At the Consulate General of Italy in New York, memory becomes an interactive map. Not a static archive or a simple collection of testimonies, but a project that tries to transform the Italian roots in the United States into a live network of stories, territories and shared identity.
TracingITALIANroots was presented yesterday. NY, digital platform dedicated to the enhancement of Italian cultural heritage in America. At the heart of the initiative a free web app that allows users to explore a dynamic map of Italianity in the United States, through family stories, traditions, places of origin and migration.
The project, recognized as Special Project by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation and developed by GlobalMedia, debuts in New York after a first pilot phase launched in Washington. One hundred profiles already available on the platform, available globally.
More than a genealogical database, TracingITALIANroots. NY tries to build a bridge between past and present, between the small Italian villages and the Italian American communities scattered in the United States. An emotional geography before even digital.
“We started in Washington, now we are here in New York for the expansion of the project. It is a web app, therefore not an app to download, through which is mapped all the Italianity here in New York”, explained Fabio Castagna of Global Media, partner and owner of the Tracing Italian Roots platform.
“The interesting thing is that the roots in Italy are also mapped: there is a bridge that starts from New York to understand which origins and vice versa. There are databases, search engines, the ability to autoregister and perform interviews. But above all it is not a simple description: the history of that territory is told and this also allows a cultural promotion of Italy”.
The idea was born about three years ago from a local work linked to the city of Mantua and the history of the Gonzaga, and then gradually transformed into a wider project dedicated to the Italian presence abroad.
“When we started mapping the Gonzaga in Mantua, the idea was born to tell not only a territory, but Italianity in general. From there we arrived in New York, we developed other applications and, thanks to the dialogue with the Comites of New York, a partnership was born on the Italian roots. Later, along with MAECI, the project was designed for all the Comites of the United States”.
During the event the institutional recognition obtained by the platform was also remembered, supported as a model capable of woven innovation, memory and cultural promotion.
«The MAECI together with Global Media has funded the project by recognizing it as a virtuous model between culture, memory and innovation. In 2025 the Italian Embassy had presented a first pilot version that had an immediate success. Today the platform is fully operational and constantly evolving”.
The goal, the promoters explain, is to create a participatory network capable of involving institutions, associations, museums, media and local communities. A map that not only serves to trace surnames or places of origin, but to reconstruct a sense of collective belonging.
In the course of the presentation a video simulation of the platform showed the operation of the web app: a virtual journey between family stories, images, culinary traditions and small Italian countries from which, generations ago, thousands of direct families have started in the United States.
L’articolo New Italian map in the United States proviene da IlNewyorkese.