From Sojourners to Settlers: A Qualitative Study of the Homes of Italian Migrants in Brisbane (Australia)

Abstract

This research study focuses on the architecture of the domestic dwellings built by a group of twenty first-generation migrants, natives of the Veneto region in Italy. This group migrated to Australia after WWII and built their houses in the 1980s and 1990s in Brisbane. The study looks at the material realm of these houses, that is, their facades, the internal and external organization and use of spaces, as well as at the symbolic realm that corresponds to the meanings attributed by the Veneto people to their houses in Brisbane. The project is of qualitative nature and as primary sources of data uses (1) semi-structured interviews, associated when circumstances made this possible, to (2) photo-elicitation interviews, and (3) focus group discussion. The study argues that home is both a physical structure and a set of meanings where these two components are tied together rather than being separate and distinct. It shows that there were two models the Veneto migrants chose for the erection of their houses in Brisbane and these correspond to: (1) the rural houses built in the 1970s and 1980s by their family and friends in the Veneto region and (2) the villas designed for noble families by the architect Andrea Palladio in the 15th century in the homeland of the respondents.