In Italy, a Mamma Accused of Doting Too Much

In Italy, a Mamma Accused of Doting Too Much

In the idealized picture of the American heartland, baseball, mom and apple pie feature prominently. The Italian version? Soccer, spaghetti and, yes, la mamma. But in recent years, the folkloric image of the doting Italian mother has been joined in the national consciousness by something a tad less idyllic: the mammone, or mama's boy, the hyper-coddled son (daughters are statistically less susceptible) who grows up so attached to his home, and to his mamma in particular, that he never really becomes independent or a self-sufficient man.