Browsing by Subject "Mussolini, Benito, 1883-1945"

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    “Discriminate, but Do Not Persecute”: Mussolini’s Urban Plan for the Jews of Rome
    (2015) Sanchez, Meghan; Friedman, Andrew, 1974-; Gerstein, Linda
    During the early 1930s, Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini began his urban plan to reconstruct and rebuild Rome to its former ancient glory. Black-and-white photographs were taken to mark each momentous, groundbreaking occasion. These images depict Mussolini and his squads of Fascist youth and political goons traipsing across the ruins and remains of classical Rome. Through reconstruction, he wanted to uncover the great city that was once the capital of the leading empire of Western civilization and graft this legacy onto Fascist Rome. This urban project would create a nation that would be envied by all. While Mussolini sought to use these sites from ancient Rome as a bridge between classical antiquity and the modern capital of Italy, he also reemphasized a relationship between the Romans and Jews that had lain dormant among these ruins, in which Roman Jews from antiquity were not seen as Roman, but as “others” living in a land amongst true Roman citizens. The three sites that I focus on, Largo Argentina, the Roman Forum, and the Theater of Marcellus, are all within a mile of the Roman Jewish ghetto. Mussolini’s urban renewal project uses these sites to separate the revitalized center of Rome from the Jews, and attempts to marginalize them from Italian Fascist history. My thesis uses photographs of the three sites to demonstrate the revival of these ancient spaces and how they separate the Jews from the Roman architectural landscape, which acts as a precursor to the 1938 racial laws implemented to discriminate against the Jews of Italy. Many historians suspect that Mussolini enforced these laws to appease and follow the lead of Nazi Germany, but I claim that anti-Semitism has always been a part of Italian history and this relationship resurfaced in 1930 as a way to align Fascist Italy with its forefathers of classical Rome.
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    "Her and Yet Not Her": Women Authors Questioning Mussolini's Fascist Regime on the 'Terza Pagina' of Italy's Newspapers 1925-1936
    (2011) Yarkin, Genna; Kitroeff, Alexander
    My thesis examines the ways in which Italian female authors questioned the policies and ideologies of the fascist regime, led by Benito Mussolini. With the support of eight short stories written by authors Grazia Deledda, Ada Negri, Amalia Guglielminetti, Pia Rimini, Maria Luisa Astaldi and Marinella Lodi, my thesis draws connections between regime policy and the attitudes and actions of female citizens in Italy. Because women's short stories were some of the most visible and widely distributed forms of women's self-representation during the regime, they give us valuable insight into the criticisms and questions women had concerning its treatment of women, their bodies, and their destinies. The stories examined in my thesis originally appeared between 1925 and 1936 on the third page, or 'terza pagina,' of two of Italy's most popular newspapers, the Corriere della sera of Turin and II Giornale d'Italia of Rome. While women's writing was successful in other mediums, such as novels or collections of stories and poems, they enjoyed the most popularity and daily readership on the cultural pages of these newspapers. Because the regime had 'Fascized' Italy's media by 1926, driving social and political criticism and commentary off the pages of newspapers, short stories began appearing almost daily on the first two columns on the third page. This provided a valuable and highly visible stage on which women gave voice to issues affecting them. Namely, in three separate sections, this thesis addresses women's responses to the regime's policies concerning the following issues: motherhood and marriage, the real and imagined needs of rural, peasant women, and the emphasis of a collective will and identity over that of the individual. Each of the themes is illustrated by short stories that delve into the lives of Italian women and how the policies and attitudes of the regime negatively affected them. Ultimately, our possession of and analysis on women's contributions to the 'terza pagina' of Italy's newspapers allows us to conclude that women did not meekly accept the role of the 'New Woman' that was forced upon them. Rather, they questioned and resisted the regime's laws, ideas, propaganda and policies. This resistance and criticism is vividly represented and brought to life by women's short stories, which, until recently, were forgotten by Italy and the world.