“We don’t share the same language with the Orientals yet”. The Italian colony in Egypt and the spread of ‘radical’ ideas between the XIX and XX century

Alessandra Marchi

2023-01-01

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Abstract

Between the XIX and XX centuries, Egyptian cities such as Alexandria and Cairo hosted many rebels, anarchists, socialists and activists, who promoted civil and social rights through their ‘radical’ ideas and struggles. The role played by the foreign press in spreading such ideas was fundamental for wider political mobilization in Egypt during the colonial period. In this paper, the links between colonialism, labour and migration will be investigated through the analysis of the Italian anarchist press, a useful source for research that aims to shed light on the multifaceted composition of the same Italian ‘subaltern’ society in Egypt, its radical social groups and their somehow contradictory ideas – colonialist and even racist – about Arab peoples. Yet, the development of such complex historical social formations, dominated by colonial capitalist settings like in Egypt, normally intersects forms of racialization, class and national oppression which can be expressed on several levels.