The (Re-)Production of Differences in a Colonial Regime of Violence. Private Photographic Practice from the 1935-1941 Italo-Abyssinian War

This article presents a case study of a colonial officer, who served in the Italian colonies in East Africa from 1939 to 1941. During his war deployment he took dozens of photographs, which he sent home via field post to his family in Northern Italy. Drawing on this historical material, the author investigates the visual (and textual) practises the colonial officer used to express his feelings of belonging by writing himself into categories such as race, gender, and nation. Concepts of un/doing difference (Hirschauer) and performance theory provide the theoretical frameworks for the analysis of the visual sources. By investigating these sources, complex and contradictory patterns of difference on which perceived colonial hegemonies depended become evident.