Click the star to add/remove an item to/from your individual schedule.
You need to be logged in to avail of this functionality,
and to see the links to virtual rooms.
Log in
Accepted Paper:
Familiar demons: more-than-human histories of wheat science and farming in fascist Italy
Michele Sollai
(University of Zurich)
The paper analyzes the role of rust fungi, sparrows, and hot winds in the evolution of agrarian development and wheat autarky in fascist Italy. Particularly, it examines how fascist science sought to transform the relationship between these non-human agents and wheat farming in the Italian South.
Paper long abstract:
The paper brings to the center stage three more-than-human agents that have long characterized and deeply shaped the agrarian wheatscape of southern Italy: a plant fungus (rust); a bird (sparrow); and a wind ("favonio" or "libeccio", hot and dry south-west winds). As affirmed in 1919 by southern intellectual Giustino Fortunato, these were the “familiar demons” of southern Italian farmers: a cyclical, seemingly never-ending presence in their wheat fields, painful and yet embodied, accepted in daily life and popular folklore. The paper shows how in the context of the fascist diktat of agrarian development and wheat autarky in the Italian South, Italian agrarian science and technology was tasked to finally “fight” these demons and "free" local wheat farmers from their chains. The paper thus analyzes the interplay between "modern" agrarian science and technology, farmers’ agroecological knowledges, and the agency of rust, sparrows, and wind as an entry point to provide a new perspective on the history of science, farming, and the environment in fascist Italy.