Description:
"Italy has been made; now we need to make the Italians," goes a familiar Italian saying. Mussolini was the first head of state to include women in this mandate. How the fascist dictatorship defined women's place in modern Italy and how women experienced the Duce's rule are the subjects of Victoria de Grazia's seminal and influential study. De Grazia draws on an array of sources―memoirs and novels; the images, songs, and events of mass culture; and government statistics and archival reports--to craft a broad yet detailed characterization of Italian women's ambiguous and ambivalent experience of a regime that promised modernity yet denied women emancipation. Now, thirty-five years after its initial publication, de Grazia has thoroughly revised and expanded her work, adding two new chapters specifically focusing on the Fascist regime's imperial rule in East Africa.
Brief description:
Victoria de Grazia is the Moore Collegiate Professor Emerita of History at Columbia University. She is the author of The Perfect Fascist: A Story of Love, Power, and Morality in Mussolini's Italy and The Culture of Consent: Mass Organization of Leisure in Fascist Italy.
Review Quotes:
Praise for the previous edition:
"The first comprehensive study of women under Italian Fascism."--New York Times
"Many of us in Italian history have long awaited a study like Victoria de Grazia's book. . . . De Grazia intelligently succeeds in her aim of introducing a host of new issues into the historiography of fascist Italy."--American Historical Review
"A marvelously nuanced account."--Contemporary European History
"A challenging, fascinating history of the ways that the Italian fascist state sought to mobilize women. . . . De Grazia has written a book that should command the attention of anyone concerned with how women emerged as political and social subjects in advanced industrial societies."--American Journal of Sociology
"A thoroughly researched and well-written account of a previously under-explored aspect of the Mussolini regime."--Virginia Quarterly Review
"Superb. . . . De Grazia's important book will be the point of departure for those interested in the question of the relation between women and fascism for some time to come."--Modernism/modernity
"De Grazia's meticulously documented investigation is an outstanding addition to the field of mid-twentieth-century Italian social history. . . . A vital, indeed, indispensable contribution."--Annali d'Italianistica
"De Grazia makes an invaluable contribution to the ongoing reevaluation of this period in Italian history. . . . Groundbreaking and provocative."--Italica
"A unique contribution to the social history of Italian Fascism that ought to be read not just by specialists in women's studies but indeed by everybody with an interest in twentieth-century Italy."--History
"The first major study of women under Italian fascism."--Journal of Women's History
"A fundamental contribution to our understanding of the relationship between Italian Fascism and women. . . . Meticulously crafted."--Ayer
"Extremely well researched and drawing upon a vast array of sources."--Library Journal
"Noteworthy. . . . An important contribution to women's studies."--Publishers Weekly