‘Bella ciao’: A portable monument for transnational activism

Daniele Salerno; Marit van de Warenburg

doi:10.1177/13678779221145374

‘Bella ciao’: A portable monument for transnational activism

ICON - Modern and Contemporary Literature

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Academic › peer-review

Abstract

‘Bella ciao’ is one of the best-known partisan songs of the Italian anti-fascist Resistance (1943–5) and is part of the repertoire of protest of many movements across the globe. In 2018, the song was revived by its use in the popular TV series La casa de papel. This article examines how ‘Bella ciao’ is adopted by activists worldwide. It does so by analyzing the song through the concept of ‘portability’: the capacity of a cultural artifact to be a model that can be adapted to different contexts. After an examination of ‘Bella ciao’'s historical uses, the article focuses on the song's feminist versions for supporting different causes and in particular abortion rights. The reuses of the song speak of memory in terms of not only a product – what we remember – but also a process: the creative use of the cultural legacy of past movements for the shaping of new stories.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	164-181
Number of pages	18
Journal	International Journal of Cultural Studies
Volume	26
Issue number	2
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1177/13678779221145374
Publication status	Published - Mar 2023

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2023.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: Research for this article was financially supported by the European Research Council (ERC) under grant agreement 788572: ReAct - Remembering Activism: The Cultural Memory of Protest in Europe; and by the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions under grant agreement 840302: MemoRights - Cultural Memory in LGBT Activism for Rights.

Funders	Funder number
HORIZON EUROPE Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions	840302
European Research Council	788572

Keywords

abortion rights movement
activism
cultural memory
memory activism
songs of protest
‘Bella ciao’
‘Money Heist’

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10.1177/13678779221145374Licence: CC BY

Bella CiaoFinal published version, 949 KBLicence: CC BY

Cite this

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abstract = "{\textquoteleft}Bella ciao{\textquoteright} is one of the best-known partisan songs of the Italian anti-fascist Resistance (1943–5) and is part of the repertoire of protest of many movements across the globe. In 2018, the song was revived by its use in the popular TV series La casa de papel. This article examines how {\textquoteleft}Bella ciao{\textquoteright} is adopted by activists worldwide. It does so by analyzing the song through the concept of {\textquoteleft}portability{\textquoteright}: the capacity of a cultural artifact to be a model that can be adapted to different contexts. After an examination of {\textquoteleft}Bella ciao{\textquoteright}'s historical uses, the article focuses on the song's feminist versions for supporting different causes and in particular abortion rights. The reuses of the song speak of memory in terms of not only a product – what we remember – but also a process: the creative use of the cultural legacy of past movements for the shaping of new stories.",

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author = "Daniele Salerno and \{van de Warenburg\}, Marit",

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doi = "10.1177/13678779221145374",

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‘Bella ciao’: A portable monument for transnational activism

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Funding

Keywords

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