1968 REBELLION

Pasolini a Venezia nel 1968 (foto Biennale ASAC ) As a life-long Communist Party of Italy (PCI) member, Pasolini's Marxist positions politically may have been farther left than the student movement of the 1960s. However, in his poem called "The PCI to the young generation" [Il PCI ai giovani], he appeared to criticize the protestors and side with the police in the lines: When yesterday at Valle Guilia you came to blows with the policemen I sympathized with the policemen! Because the policemen are the children of the poor However, in other examinations of the poem, it is not believable that Pasolini sided with the right-wing or the police actions themselves... he seemed to be making note of the self-contradictory nature of the current struggle, which featured the students: You have daddy’s boy faces You were born with silver spoons in your mouths. However Pasolini is also fairly clear: We obviously are in agreement against the police instit

Reformer Alexander Dubček Becomes First Secretary, Launching the Prague Spring of 1968

Source: BPB Alexander Dubček was elected First Secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia on January 5th, 1968. Dubček's reform movement allowed for a loosening of the press restrictions, and within a few months resulted in the resignation of the President, Antonín Novotny. In this context, the Prague Spring of 1968 was born. The conditions of a ground-swell of freedom, rejection of the Soviet government apparatus, and self-motivated collaboration was described in Colin Ward's "Anarchy in Action ," and was also remembered by Milan Kundera in his novel, " The Unbearable Lightness of Being ". Only six months later, the Prague Spring was brutally crushed by the force of Soviet tanks, in August 1968.

The Rag Dolls, Germany's First Girl Group

photo (c) Ilse Jung Playing nearly every weekend in the industrial Ruhr Valley around Duisberg, Bochum, Dusseldorf area, the Rag Dolls were a phenomenon in the male-dominated "beatbands" genre. Sources: "THE RAG DOLLS" eine ziemlich unbekannte Gruppe aus dem Ruhrpott von 1965 , by Manfred Nitschke (Oct 24, 2017) Women, Power, Music, Remembering the Rag Dolls , by Heike Mund, DW (Aug 20, 2013) The Rag Dolls , Manfred Nitschke, The Beat Club All-Female Bands of the 1960s - Happy Women's History Month! , by Eric Brightwell The Rag Dolls , Ilse Jung

The “Battle on Tegeler Way” [Schlacht am Tegeler Weg] was a violent confrontation between the police and demonstrators. The demonstrators were mainly connected with the SDS [Students for Democratic Society] and the APO [Anti-Parliamentary Opposition], who had called for a protest on November 4, 1968 at Tegeler Way in Berlin-Charlottenburg. In addition to students, many workers and rockers were been among the demonstrators. This street battle is considered a major turning point in the history of the APO in the '68 movement and went down in the history of the political left in Germany. At the Battle of Tegeler Weg 130 police officers and 22 demonstrators were seriously injured. Sources: Schlacht am Tegeler Weg Wikipedia The long and winding May of 1968 (6): German student movement by Julius Gavroche, April 3, 2018 Schlacht am Tegeler Weg (NDR, 1988), Youtube Video

Dynamite Topples Power Transmission Lines At U.C. Berkeley

Power was disrupted at U.C. Berkeley and the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory on March 20th, 1968, when two 115,000 volt transmission lines were toppled. According to the House Committee on Un-American Activities Report on "Subversive Influences in Riots, Looting and Burning," the tower carrying the power lines was dynamited at 1:40 am, and power restored at 8am. No other news reports confirming this incident could be found online. Sources: " Subversive Influences in Riots, Looting and Burning ", Hearings Before the Committee on Un-American Activities: House of Representatives, June 28, 1968, p2157

Police crack down on strikers turns into riot, Normandy, France

Riots follow a massive protest and strike in Caen, France. In a city that was nearly destroyed during the Normandy Invasion of 1944, a massive crowd of 10,000 protesters and striking workers surrounded the Saviem truck factory. Later they were drenched with tear gas by the police without provocation. In response the marchers resorted to rocks and Molotov cocktails, igniting riots that lasted through the night and ended up with thirty-six people hospitalized, and another eighty-five in jail. Sources: Gerd-Rainer Horn, The Spirit of '68: Rebellion in Western Europe and North America, 1956–1976 (Oxford University Press, 2007) pp73-74 via Wikipedia John Duhan, "Vive le Proletariat: The 1968 Revolt of French Workers and Students," (thesis, Western Michigan Univ, 2013). photos: Manifestation du 26 janvier 1968 Archive de Calvados .

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