The Path to Italian Citizenship
And why I have to take a language test to get it
I am married to an Italian! My husband just scored his citizenship after four years of working with immigration lawyers to make it happen. His particular case wasn’t straightforward—he was caught in a situation they call the 1948 law. This video explains it pretty well:
When we met, there was no option for Joe to seek citizenship because, at the time, all citizenship had to go through the paternal line, and his grandfather renounced his Italian citizenship to become a U.S. citizen before his mother was born. However, in 2009, the Court of Cassation amended the 1948 Rule, thereby restoring citizenship rights to Italian women (because the law was misogynist) who had married foreign nationals before 1948. Under this rule, if your dual citizenship claim is through a female ancestor, you are entitled to present your case in the Italian Courts.
Which means you have to hire lawyers. The lawyers do a few things. They help you secure documents (birth and marriage certificates, citizenship, etc.), and then they arrange for the official translation of those documents. They represent you in court, and they help you arrange for your passport.
This week, we learned that the court of Bari had granted Joe his citizenship!
There are some additional steps in the process, including time for an appeal, then some applications for vital records, and for AIRE, which is a registration for Italian foreigners living abroad. Then Joe will be connected with the consulate here to have his passport issued.
What about me? Well, I wish we had realized much earlier that the 2009 law made it possible for Joe to get his citizenship, and we had applied then. Because then I wouldn’t have been subject to the 2019 law that requires spouses who marry Italians to take the B1 language test to gain their citizenship.
Note that I didn’t mention that Joe has to take a language test. Nope! He’s got il sangue, the blood.
The B1 language test is an intermediate test, equivalent to 4-5 years of high school/college study. The idea is that you’ll be able to integrate into Italian society and be able to work. The B1 test examples I’ve seen are pretty difficult, and I’ve been learning Italian for over a decade.
I should be able to take it in Boston, but the Dante Alighieri Society here is in some general sad state of disarray, and they aren’t offering the test anytime soon, which is frustrating. It means I have to book a trip to NYC for it. The good thing is that I like NYC, and having a reason to go there isn’t a bad thing.
So, for the next few months, I’ll be head down, studying daily, watching lots of RAI and Yabla, and reading primarily Italian texts. I feel fairly confident about the reading comprehension and the oral speaking, but less so about the writing and the listening (which has more to do with remembering (under serious pressure!) what was said in the audio vs. understanding).
If you have taken the B1 Italian test for citizenship, I’d love to know about your experience!
What’s Bringing Me Joy This Week'
I booked a hotel room a few blocks from my house for the weekend to help me catch up on a book deadline (for the one coming out in 2025). I’d never done that before, but it was incredible to have such an opportunity to focus.
I LOL’d (and yes, I realize it’s passe to use LOL and I should go with IJBOL, but well, here we are) at this video sooooo much.
The horror (click through to experience the same Italian outrage)!!!
Salvador Dali painting a rhinoceros at the Paris Zoo in 1955.
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Congratulations! That's so exciting. I have a path through either my ggf or ggm, though my great-grandmother would involve a 1948 case, too. Still on the search for my great-grandfather's birth certificate that would make having an all male line easier. So while I am very happy for you I am also dying of jealousy ;)
I got a German Citizenship a few years back. The hardest thing was how to get my parent’s wedding certificate from Bolivia. I asked a group I belong to how to go about. A guy asked me to send him a photo Id and within a day I got a copy. I didn’t need to take a language test. It just took a couple of years for the process.