Malaria and technological networks: medical geography in the Pontine Marshes, Italy, in the 1930s

Abstract

This paper examines the struggle against malaria undertaken by the fascist regime in the Pontine Marshes, south of Rome, and relates it to discourses of domination of nature on the one hand, and modernization and civilization through technological networks such as health and medical networks on the other. The marshes' 'first nature' is described first of all, focusing on malaria and the difficulty of making an impact on marsh biology before the fascist enterprise and before the large-scale employment of modern technology for the subjugation, channelling and development of the marshes. Secondly, the paper focuses on the organization of medical antimalaria networks in the marshes during the years immediately preceding and during the fascist period . Thirdly, the 'second nature' produced in the marshes following the land reclamation and antimalaria projects is examined, and an assessment is provide of the fascist antimalaria project in the marshes.

Knowing Insects: Hosts, Vectors and Companions of Science

“…The resulting knowledge has been used to evacuate, displace and destroy habitats; but not without critical attention from scholars, activists and the 'bitten' to the stakes and effects of dividing cities, sanitizing nations, controlling population movements, destroying ecologies and cultivating new forms of domesticity and production (Hoppe, 2003;Caprotti, 2006). Insectknowledge informs not only the domination of insects in space; the 'bitten' and lands claimed in their name are also constituted as governable by the spatial conceptualizations and practices of vector and pest control.…”

The interaction of scientific evidence and politics in debates about preventing malaria in 1925

“…Caprotti has observed that fascist publications showed that the success of Bonifica was considered a triumph of fascist views on Nature -which was taken to be intrinsically bad -through to its transformation into a new, 'domesticated' Nature, which would permit a kind of regeneration of mankind. 25 The philosophy of fascist Bonifica needed extensive public works to create an 'ideal fascist landscape' out of the marshes, 26 a kind of fascist Utopia. 13 Indeed, wherever Bonifica had been pushed to the level of permanent settlements (such as those around the cities of Pontinia and Latina), the landscape had been profoundly reshaped, much more than was needed for drainage of marshes, and 'ideal towns' had been built.…”

Producing the ideal fascist landscape: nature, materiality and the cinematic representation of land reclamation in the Pontine Marshes

“…The characteristics of this "sterile" nature were often associated with "female" nature, echoing late nineteenth and early twentieth century gendered rhetoric (Green 1990;Falasca-Zamponi 2000) iii . Referred to as la mortifera palude (the death-inducing swamp), the pre-fascist landscape in the marshes was perceived as belonging precisely to this sterile, non-fascist sphere (Caprotti 2006). The Pontine Marshes land reclamation project aimed at transforming this wild, sterile nature into a fertile, life-giving nurturer, an idealised and romanticised nature that would provide the perfect setting for the production of ideal fascist citizens.…”