Music as discipline, solidarity and nostalgia in the Zonderwater prisoner of war camp of South Africa

Abstract

A particularly rich vein of cultural products in a variety of media emerged from South Africa’s Italian prisoner of war camps in the Second World War. Contrary to the popular image of nightmarish World War Two prisoner of war camps such as those of Japan and Italy, as well as the British-run camps in North Africa, the South African internment sites offered prisoners of war (POWs) a safe and relatively comfortable experience. They were run along humane lines in strict adherence to the precepts of the Geneva Convention. Foremost among these in both size and reputation was the camp of Zonderwater, east of Pretoria, which housed up to one hundred thousand Italian prisoners. The fairly open and fair-minded approach taken at this camp allowed a number of creative endeavours to flourish. A pathologized perspective on the Italians’ love of music was generated by the camp management and then apparently deployed as a method of social control appropriate for Italian prisoners. The stereotype of Italians as a singing nation was read as symptomatic of an essential weakness or softness in their character, part of a broader set of stereotypes that positioned Italians as lazy, effete and uncommitted participants in the Second World War. This perspective differed radically from the Italians’ own sense of themselves and the cultural values embedded in music. An ethnocentric and very patriotic perspective on their musical culture defines the parameters of their national identity; an issue central to the war itself. The respective approaches of the South Africans and Italians, however, facilitated a musical culture that fulfilled both agendas; creating a more than satisfactory set of ‘docile bodies’ for the captors, and a vehicle of nostalgia, solidarity and channels of communication with the outside world for the prisoners. This article traces the roots of this singular musical culture through an exploration of certain culturally specific narratives at work in the wartime culture of both Italy and South Africa.