INDIAN OCEAN EMPIRE
I N T H E
AGE OF
ANGELO CAGLIOTI (Bernard College)
On the Coast of the Monsoon: Italian Colonialism the Environmental History of Somalia (1889-1960)
The seasonal rhythms of the monsoon is one of the most important factors in the environmental history of Somalia. The monsoon connected – and at times separated – Somali pastoralism, agriculture, fishing, and trade with the broader Indian Ocean. Italian colonialism disrupted these historic links to reshape Somalia in European interests. This talk examines how different colonial regimes – direct and indirect rule – and techno-political projects – such as plantations, irrigations, and resettlement – tried to change Somalia's society and alter its place in the Indian Ocean world from the perspective of environmental history and the history of science.
.png)
Angelo Matteo Caglioti is Assistant Professor in History at Barnard College, Columbia University. His research intersects late modern European history, history of science, and environmental history. He received a Ph.D. in History from the University of California, Berkeley and a M.A. from the University of Padova in Italy. He has been a Rome Prize Fellow in Modern Italian Studies at the American Academy in Rome, a Max Weber Fellow at the European University Institute in Florence (Italy), and a Fellow at the Rachel Carson Center in Environment and Society in Munich (Germany). He is working on a book titled "The Climate of Fascism: Scarcity, Environmental Knowledge, and Italian Colonialism." The book deals with the history of Italian colonialism in North and East Africa from the perspective of environmental history and the history of science. He is the author of "'Natural' Disasters, Ignorance, and the Mirage of Italian Settler Colonialism in Late Nineteenth-Century Africa", Past & Present, XX (2024)