Challenging race, gender, and class in Fascist and postwar Italy. Biographical notes on Elena Sengal (1911–1962)

Our essay aims to offer a biography of Elena Sengal (1911–1962), an Italian citizen of Ethiopian origin, whose life offers important elements to better understand both Fascist and postwar Italy. Elena was born into an Italo-Ethiopian family and became an Italian citizen after the naturalisation of her father, Sengal Workneh, a former Italian colonial subject and a lecturer in Amharic and Tigrinya at the Istituto Orientale in Naples. She grew up in Naples where she graduated and later held a teaching position, following in her father’s footsteps. When in 1939 her partner, Guido Cucci, fell in Ethiopia fighting the Ethiopian resistance, Elena found herself alone with a newborn child and struggled to make a living. Her life did not improve with the end of Fascism. Indeed, in postwar Italy it became so unbearable that she relocated to Ethiopia. However, racism and exclusion accompanied her life in the East African country too. This biography is based on archival materials as well as a body of personal letters of Elena Sengal, kindly made available by her granddaughter Maria Elena Cucci.