Word: motherism
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...Italy in particular? "It can be extreme," she says of a child's attachment to casa and mamma. This extra-close relationship between Italian mothers and their children is thought to have its origins in the economic and political history of the country. For centuries, the Italian peninsula was a poverty-stricken place with weak governments, meaning that the family was the only source of protection and economic support for people. More recently, psychologists and economists believe the mammone problem is rooted in the economic precariousness of a debt-ridden nation that has been in gradual decline since its post...
...case centers on the overprotective mother and grandparents of a 12-year-old boy known only as Luca in the northern city of Ferrara. Prosecutors say the three built a wall of protection so high around the boy, it stunted his development. The boy's mother and grandfather have already been convicted of child abuse and are appealing the verdict. The grandmother appeared before a criminal tribunal earlier this month to face a similar charge. All three defendants have denied any wrongdoing, and the child has remained in the mother's custody while the case is being adjudicated. (Read "Custody...
...Considering the eternal debate in Italy over the country's supposedly overly sheltered mammone, the case has garnered widespread publicity. But the boy's plight doesn't exactly fit in with the national stereotype of an overprotective mother and her son - it's far messier than that. The parents divorced soon after the boy's birth and the father claimed that he wasn't permitted to see his son for nine years. Concerned about the child's welfare, he finally contacted social services and prosecutors opened an investigation into the mother and grandparents. (Read "What Women Want...
...sorts of problems in their children, from learning disabilities to teenage anorexia. "If you don't let your child discover the world, it can do real harm," says Henriette Felici-Bach, a child psychologist in Paris. "In these cases, the parent must be cured as well. If a mother is acting this way, it is because she is not well, she fears something that does not exist...
...Italians, unlike parents from most other countries," Moretti says, "like living with their grown children." Felici-Bach's experience with her Italian husband, though, is slightly different. Born and raised in Rome, he left home for good at 20. But, as it turns out, John Felici has an English mother...