Antonio Gramsci

What if ideas are more powerful than armies? Antonio Gramsci found out that the words we hear every day — in school, songs, and newspapers — can make people agree that one way of doing things is 'normal.'

Antonio Gramsci was an Italian thinker and political leader from the early 1900s (1891–1937). He is famous for studying how culture helps shape who holds power; his most important idea is called 'cultural hegemony.'

He helped start the Italian Communist Party and ran a workers' newspaper in Turin to help factory workers organize. In 1926, Italy's fascist government jailed him. While in prison, he quietly wrote the 'Prison Notebooks' — notes and essays that later changed how people study politics and culture.

Gramsci showed that schools, books, movies, and jokes can teach people to accept rules even if they aren't fair. To change a society, you must change what people believe is normal. Teachers, activists, and artists still use his ideas to explain and challenge unfair rules.

Gramsci's story reminds us that ideas matter—and that anyone who loves reading, talking, and creating can help make the world fairer. He used writing to fight, and his words are still read around the world today.