Avant-garde modernism and Italian Fascism: cultural politics in the era of Mussolini

The article explores the efforts of Marinetti's futurists, Sarfatti's Novecento movement, and the Tuscan circle that propounded strapaese to shape a cultural basis for Italian Fascism. The first two movements sought to become an official art for Fascism, while the third sought to produce a culture that would remain true to Fascism's origins in 1919, but all were in different ways 'modernist' movements and they are therefore contextualized both in terms of the challenge presented by Fascism and those faced by their modernist counterparts elsewhere in Europe. It is argued that the three movements enjoyed some success in the 1920s but were effectively shut down by the rise of the intransigent Right in the 1930s. Yet it is also argued that they needed the regime because they were too weak by themselves to assert the principle of artistic autonomy in the face of an internationally ascendant commodity culture. L'articolo esplora i tentativi dei futuristi facenti capo a Marinetti, del movimento Novecento di Sarfatti, così come del circolo toscano detto di Strapaese, nel costruire e definire le basi culturali del fascismo italiano. I primi due movimenti cercarono di costituire un'arte ufficiale del fascismo, mentre la terza si protese a far nascere una cultura che rimanesse legata alle origini del movimento fascista del 1919; ma tutti erano, in maniera diversa, movimenti 'modernisti' e sono qui tra l'altro posti sia nel contesto del cambiamento, nel clima politico e culturale, rappresentato dal fascismo che in quello degli altri movimenti modernisti europei. Viene messo in evidenza che i tre movimenti ottennero un discreto successo negli anni venti, ma furono censurati da una destra intransigente che emergeva negli anni trenta. Tuttavia, è possibile affermare che tutti e tre i movimenti avevano bisogno del Regime perché troppo deboli ed incapaci di consolidare un principio di autonomia artistica nei confronti di una emergente cultura consumista nel contesto internazionale.     

James Arbuckle and Dean Swift: cultural politics in the Irish confessional state

James Arbuckle, born a Presbyterian in Belfast, educated at Glasgow University, moved to Dublin under the patronage of the radical Whig Viscount Molesworth. He arrived at the time of Swift's triumph as ‘The Drapier’. Writing under the name ‘Hibernicus’, he produced a series of essays in the style of Addison's Spectator (1725–26). They can be read as a ‘polite’ Whig critique of Swift's Irish writing, particularly on confessional division. Arbuckle was clearly identified as a political opponent of Swift in a series of lampoons from Swift's circle. He wrote more incisively against the confessional state in his 1729 work The Tribune, lost to historians because of a mistaken attribution to Swift's friend Delany. This article will study Arbuckle's critique of Swift, aiming to give an insight into cultural conflict, both Whig/Tory and Anglican/Presbyterian in a period when both Whig and Presbyterian views have generally been overlooked.     

Language and politics: Investigations of language and speech by social and cultural anthropologists

Anderson, Benedict R. O'G. Language and Power: Exploring Political Cultures in Indonesia. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990. vii + 305 pp. including index. $44.95 cloth, $14.95 paper.

Merlan, Francesca and Alan Rumsey. Ku Waru: Language and Segmentary Politics in the Western Nebilyer Valley, Papua New Guinea. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991; xvii + 387 pp. including appendices, notes, references, and index. $59.50 cloth.     

The cultural politics of shit: class,gender and public space in India

In this article we seek to interrogate the cultural, political and economic conditions that generate the crisis of sanitation in India, with its severe implications for the poor and the marginalized. The key question we ask is how to interpret and explain the spectre of ‘open defecation’ in India's countryside and its booming urban centres. The discussion is divided into three parts. Part one examines the cultural interpretation of ‘shitting’ as symbolic action underpinned by ideas of purity, pollution and ‘the body politic’. Part two takes the political economic approach to gain further insights into contemporary discourse, performance and cultural politics surrounding toilets and open defecation in India. Part three examines civil society activities, state campaigns and media accounts of open defecation to explore the disruptive potency of everyday toilet activities, and how these interplay with issues of class, caste, and gender. Drawing on interviews and a review of ethnographic work, we seek to interrogate the idiom of modern sanitation, with its emphasis on cleanliness, progress and dreams of technology, as a constitutive idea and an explanatory force in Indian modernity.     

The hypocrisy of European moralism: Greece and the politics of cultural aggression ‐ part 2

In the current debt crisis, Greeks often stand accused of irresponsible borrowing, corruption, and laziness. In this article, I argue that the patently unfair way in which these stereotypes have framed the ongoing tensions between Greece and the other European countries is deeply grounded in the dynamics of “crypto‐colonialism.” German fascination with ancient Greece has combined with the needs of British, French, and, later, American strategic interests to produce a toxic brew of humiliation and contempt for the Greek people of today. Yet Greece, by escaping from the aftermath of military dictatorship under the unexpectedly benign guidance of the elder Constantine Karamanlis, is now – in marked contrast to at least one other crypto‐colonial state – giving the unelected leadership of the European Union and other creditors a lesson in democratic self‐sufficiency. Resolution of the residual tensions will nevertheless only be possible when both sides agree to cease trading insulting stereotypes and admit the errors of a shared and embarrassing past – a process for which anthropological perspectives can offer significant support.     

The hypocrisy of European moralism: Greece and the politics of cultural aggression – part 1

In the current debt crisis, Greeks often stand accused of irresponsible borrowing, corruption, and laziness. In this article, I argue that the patently unfair way in which these stereotypes have framed the ongoing tensions between Greece and the other European countries is deeply grounded in the dynamics of “crypto‐colonialism.” German fascination with ancient Greece has combined with the needs of British, French, and, later, American strategic interests to produce a toxic brew of humiliation and contempt for the Greek people of today. Yet Greece, by escaping from the aftermath of military dictatorship under the unexpectedly benign guidance of the elder Constantine Karamanlis, is now – in marked contrast to at least one other crypto‐colonial state – giving the unelected leadership of the European Union and other creditors a lesson in democratic self‐sufficiency. Resolution of the residual tensions will nevertheless only be possible when both sides agree to cease trading insulting stereotypes and admit the errors of a shared and embarrassing past – a process for which anthropological perspectives can offer significant support.     

Unmaking the fascist man: masculinity,film and the transition from dictatorship

This essay examines the recasting and renegotiation of Italian masculinity during the war and during the transition from dictatorship to democracy. Film is my privileged source for understanding the complexities of male experience during this period of dramatic change, but I also rely on war crimes charges, diaries and memoirs. While not explicitly comparative in nature, the essay considers whether we can speak of a ‘crisis of masculinity’ in postwar Italy akin to that diagnosed by historians of postwar Germany and France. Within this broad frame, the essay focuses the experiences and representations of one category of men who evoked particular anxieties about the legacies of defeat and the redemption of Italian men for democratic models of fatherhood and citizenship: veterans, in particular returned prisoners of war. The 1946 film Il bandito (The Bandit, Alberto Lattuada), which I analyze in the last section of the essay, dramatizes the situation of these returned prisoners and the problem of a generation of men raised according to fascist norms that linked masculinity to the performance of aggressive acts.     

NATO: the practice and politics of transformation

The Iraq crisis caused a deep rift in US–European relations and within Europe. NATO seemed sure at least to be damaged, if not fatally undermined. But to the dismay of those who have been waiting for many years for NATO finally to unravel, the Atlantic alliance spent 2003 proudly showing off its transformation project, and looking forward to its next enlargement in 2004. Yet these necessary improvements to NATO's political and military structures, and to its deployable capability, cannot alone secure the alliance's future. This article argues that what is needed, as ever, is a shared determination among governments that NATO can continue to serve their needs. There has been no better opportunity since the end of the Cold War to place the US-European security relationship on a firm footing through NATO. There has also been no moment when the penalties of failure have been higher. If NATO's transformation agenda, together with the NATO–EU 'Berlin Plus' arrangement, are not exploited to the full, then US-European security relations are unlikely to recover from Iraq.     

'It's a Man's Life!': Soldiers,masculinity and the countryside

This article explores the relationships between soldiers, masculinity and the countryside. It draws on a variety of published materials ranging from army recruitment literature to military autobiography. It is located primarily in conceptual frameworks suggested by feminist and rural studies literatures. Following a brief discussion of the historical contribution of the military to ideas of rurality, the relationships between soldiers, masculinity and the countryside are explored. First, the ways in which the army constructs a particular view of the countryside are discussed. This view accords the army rights of control over space, dictates a particular way of seeing rural space, and develops a quasi-environmentalist interpretation of the impact of army activity on the landscape. Second, it is suggested that this conceptualisation of the countryside contributes specifically to the construction of particular (hegemonic) notions of masculinity. The ideas of adventure and danger are particularly important in this respect. Third, the role of the body of the soldier in this process is examined. The construction of a specific gendered identity through a process of transformation from civilian to soldier is discussed. The article concludes by suggesting how the body of the soldier is used to signify particular senses of place.     

Federalism: Money and politics

J. S. H. Hunter, Revenue Sharing in the Federal Republic of Germany, Centre for Research on Federal Financial Relations, Research Monograph No. 2, ANU, 1973, pp. 116 + xi, $3.00.