Written on the Subaltern Body: Gramsci and the Material Politics of Sardinian and Italian Prison Lives

This article argues for the need to combine written texts with other material sources when studying past subaltern lives. It suggests that much of a person’s life history is inscribed on their body (i.e. their teeth and bones) and objects. Such nonverbal traces are especially vital for reconstructing the historical value of subaltern lives. In his prison notes (Q25), Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) pointed out that it is hard to collect the histories of the subalterns, as they are scattered, fragmented by the ruling groups. We apply this thought to Gramsci himself in relation to his subaltern contemporaries in Sardinia by integrating multiple material legacies (bodily remains, texts, objects). We thereby wish to situate Gramsci’s suffering within the broader bodily experience of his contemporaries, revealing how the physical symptoms he described may have materialised as skeletal pathologies. While Gramsci is known for his sharp-sighted mind, we know much less of his body. Yet, he lived a life entrenched in and physically marked by colonialism, imprisonment, inequality, child labour, poverty, discrimination and illness. Presumably, his remains are marked by a life of struggle and labour, similarly to the bones of his contemporaries from Sardinia. By combining osteo-biographies (archaeological research on indicators of physiological stress on bones and teeth) of his contemporaries with written knowledge about Gramsci’s symptoms, diet, and material culture in Sardinia and Italian prison, this article reveals an array of different stories about these bodily lives which are as yet untold.