author who chose to write in Italian, speaks of the deep complexities of learning a new language. Despite not having Italian heritage, she moved to Italy and began to write exclusively in her adopted tongue

Her work is intensely literary. In one chapter about Venice, she describes her disquiet or inquietudine as she gets lost in the city’s maze of bridges. At first, she feels suffocated and disoriented, but eventually realises she is in an “isolated, shining place” (p. 99). Her metaphors reflect her internal language journey, bridging the gap between English and Italian, between belonging and exile. I wonder if my nonna would be able to create a metaphor for her experiences, whether she would feel the same.

Furthermore, Jhumpa admits that she will never truly master Italian, but that she has the impulse to. That writing, for her, is “the only way of absorbing and organising life” (p. 87). She describes herself as belonging “only to [her] words,” feeling untethered by culture or country. For Lahiri, language becomes a mirror, a metaphor, even a life: boundless, ineffable.

I keep thinking of my grandparents when I read these passages. Language must have shaped their identities profoundly here. They likely hesitated to speak English, defaulting to Italian out of instinct or necessity. We all have different motivations for how and when we speak.

Students often ask me if I’m “really Italian.” They don’t understand that bilingualism isn’t static. I try to explain that identity is fluid, that when I speak a dialect, I might feel like a modified version of myself. Even my accent shifts. There are some slight nods in the room as students have access to the language from their relatives, something that is slowly disappearing.

Lahiri describes feeling more herself in a language that isn’t her own. She also speaks of the creative potential of imperfection. The more she struggles with Italian, the more alive she feels.

I sense that same creativity in our ancestors. Despite the distance from home, they built new industries and new communities here. Unlike Lahiri, who entered Italy as an outsider, Italian migrants in Victoria were part of a growing collective. They formed social clubs, support networks, and traditions that helped preserve a sense of identity, never fully losing their mother tongue.

Their access to literature was not quite Lahiri’s, nevertheless their stories were told in Italian to the nearest and dearest. My nonno even loved the iconic lyrics to the song Mamma mia, dammi cento lire Che in America voglio andar to highlight the dream of escape from a war-torn Italy.

Lastly, Lahiri writes about exile, suggesting that those who no longer belong to one place can’t really return to another (p. 133). Perhaps that is how some migrants felt coming to Australia. I hear of many post-war migrants who did not return to their homeland until their children were old enough to take them back.

I’m going to use Lahiri’s analogy of language as a triangle but slightly tweak the tip - shaped by the ancestral, sustained through the acquired, and pointing toward an uncertain future. Is the tip of the triangle where the language is slowly abandoned? Or is it where it transforms, into something new, still bound to its roots? This complexity mirrors Lahiri’s experience of living in multiple linguistic selves. Each of us can find some resonance in her words, or begin to write through our own. It takes intention. Curiosity. Sometimes even grief. But writers like Lahiri, who chose this language despite not inheriting it, remind me that it’s never too late to begin again. Because language isn’t only about heritage. It’s also about imagination, and what we choose to carry forward.

This is my first piece I’ve written without my grandparents alive. In my next piece, I will explore not just the language we carry, but the places we return to with memories.