Introduzione
Andreina De Clementi e Dianella Gagliani
Dal fascismo alla democrazia. Interpretazioni americane dei ruoli di genere nell’Italia del secondo dopoguerra
Elisabetta Bini
Between Fascism and Democracy: American Interpretations
of Gender Roles in Postwar Italy
The essay analyzes the interpretations offered by the United States of Italy’s
transition from Fascism to democracy. It focuses in particular on two sources: the
magazine «Life», and the American Association of University Women (AAUW),
and argues that they both played an important role in building postwar US internationalism.
By placing gender at the center of her analysis, the a. attempts to
highlight the analytical importance of the category of gender for the study of international
relations, and in particular of the Cold War. «Life» embraced the idea
that the US should serve as a model for other countries. It conceptualized the
transformation of Italy into a modern democracy as a shift from a form of masculinity
characterized by violence and unruliness, associated with Communism,
to a strong and determined masculinity, symbolized by the American troops.
Furthermore, it interpreted the Marshall Plan as a source of social stability and
economic growth. Thanks to American aid, Italy would be able to embrace modernity,
symbolized by nuclear families with a male breadwinner and a housewife,
living in modern apartments and consuming new forms of leisure activities. On
the other hand, the AAUW argued that Italian women had a crucial role to play in
the rebuilding of their country. Highlighting the importance of women in the
creation of a democratic world, based on peace and on international cooperation,
it organized a series of exchanges between Italy and the US, in order to teach
Italian women the techniques of democracy. Compared to «Life» the AAUW refused
to look at the Italian situation through the lens the Cold War, and conceived
of the immediate postwar perioda s a revolutionary moment, in which women
could play a politically decisive role.
Affectionate Condescension: The “Two Cultures” and
Anglophone Views of Italy’s Divorce Question (1900-1974)
This article examines the way the English-language press judged Italy
on its treatment of the divorce question in the twentieth century, arguing that
the fate of divorce-law proposals came to be seen as a litmus test of the true
nature of Italian culture. The introduction of divorce laws in most of the western
world by 1900 was a result of state formation and the corresponding
erosion of religious jurisdiction over private life. Although Italy had been the
bright star of liberalism in the 1860s, its refusal to introduce a divorce law
throughout most of the twentieth century was interpreted as a sign of lurking
medievalism. After World War II the continued absence of a divorce law appeared
particularly anomalous against the background of extraordinary economic
and social progress. The English-language press followed the campaigns
to introduce a divorce law in the 1960s with great interest, and when
the Italian public affirmed their support for divorce in the referendum of
1974, Italy was finally held to have shed its vestiges of medieval culture and
fully embraced progress and modernity.
Memorie del colonialismo italiano fra le donne eritree: la storia di Frewini
Giulia Barrera
Eritrean Women and the Memory of Italian Colonialism:
The Story of Frewini
The article discusses the memories of Italian colonialism in Eritrea by
looking at the life history of Frewini, an Eritrean woman born in the early
1920s. Her life history shows that the periodization of decolonization could
be gender specific. Moreover, Frewini’s unconventional life history challenges
stereotyped images of the colonial relation and shows that individual
experience of colonialism changed according to individual’s position in the
colonized society. In the introduction, the article discusses how different wars
contributed to shape both history and memory of Italian colonialism in Eritrea:
Adwa forced the Italians to limit land expropriation and thus limited the
conflicts between Italians and Eritreans; WWII caused Italy the loss of her
colonies, thus saving Eritrea from the painful conflicts that typically accompanied
decolonization in settler colonies; the thirty-year-long liberation war
had such a devastating impact on Eritrans’ lives that memories of the pre-war
period easily tend to get idealized.
Conquiste, censure, dissimulazioni. Donne cinesi negli anni Cinquanta
Maria Clara Donato
«Quello non era un concorso di bellezza». Le voci delle regine del lavoro sotto il regime peronista
Mirta Zaida Lobato
Forum: Ancora su //Italiane//
a cura di Ida Fazio
Forum: Ancora su //Italiane//
a cura di Ida Fazio
marzo 2006, 232 p. ISBN-10: 88-8334-197-X ISBN-13: 978-88-8334-197-7 € 21,00