Australian-elected Italian politician on special visit to Wollongong

Feb 14, 2007

Marco Fedi, elected by Australians to the Italian Parliament last year, is travelling from Rome to Wollongong to launch the Gramsci Society (Asia-Pacific) at the University of Wollongong tomorrow (Thursday 15 February).

Fedi was born in Ascoli Piceno, Italy, and emigrated to Australia in 1983. He was elected to the Chamber of Deputies of Italy in the Italian general elections as an overseas candidate for the centre-left coalition (L’Unione). Fedi is a member of the Italian Democratic Party of the Left and was on the same ticket as Nino Randazzo who was elected to the Italian Senate.

Fedi is the Vice Secretary of the General Council of Italians Abroad.

The Gramsci Society (Asia-Pacific) is part of the International Gramsci Society which was founded in October 1989 to facilitate communication and the exchange of information and ideas among people interested in the life and work of Antonio Gramsci.Gramsci was an Italian working class activist, political leader and Marxist theoretician born in 1897 in Ales, Sardinia, Italy. In 1921 he helped to establish the Italian Communist Party and in 1924 he became the parliamentary leader of the party. When the party was banned by Mussolini, Gramsci was arrested and spent the rest of his life in prison where he completed about 30 notebooks of reflections. His notebooks are considered one of the most important political works of the 20th century.

During his visit to UOW, Fedi will not only launch the Gramsci Society (Asia-Pacific) but attend a book launch of “Ruling Class Men: Money, Sex, Power” by Dr Mike Donaldson who convenes the Sociology Program at UOW and Associate Professor Scott Poynting from the School of Humanities and Languages at the University of Western Sydney. The authors have researched the desires and fears of the world’s most powerful men. It exposes the nature of ruling-class masculinity itself.

Media please note

A special photo/filming opportunity has been arranged for the media to meet Marco Fedi ahead of the book launch he is attending (4.30pm-5-30pm) and the Gramsci Society (Asia-Pacific) launch from 5.30pm to 7pm.

Fedi will be available to meet media representatives at 11am in UOW’s Arts Building (Bldg 19) in Room 1047 where he will be having a preliminary meeting with Gramsci Society representatives.

Following this media opportunity, Fedi will be attending a seminar from 12.30pm to 2.30pm in the Arts Building (Room 1003) presented by Professor Guido Liguori on the topic, “Common Sense and Good Sense in Gramsci”. Professor Liguori is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Calabria and Vice-President of the Italian branch of the International Gramsci Society.

For further information contact Dr Mike Donaldson on (02) 4221 3506 or (02) 4268 1580 (h); and Marco Fedi can be reached via the following mobile number (only while he is in Australia) on 0412 003978.

For more information, contact:

media@uow.edu.au
University of Wollongong
Ph: (02) 4221 5942; fax (02) 4221 3128