Noi donne (Italian: We Women) is a monthly feminist magazine published in Rome, Italy. It is one of the most significant feminist publications in the country.[1]
Noi donne was illegally published between 1937 and 1939 in Paris by the Italian women exiled there before its official start in 1944.[2][3][4] Its publication was possible only after the liberation of Rome[5] and the first issue appeared in Naples in July 1944.[6][7] The founders led by Valentina Palumbo[8] and Adele Cambria were communist women.[9] In the period between 1952 and 1953 the number of the pages was 48.[10]
The headquarters of the magazine was moved from Naples to Rome.[2] From 1945 to the 1990s it was the official magazine of the Unione Donne in Italia (UDI; Union of Italian Women).[2][7] The Union was closely connected to and financed by the Italian Communist Party (PCI).[11]
Noi donne is circulated monthly, and its website was launched in 2004.[2] It was previously published on a weekly basis.[12][13] The magazine was funded by government funding which temporarily ended in the late 1993.[6]
The magazine sold nearly 300,000 copies in 1952.[10] In the 1970s Noi donne enjoyed higher levels of circulation.[14]
Noi donne was not established as a magazine targeting bourgeois Italian women.[15] Instead, its target audience is women on the left.[3] Maria Casalini claimed that the magazine was instrumental in introducing Italian women to the political arena of democratic Italy.[5] However, at the beginning of the 1950s its focus was on entertainment, daily life and culture.[15] Later, the magazine again began to cover articles on politics, social change, culture, women's equality, violence against women and health.[2][16]Noi donne also features articles on cinema.[17] In addition, it frequently attacked mainstream women's magazines in Italy.[18]
In 2001 Newsweek described Noi donne as a popular semifeminist magazine.[19] In addition, it was less feminist than other magazines such as Effe and Differenze.[13]
The editors of Noi donne have been women.[3]Maria Antonietta Macciocchi, an Italian politician and writer, served as the editor of the magazine[15][20] from 1950 to 1956.[21][22] She replaced Fidia Gambetti in the post.[22] Bia Sarasini was the cultural editor during the 1990s.[23]
^ abcPenelope Morris (2007). "A window on the private sphere: Advice columns, marriage, and the evolving family in 1950s Italy". The Italianist. 27 (2): 304–332. doi:10.1179/026143407X234194. S2CID144706118.
^Nina Rothenberg (November 2006). "The Catholic and the Communist Women's Press in Post-War Italy—An Analysis of Cronache and Noi Donne". Modern Italy. 11 (3): 285–304. doi:10.1080/13532940600937053. S2CID144034180.
^Dalila Missero (2019). "Playboys and the Cosmo Girls: Models of Femininity in Italian Men's and Women's Magazines and the Popularization of Feminist Knowledge". AboutGender. 8 (16): 90. doi:10.15167/2279-5057/AG2019.8.16.1103.