PRESS RELEASE
PAGE OF REMEMBRANCE | Research organisations and Jewish people come to tell the impact of racial laws on science and culture
One year after the creation of the web platform “Page of Remembrance”, the Italian scientific and academic communities formalise and expand their collaboration to collect and disseminate documents and testimonies on the impact of the Nazi-Fascist racial laws on science and culture.
[Rome, 12 January 2023].
With the Agreement signed on 10 January 2023, INGV, CNR, the Accademia dei Lincei and INAPP, together with UCEI and ERC, will collaborate closely to collect and disseminate testimonies and documents outlining the impact that the so-called “racial laws” on the Italian scientific and academic communities.
The collaboration will contribute to the Page of Remembrance launched in January 2022 by INGV and will seek to study, collect and disseminate the testimonies and documents citizens of Jewish religion and/or descent that were discharged or expelled from Italian Research institutions, universities and academies.
Through joint initiatives, the institutions involved will promote documentary, historical and bibliographical research as well as organise cultural events in order to highlight the dramatic impact caused by Royal Decree-Law no. 880 of 19 April 1937 which came to be known as the “Racial Laws”.
“The fundamental aspect of this project consists in bridging together Jewish people and research institutions to collect, study and disseminate testimonies related to the impact of the “Racial Laws”, in the context of academic and research institutions. The ultimate goal is to emphasise the irreparable damage caused to Italy’s scientific and cultural progress” says Aldo Winkler, the project’s creator. “In addition, we also want to highlight the expulsion of many Jewish women, whose participation in the academic life was avant-garde compared to the customs of the time, and document the brain-drain of those who managed to escape abroad. Finally, we hope to bring in more and more institutions in this important and shared journey.”
According to Carlo Doglioni, President of INGV, ‘Remembering is key for a conscious society and to prevent such despicable events from occurring again. Italian science suffered the serious consequences of the racial laws and it is important that people are made aware of this, so it never happens again.”
The President of the Union of Italian Jewish Communities, Noemi Di Segni, also emphasises that ‘the remembering of what has been – accompanied by research and rigorous examination of the facts – is the necessary prerequisite for a greater understanding of the events. Moreover, joint reflection among institutions and scholars from different backgrounds is the basis for building civil and democratic coexistence, within the framework of our precious Constitution.”
“Many do not remember and many do not know the absurd persecutions perpetrated in that sad period of history,’ says Sebastiano Fadda, President of the National Institute for Public Policy Analysis. ‘But the courage of those who suffered the sad horrors of deportation and those who refused to bow down and were forced to abandon their academic and research communities to pursue their activities in exile, must be remembered and held up as an example in a world that still often degrades human dignity and freedom. When people die, their experiences and memories are also in danger of being forgotten – institutions can play an important role in preserving these memories. That is why we also feel committed to this task’.
“Because of the racial laws of 1938, women and men, eminent scientists, young researchers and technicians were exempted from serving in our institution, as in others. A persecution of rights that would soon become a persecution of lives. That was one of the darkest pages of the 20th century and led to the destruction of scientific research and entities, as well as entire families” states Maria Chiara Carrozza, President of the National Research Council. “This project aims to piece together painful and little-known events and to bring to light what has been, so that this new research can give a voice to those who did not have one at the time”.
“The Lincei’s participation in this initiative is fully in line with the history of our Academy,” says the President of the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Roberto Antonelli, “which also suffered from the persecution of the Jews caused by the racial laws. Among the many Italian Jewish personalities who were members of our academy, I would like to recall at least three: Vito Volterra, Guido Castelnuovo and Beniamino Segre. Vito Volterra was a limpid example of human, civil and democratic ethics. A senator for life in 1905, he was one of the signatories in 1926 of the Manifesto of anti-fascist intellectuals promoted by Benedetto Croce and one of the twelve Italian university professors who refused to swear allegiance to fascism in 1931, thus forfeiting his professorship and his role at the Accademia dei Lincei. Guido Castelnuovo, who, with great generosity as a scientist and an Italian, lavished all his energies to refund the Lincei suppressed by Fascism after the establishment of the Republic, by collaborating with its vice-president Luigi Einaudi, who as President of the Republic appointed him senator for life in 1949. Beniamino Segre, who founded the interdisciplinary Lyncean centre and was painfully exiled in England. Volterra, Castelnuovo and Segre were Italian Jews who, like many others, contributed to science research and the advancement of our civil democracy’.
The cultural events, conferences and seminars will be open to the public to provide dignity and visibility to those affected by the persecutions and involve family members and descendants of the victims.
The institutions will also take care of archiving, also via digital means, all documents collected, and trace the biographies of those persecuted as far as possible.
The Page of Remembrance will be preserved and continuously updated, as a reminder of what must never happen again.
Links:
Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia (INGV) – Pagina della Memoria
Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR)
Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei
Istituto Nazionale per l’Analisi delle Politiche Pubbliche (INAPP)
Unione delle Comunità Ebraiche Italiane (UCEI)
Comunità Ebraica di Roma (CER)
Allegati
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