GRAMSCI UNDISABLED

Abstract

A translation of "Gramsci undisabled" article by David Forgacs, into Portuguese

Most books by or about Antonio Gramsci reproduce on their covers the same studio photograph dating from the early 1920s. It is a head and shoulders portrait showing Gramsci with longish hair, dark coat buttoned at the neck, unsmiling and looking into the camera through wire-rimmed glasses. This was also the image of him most commonly displayed in Communist Party branches all over Italy from the late 1940s to 1991. Yet if we compare it with other extant photographs of Gramsci, as well as with those of other revolutionary leaders adopted as iconic in the communist movement, we can see it differs from the former and resembles the latter in several ways. The most striking difference is the erasure of any sign of Gramsci’s bodily impairment: the curvature of the spine and short stature resulting from the spinal tuberculosis he had as a child. The article examines the history of this photograph and the way it became adopted as the approved image of Gramsci and considers what was at stake in removing from official memory a condition of disability that was central to his own personal and political identity.