Learning and memory through new media and alternative protest: the 1992 bedsheets committee against mafia in Sicily

• In Event: Youth Empowerment, Transformative Education, and Social Movements

Proposal

In 1992 a series of terror attacks by cosa nostra (the Sicilian mafia) brought Italy to an unprecedented crisis, changing the way mafias were perceived. The killing of the magistrate Giovanni Falcone through a bomb attack meant a radical change of strategy by cosa nostra, shocking the citizenship and stimulating new answers from civil society, social movements and organised forces opposing mafia. A spontaneous collective, called “comitato dei lenzuoli” (bedsheets committee) emerged in Palermo and later in other locations, exposing white bedsheets with slogans painted on them at the windows of their houses, creating one of the most popular symbols of that season of the anti-mafia mobilisation. Through the study of archival sources preserved by Marta Cimino, founder of the committee, and of secondary sources authored by activists and by experts, this research exposes the conscious work of symbol production enacted by the collective. Playing with the meaning of objects and of traditional practices, the committee embodied an accelerated perception of time and the urgency of establishing a shared memory of what was happening in an eventful moment. How could a small actor emerged from below influence a vast movement and gather broad visibility at national and international level? Which was the meaning of memory and of remembrance for people involved in the happenings and reacting to extreme violence in the urban landscape? Which symbols were used to embody the vision of a new society in times of crisis? How was that connected to teaching and how did this political battle reach the classrooms? Some answers to these questions can be found taking advantage of the abundant production of materials and of objects by the activists, and connecting this case study and the existing scholarship on the history of antimafia to newer strands of literature on social movements. The study is part of a broader project involving the historian and anti-mafia activist Giovanna Fiume.

Author

• Giuseppe Lipari, Scuola Normale Superiore