Paola Bonifazio investigates the ways in which films sponsored by Italian and American government agencies promoted a particular vision of modernization and industry and functioned as tools to govern the Italian people.

Paola Bonifazio is an assistant professor in the Department of French and Italian at the University of Texas at Austin.

‘Schooling in Modernity is a fascinating account of short films sponsored by Italian and American governments… It makes a convincing argument about the significance of sponsored cinema in negotiating the transition between Fascism and post-war democracy.’

Gianluca Fantoni:

‘This important empirically rich and theoretically nuanced book is certainly of great interest to researchers in modern Italian history as well as to scholars studying propaganda.’

Luca Caminati, Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema, Concordia University:
“This is a wonderful book that will have a long-lasting impact on Italian cinema as it moves towards the study of cinematic cultures. Based on rare and difficult-to-access materials from minor and previously inaccessible archives, Schooling in Modernity is the first book to address this important body of films.”

Christopher Duggan, Director, Centre for Modern Italian History, University of Reading:
“Schooling in Modernity is an interesting and sophisticated work that makes use of a hitherto little known body of material: the hundreds of short films that were made by Italian and American state and non-state sponsors from the late 1940s to the late 1950s. Thorough and analytically rich, this book is a valuable contribution to the history of Italian cinema.”