Nadina LaSpina: The Missing Link in Italian American Disability Studies

Abstract Nadina LaSpina's Such a Pretty Girl: A Story of Struggle, Empowerment, and Disability Pride (2019) bridges the gap between disability studies and Italian American studies. It is the missing link between the tradition of Italian American women writers and the contemporary boom of disability memoirs. The memoir opens in Sicily, where LaSpina's childhood is shaped by religious imagery, pity, and prejudices against her inability to walk caused by polio. Riposto becomes more than a literal place; it serves as a metaphor for the displacement and isolation experienced by disabled people everywhere. As LaSpina transitions to life and freedom in America, she explores essential Italian American themes, including language, the garden, food, the relationship with her mother, and memory. The American Dream, in particular, is not presented as material wealth but as her father's hope for a cure. LaSpina uses writing as a tool for emotional catharsis, reflecting on romantic and familial relationships, abuse, and motherhood. Ultimately, Such a Pretty Girl is a narrative of disability pride that refuses to frame LaSpina's journey in terms of overcoming, recovery, or supercrip narratives. Instead, it recounts the authentic journey of an Italian American woman without losing the materiality and reality of disability.