A-Infos (en) Italy, FDCA, Cantiere #42 - In memory of Adriana Dadà, historian and anarchist communist activist (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

On Wednesday, January 28, 2026, her partner Adriana Dadà passed away at 
her home in Florence after an illness that had rapidly worsened in 
recent weeks. Adriana, a former researcher and professor of contemporary 
history at the University of Florence, a student of Gino Cerrito, a 
historian of anarchism and a former activist in the FAI, was an avowed 
anarchist communist, always committed to political, social, cultural, 
and trade union activities, with a materialist and class-based approach.
Born in Filattiera, a small town in Lunigiana, in November 1947, she 
lives successively with her family in Pontremoli, Fosdinovo, and Marina 
di Carrara. Then, in the late 1960s, as a student at the University of 
Florence, she became interested in anarchism and became an active member 
of a group that published a university student newspaper 
("Redimensione"), which, under her leadership, evolved into the Gruppo 
Anarchico Crescita Politica (Political Growth Anarchist Group), then, in 
the 1970s, the Gruppo Comunista Anarchico di Firenze (Anarchist 
Communist Group of Florence). A member of the editorial board of 
Crescita Politica Editrice, in 1979 she participated with the GCA of 
Florence in the founding of the Union of Anarchist Communists of Tuscany 
(UCAT). In 1985, she actively participated in the founding congress of 
the Federation of Anarchist Communists, an organization in which she 
remained active until 2010, holding national positions, and finally in 
the Union of Anarchist Communists of Italy (UCADI). For several years, 
she had not joined any political organization, despite her conviction of 
its necessity. In addition to her studies and research, she had devoted 
herself to intense social activity in the working-class Florentine 
neighborhood of San Jacopino, where she lived and led educational and 
social projects with migrant women and young people, organizing various 
anti-fascist initiatives every April 25th, participating in conferences, 
and other cultural and political activities. In this work, she had also 
successfully defended a large green space, the only one in the 
neighborhood, a fact she was particularly pleased about. A large mural 
was painted here, depicting episodes of struggle but also the convivial 
joy of being together.
A nationally renowned historian, she has written numerous articles, 
essays, and books on the phenomenon of migration-particularly female 
migration-which she had extensively investigated, especially that of the 
barsane (street vendors from Lunigiana), wet nurses, and seasonal and 
long-term migrants from Tuscany. Adriana, for this reason, specialized 
in oral history, translating her research into multimedia tools and 
actively collaborating with the Municipality of Bagnone, for which she 
curated the Museum Archive of Memory, and then with the Paolo Cresci 
Museum for the history of Italian emigration in Lucca. Her study of 
Italian emigration to the United States in the context of that country's 
social struggles was also significant (essays on "Italian Americans and 
Italian Society"; "Aspects of American Trade Unionism: The IWW"; "The 
Italian-American Anarchist Press and the Second World War"). She also 
studied anarchism intensively, producing essays and volumes: "Italian 
Anarchists Between Class War and Reaction" in Teti's "History of Italian 
Society"; her editing of "Anarchists in the Apuan Resistance" by Gino 
Cerrito; and that of "Anarchist Antifascism 1919-1945" by Nino Malara; 
then the much-cited volume Anarchism in Italy between Movement and 
Party: History and Documents of Italian Anarchism. Adriana's attention 
has also often focused on the 1968 movement, in Florence and beyond, 
with contributions to books such as Sixty-Eight: The Season of Movements 
(1960-1979) and, more recently, The Image in Protest: In '68 and Today. 
A longtime contributor to various magazines (Zapruder, Antipodi, 
Comunismo Libertario, Per un'altra città, Il Cantiere, etc.), she was 
formerly vice president and scientific director of the '68 Archive in 
Florence.
The passing of Adriana Dadà, beyond being a painful human loss for all 
who knew her, deprives the entire anarchist movement of a comrade, a 
militant, and a historian of great value. As anarchist communists, we 
are particularly affected by her loss and will be committed to 
remembering her appropriately, also for all that she did and left us, 
which will not be lost.

https://alternativalibertaria.fdca.it/wpAL/
_________________________________________
A - I N F O S  N E W S  S E R V I C E
By, For, and About Anarchists
Send news reports to A-infos-en mailing list
A-infos-en@ainfos.ca
Subscribe/Unsubscribe https://ainfos.ca/mailman/listinfo/a-infos-en
Archive: http://ainfos.ca/en