Sicilian Mafia
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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The Sicilian Mafia (also known as Cosa Nostra, in English "Our Thing") is a criminal syndicate in Sicily, Italy. It is a loose association of criminal groups that share a common organizational structure and code of conduct, and whose common enterprise is protection racketeering. Each group, known as a "family", "clan", or "cosca", claims sovereignty over a territory, usually a town or village or a neighbourhood (borgata) of a larger city, in which it operates its rackets. Its members call themselves "men of honour", although the public often refers to them as "mafiosi".
The American Mafia arose from offshoots of the Mafia that emerged in the United States during the late nineteenth century, following waves of emigration from Italy. There were similar offshoots in Canada among Italian Canadians. The same has been claimed of organised crime among Italians in Australia.
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