New York's Italian Heritage and Culture Month celebrates its thirty-third anniversary this year, 2009. The IHCC-NY, Inc. has provided more than three
decades of special events, concerts, exhibits, lectures, and proclamations to celebrate and to better inform all of New York, the largest Italian city outside Italy, and other geographic areas throughout the United States and the world, of an important part of its Italian and Italian American culture.
In the spring of 1976, NYC Mayor Abraham Beame, proclaimed the first Italian Culture Week, from May 17 to 23. Nine years later, in 1985, the festivities moved to October, to coincide with the Columbus Day celebrations. By then, a week had become too short to contain the entire program, and so from that year on Italian Culture Week became Italian Culture Month, ultimately to become Italian Heritage and Culture Month. As the years passed, the Governor of the State of New York and even the President of the United States joined in acknowledging the annual celebrations in issuing proclamations in recognition of the heritage and culture of Italians and Italian Americans.
This celebration grew out of an idea from Dr. Angelo Gimondo, then President of the Italian Bilingual Educators Association and Superintendent of School District 30 in the Borough of Queens, NYC. Dr. Gimondo, honored by the Italian Government on several occasions with the most recent that of Gran. Uff. in the Order of the Star of Solidarity, had been at the head of the IHCC's group of volunteers who annually coordinate the celebration of Italian heritage and culture in the five boroughs of New York, until leaving the post in December 2006, after 30 years of great leadership and stewardship.
At the time of the founding of the IHCC-NY, Inc. and in promoting a week of the Italian language and culture, Dr. Gimondo found a like mind and enthusiasm in Rosamaria Riccio Pietanza, then President of the Italian Teachers Association. They gathered about them numbers of educators and administrators with an interest in language and culture, many of whom are yet involved with the IHCC-NY, Inc. In 1976, the two colleagues proposed the idea to Dr. Leo Bernardo, Director of the Bureau of Foreign Languages, who was easily persuaded of the usefulness and importance of the project. Dr. Bernardo appointed Dr. Gimondo citywide coordinator, and the first celebration of Italian Culture Week thus saw the light under the auspices of the Bureau of Foreign Languages of the Board of Education of the City of New York.
Soon, after inception, the idea to dedicate each year–s event to a specific theme or personality representative of the history and culture of Italy and Italian Americans evolved.
Commencing in January 2007, Cav. Uff. Joseph Sciame, Vice-President for Community Relations at St. John's University, a past president of the national Order Sons of Italy in America, and IHCC-NY, Inc. Board member for almost all of the three decade history, was elected President/Chair of the Board of Directors. He continues to lead the IHCC-NY, Inc. until the present time.
The Board of Directors of the Italian Heritage and Culture Committee of New York, Inc. is composed of eminent representatives of New York–s Italian and Italian American community. Each year the Board of Directors selects a new theme and then proceeds to create a theme poster and publish a Calendar of Events. The role of the Board of Directors has always been to promote, coordinate, and manage the month long celebration. The themes are herein included for review and historical importance, and represent many individuals, concepts and events that have memorialized the Italian and Italian American movement.
In addition to its work on heritage and culture, as well as the annual ceremonies for the IHCC-NY, Inc.'s DaVinci Award, conferred upon distinguished Italian and Italian American personages, the IHCC-NY, Inc. in recent years has also:
-sponsored in 2007 a public concert in honor of Giuseppe Garibaldi's 200th Birthday in the Park at NYU;
-held in 2008 a special anniversary gathering at Snug Harbor on the occasion of the 200th Birthday of Antonio Meucci, the true discoverer of the telephone;
-sponsored in 2008 in New York City a special international art exhibit from Palermo, Sicily by Rosa Ponte Fucarino;
-partnered in 2008 with the Institute of Classical Architecture and Classical America in the 500th Anniversary Celebration of Andrea Palladio;
-coordinated in April 2009 the salute to Lt. Giuseppe Petrosino on the occasion of the 100th Anniversary of his assassination in Palermo, Sicily;
-coordinated in May 2009 the ceremony honoring the late Dr. Rocco Caporale, former Board member of the IHCC-NY, Inc.
-raised the Italian and American flags annually since 2007 on the October Columbus Day weekend at the Bowling Green site;
-and supported the efforts of the Italian and Italian American community in advancing the cause of the Advanced Placement in Italian at high schools in the USA.
The IHCC-NY, Inc.'s role with the Office of the Consulate General, now led by Minister Francesco Maria Talo, as well as with the American Association of Teachers of Italian (AATI) and the Italian American Committee on Education (IACE), has been strengthened over the years in order to work in more collaborative ways so as to achieve common goals in education, heritage, culture, language, diplomatic respect and a better understanding of the "Italianita" that is so very important to the legacy left to Italian Americans by their families all. In fact, for most of the years of various activities it has been the Consuls General of Italy who have each fully supported the efforts of the IHCC-NY, Inc. as well as the Director of the Istituto Cultura Italiana.
Today, owing to the work of the IHCC-NY, Inc., a multitude of programs and events are organized by cultural associations, community centers, libraries, schools, and university departments of Italian in the Greater New York metropolitan area to proudly Celebrate October as "Italian Heritage and Culture Month." Moreover, other states such as Illinois, Massachusetts and Rhode Island, and several others, have worked to follow the lead of the IHCC-NY, Inc. and enhanced their activities in their respective states for the month of October.
For the year 2009, the Board of Directors of the IHCC-NY, INC. determined that it be appropriate in its expanded role to recognize Italians and Italian Americans, and honors two individuals of great importance: Galileo Galilei, the "Father of Modern Astronomy" during the International Year of Astronomy and on the occasion of the 400th Anniversary of Galileo's perfected model of the telescope, and Lt. Giuseppe Petrosino, a famed Italian American Crime Fighter, on the occasion of the 100th Anniversary of his passing.
ITALIAN HERITAGE & CULTURE COMMITTEE – NY, INC.
MISSION AND VISION STATEMENTS
Mission Statement
The mission of the Italian Heritage and Culture Committee, New York, Inc. (IHCC-NY, Inc.) is to:
• Raise public awareness of Italian heritage and culture;
• Coordinate sponsorship of programs that celebrate Italian heritage and culture;
• Sponsor the Italian Heritage and Culture Month activities annually;
• Promote the study of Italian language and culture among all ethnic groups;
• Engender pride in Italian-Americans about their own heritage; and
• Encourage positive portrayals of Italian-Americans in the media and with the general public.
Vision Statement
The Italian Heritage and Culture Committee of New York, Inc. will conduct, sponsor or participate in activities throughout the year, with special efforts focused on the celebration of Italian Heritage and Culture Month.
The vision of the IHCC-NY, Inc. is to be a dynamic organization in the Italian-American community that will collaborate on and foster an appreciation of Italian and Italian American contributions to the world.
The IHCC-NY, Inc. will:
• Solicit funds to carry out its mission and fulfill its vision;
• Network with Italian and Italian American resources to gain active individual and group participation;
• Assist in promoting Italian heritage, culture, and language; and
• Provide quality materials to educational, cultural groups and other entities.
Programs
The IHCC-NY, Inc. will encourage and/or sponsor programs at schools, colleges, civic entities, ethnic and other organizations so as to promote Italian heritage, culture and language; and achieve greater positive recognition for the contributions of Italians and Americans of Italian descent to our society.
Adopted 7-14-09
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A Quarter Century of Celebrating Italian Heritage and Culture Month
Mese della Cultura Italiana
Sponsored by the Italian Heritage & Culture Committee, NY, Inc.
Theme Posters
2009 - Galileo Galilei - Father of Modern Astronomy
- Giuseppe Petrosino - Italian American Crime Fighter 1860-1909
2008 - Andrea Palladio - Architect for the Ages 1508-1580
- Antonio Meucci - The True Inventor of the Telephone 1808-2008
2007 - Giuseppe Garibaldi - Eroe dei Due Mondi/Hero of Two Worlds 1807-2007
2006 - Celebrating the Italian Genius The Leonardo DaVinci Legacy
2005 - Giuseppe Mazzini- the Political Idealist of the Italian Struggle for Independence
2004 - Amerigo Vespucci
2003 - Focus on Italian Opera
2002 - Constantino Brumidi - Artist of the United States Capitol
2001 - Giuseppe Verdi: A Tribute to Italy¹s Patriotic Composer
2000 - Italy in the Year 2000: Italian Heritage and Cultural Roots at the Threshold of the New Millennium
1999 The Italians of New York: Five Centuries of Struggle and Achievement
1998 New York City at 100: Italian Americans Commemorate the Immigrant Experience (Patria e famiglia)
1997 The Voyages of Giovanni Caboto: 500th Anniversary
1996 Italy and its Regions (L¹Italia delle Regioni)
1995 Guglielmo Marconi: Centennial of the Radio
1994 Italian Americans in Law: From Beccaria to Scalia
1993 The Legacy of Italy¹s Artistic and Cultural Contributions to the World
1992 Cristoforo Colombo 500th Anniversary: The Legacy Lives on
1991 Italian Americans: The Legacy of Cristoforo Colombo
1990 William Paca: Signer of the Declaration of Independence, Jurist, 3 times Governor of the State of Maryland
1989 Italians Reaching Out: Antonio Meucci, Inventor of the Telephone, and Mother Cabrini, Missionary of the Immigrants
1988 Lorenzo Da Ponte/Academia
1987 Year of the U.S. Constitution: Mazzei and the Italian Contribution
1986 Year of Lady Liberty
1985 Building America
1984 Year of the Etruscans
1983 Italian Culture Week
1982 Italian Culture Week
1981 Italian Festival of the Arts
1980 Italian Culture Week
1979 Italian Culture Week
1978 Italian Week, Board of Education of New York
1977 Italian Culture Week
1976 Italian Culture Week
