A Nation Built on Ice Cream

Whether we like to admit it or not, our perceptions, as a citizen of a particular country, towards a ‘foreign’ country, are typically constructed of both objective and subjective beliefs.  Oftentimes, the latter perceptions, in this instance stereotypes, can result in good-natured banter.  The Anglo-French relationship, in particular consists of a plethora of stereotypes of the ‘other’ that have been constructed over many years of both tumult and tentative friendship.  During the Second World War in Britain, stereotypes of the Axis countries built on long-standing cultural perceptions were common, and turned up not only in news articles and cartoons, but were also validated by the general public and can be found in private journals as well as recorded in conversations documented by the Mass Observation project.  http://www.massobs.org.uk/index.htm

Italy, in this case, was perceived and represented rhetorically, not as a threatening fascist country, but was consistently marginalised, and their war efforts deprecated.  Italy couldn’t make war, it was claimed; Italy makes ice cream!  The publication of this June 14, 1940 article in the Times entitled, “Sugar Hoarded by Italians” certainly didn’t do anything to counter entrenched views.   This scandalous report exposed that “during examination of some Italian premises food executive officers discovered in some cases up to 24cwt [approximately 192 stones] of sugar hidden in cellars and back rooms.”[1] This image of Italy as the ice cream man was often directly compared with the idea of Germany as, at the very least, a worthy foe and a fighting nation, even if Hitler’s pedigree was somewhat in question.  A ‘working class’ mother overheard by a Mass Observation listener in June 1940 voiced her opinion of Germany’s mustachioed leader in no uncertain terms: ”And wot is ‘e?  A corporal!  In the last war we were at least fighting a throne!”[2]  A Lancashire shopkeeper commented, “What galls me is Italy’s part in it.  I could bear knuckling under to the Germans, for after all they are a fighting race, but I can’t bear the thought of having to give in to the ice cream man.”[3]  Permanent Undersecretary for Foreign Affairs, Alexander Cadogan, referred in his diary to the Italians as “the ice cream men” or “the dirty ice creamers.”[4]

Of course, representations of self and others as a ‘fighting nation’ were far from straightforward.  Britain itself self identified as a ‘nation of shopkeepers’, and maintained a steady rhetoric that served to justify and explain any set backs: we may not win every battle, and we may bumble our way through at certain points, but in the end, we ALWAYS win the last battle.  Constructions and definitions of national identities contributed to a powerful sense of self and others during the Second World War, and in the Italian case at least, contained at least an ice crystal of truth: Italy does make excellent ice cream.

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[1] "Round-Up Of Italians." Times [London, England] 14 June 1940: 4. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 19 Sept. 2014.

[2] Mass Observation Archives, Sussex (MOA), SxMOA1/2/25/2/G

[3] MOA, Shopkeeper Diary, Lancashire.

[4] Alexander Cadogan, The Diaries of Sir Alexander Cadogan 1938-1945, edited by David Dilks, (Cassell: London, 1971)

The Banana Apology

Fyffes. The Times 
(London, England), 
Wednesday, Jun 05, 1940;
 pg. 3; Issue 48634 

Despite this pithy endorsement from Professor L. Jean Bogert, PhD, and the fact that it was advertised as “protective food,”* bananas were classified as a luxury import in 1940s wartime Britain.  This status made it rather cost prohibitive to bring bananas into the country, and if they did arrive, they were so expensive, that few (and certainly not common) folk could afford to buy them.  However, even while heavily engaged in the throes of war, overstressed and overworked members of the British War Cabinet, and specifically the Joint Planning Sub-Committee, were always prepared to be magnanimous.  Two months later, after evidence revealed that the banana certainly was high in vitamins, it was removed from the list of restricted imports and allowed freely into the country for consumption by the masses.  Following this embarrassing error, the committee “took note, with approval, of the high vitamin content of the banana” and “withdrew, with apology, their charges against the banana.”[1]  It’s comforting to know, that even during this troubling time, the above assertions of the banana’s new status were properly documented and footnoted within the top-secret world of the minutes of the Sub-Committee meetings. 

*  Protection of self was certainly on many minds in June 1940.  Just three days earlier Leo Amery, Secretary of State for India, recorded in his diary a suggestion made by Mr. Horabin “that it would be both actually and psychologically far better if every citizen carried a couple of hand grenades than if they went about carrying gas masks.”[2] 

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[1] The National Archives, Kew (TNA), CAB 84/2, 5 August, 1940, 217a

[2] Churchill Archives, Cambridge, Leo Amery Personal Papers, AMEL 7/34, 14 June 1940.

An Aspiring Historian - Elbow Patches and Pipe Dreams

I didn’t much care for history in elementary school, or high school, or undergrad for that matter.  In fact, it wasn’t until three months into my MSc course at the London School of Economics that I decided: I would like to become a historian.  I grew up taking the same boring classes about the ‘regrettable necessity’ of dropping the atomic bombs ending the Second World War (we’ll return to this point at a later date) and listening to teachers wax lyrical about Thomas Paine, although no one thought to mention that at one point he had been abandoned by the Americans to the guillotines of the French Revolution and accused by the British of committing ‘carnal acts with his cat.’   I also went through the usual plethora of childhood dream jobs: baker, doctor, Olympic hurdler, actor, teacher.  Even when I started my MSc I saw myself more as an international relations theorist or at least a future ambassador.  What changed? 

Well, personally, I discovered that most things that I had been taught in my childhood history classes were so heavily flawed as to be laughable.  History wasn’t a black and white timeline of names, dates, and simple decisions.  Rather, it was like reading the diary of your unsuitable bachelor uncle (http://www.roalddahl.com/roald-dahl/stories/1970s/my-uncle-oswald).  It is full of individuals and groups who are flawed, who have stereotypes, and who sometimes make horrific mistakes.  It is learning that British WWII policy in Morocco stipulated that “…in order to avoid the risk of internal trouble … limited quantities of green tea and sugar should be allowed to reach the Moors…” More than anything, it is recognising that the debates and subjectivities of history are what give it colour.  Every country remembers and teaches its own history differently.  However, this tendency results mostly in national glorification rather than real learning.  It’s crucial to teach all angles of history – the Allied firebombing of Germany for example, not just the heroic valor of the Blitz. 

As I round out my second year as a PhD student, I find my belief that history must be better and indeed more fairly taught and communicated stronger than ever.  So, what I propose to do in this blog is to write a series of history ‘shorts’.  They won’t follow any particular timeline and they won’t fit within a particular theme.  They will be based around small details, whether quotes, cartoons, or people, of a larger event.  In doing this, I hope to encourage others to really think about history, not as a date in the past, but as a story that held as much humour, confusion, drama and intricacy as our lives hold in the present.