Call for Abstracts for Edited Volume: "The Roots of a Rift: The 21st Century Catalan Separatist Crisis and Modern Spanish History"

Alejandro Gómez del Moral Contribution

Call for Abstracts for Edited Volume

Tentative Project Title: The Roots of a Rift: The 21st Century Catalan Separatist Crisis and Modern Spanish History.

Editors: Kathryn L. Mahaney and Alejandro J. Gómez del Moral

We are seeking proposals for contributions to an edited volume that will examine the historical roots of the ongoing sociopolitical crisis in Catalonia. This collection will not be a partisan intervention – we will explicitly refrain from taking a side in the conflict – nor is it meant to focus narrowly on Catalan topics. Rather, the intent is to produce a volume that locates the roots of the Catalan crisis within the broader sweep of modern Spanish history and that historicizes different dimensions of the conflict. For example, contributions might focus on (but are certainly not limited to) such issues as:

  • Late 20th and early 21st-century economic shifts that have helped catalyze the clash between Barcelona and Madrid
  • The professional trajectory and evolving public perceptions of legal practice and the judiciary in modern Spain, given current debates concerning what some consider the Spanish courts’ politicized character.
  • Ways that diverse parties have sought to construct robust regional cultural identities, particularly after the end of the Franco dictatorship. By this, we mean what in Catalonia is sometimes termed fer país, though chapters need not focus exclusively on Catalonia and could instead, for instance, propose new conceptual frameworks or shed light on the Catalan case through scrutiny of parallel efforts in places such as the Basque Country. 
  • Parliamentary culture and political party activity in contemporary Spain as a factor in shaping the different camps of politicians driving the conflict at the highest levels. Suitable contributions could include analyses of significant national players in the crisis, such as Podemos, as well as more directly implicated groups such as the Assemblea Nacional Catalana, Esquerra Republicana, and/or Ciutadans.

Again, we are interested in contributions that frame this crisis within Spanish, not just Catalan, history. Our aim is to contextualize what is happening in Catalonia as a product of historical processes that hold significance not just for Catalonia but for Spain as a whole, and potentially offer comparative insights for scholars of other nations as well. As such, we also welcome contributions that provide a transnational/European context and/or comparisons with other relevant national cases.

This is a broadly conceived call. Scholarship on Spain and Catalonia is a requirement, but, as noted above, comparisons and contrasts with other national contexts are certainly welcome. We have imagined the volume as covering the period from the late 19th century to the present, but we are willing to consider broadening this time span. In sum, we welcome a diversity of timelines, geographies, and perspectives. If you are unsure about whether your idea fits, please ask!

A book series editor has expressed interest in this project, and we aim to submit a formal proposal by the end of February 2020. Interested parties should either email with questions or email an abstract or article proposal of approximately 500 words to kmahaney@gmail.com or alejandro.gomezdelmoral@helsinki.fi.

Deadline for submissions is 10 January, 2020.

About the Editors:

Kathryn L. Mahaney is a Postdoctoral Researcher in Economic and Social History at the University of Helsinki.  She received her PhD in History from The Graduate Center, CUNY. Her book manuscript, Feminism Under and After Franco: Success and Failure in the Democratic Transition, which expands upon her prior doctoral dissertation, examines the multiple trajectories that struggles for women’s rights followed during and following the Franco dictatorship in mid-to-late twentieth- and early twenty-first-century Spain, and reveals how debates over women’s rights issues including access to abortion and divorce served as battlegrounds for the construction and subsequent continuing renegotiation of Spanish nationhood and national identity in the waning years and wake of Francoist rule.

Alejandro J. Gomez del Moral is an Yliopistonlehtori (Senior Lecturer) in Economic and Social History at the University of Helsinki (Finland). He holds a Ph.D. from Rutgers University (USA). His current book project, Buying into Change: Mass Consumption, Dictatorship, and Democracy in Franco’s Spain, 1939-1982 (University of Nebraska Press, anticipated Spring 2021), examines the role that mass consumption played in the sociopolitical transformation of the Franco dictatorship (1939-1975) and Spain’s transition to democracy. More broadly, he is interested in the study of consumer culture and transnational cultural flows between postwar Europe and the Americas, mass sport and its commercialization, and the construction and marketing of Spain’s brand identity in world gastronomy.