Góor baax na, jigéen baax na. Donne senegalesi tra Senegal e Italia. Migrazioni tra sopi e tradizione

The topic of this research is the study of territorial usages by Senegalese women settled in the provinces of Bergamo and Verona. The global aim is to understand how the female Senegalese occupies the space of arrival, elaborates it, and modulates her role in relation to the new territory, family and social dynamics that arise in the context of migration. The approach used is bifocal and is oriented on both the territories of immigration (Bergamo and Verona) and the point of departure. Various types of Senegalese women were analyzed through semi-structured interviews: the Bergamo and Verona migrants; the residents in Senegal linked by parental relationship or friendship to the immigrants; the returnees, women who at the conclusion of the Italian migration project go back to Senegal to open an entrepreneurship activity in collaboration with women’s associations. After having drawn up a theoretical framework the analyzed results of the fieldwork have been presented. The Senegalese woman in the provinces of Bergamo and Verona emigrates above all for family reunification, encounters language difficulties, and often remains at home partly because of the lack of the association network of solidarity for women. Having a job represents a source of additional income to the family budget but is also an element of emancipation. Considering that the women’s associations in Senegal are an important tool for expression of the needs and potentialities, the migrants try to recreate them in Italy, by adapting them to the context. Contacts with the territory of immigration have determined a revising by the Senegalese women of their spaces and roles sometimes creating problems in everyday life and in traditional family. These revisited roles, at times, have been elaborated and shaped to the new reality, becoming opportunities for empowerment and awareness for women.