Historias: The Spanish History Podcast

Political violence during Spain's Second Republic period (1931-1936) was one of the primary causes of the Spanish Civil War. What was the role of Spain's largest militarized police force, the Civil Guard, in this violence? In this episode, Historias host Bretton Rodriguez interviews Historias host Foster Chamberlin about his new book Uncivil Guard: Policing, Military Culture, and the Coming of the...

In this episode, Kathryn Mahaney, author of Feminism, National Identity, and European Integration in Modern Spain: Defining a Democracy, 1960-Present, offers insights on over 60 years of feminist history in Spain from the late Franco regime to the present day. How did the movement emerge from its secret origins during the Franco regime, what were the achievements of and divisions within the moveme...

In this episode, Cacey Bowen Farnsworth, author of Atlantic Crossroads in Lisbon's New Golden Age, 1668-1750, gives us a tour of Lisbon's streets during Portugal's second golden age in the late 17th and early 18th centuries, when the city was flush with gold and other wealth from Brazil. From black brotherhoods to English merchants to the Inquisition, Farnsworth provides a portrait of the city as...

Spain was perhaps the world’s greatest imperial power in the early-modern period, but few know about the new imperial ventures it attempted in the 19th century. In this episode, Scott Eastman, author of A Missionary Nation: Race, Religion, and Spain’s Age of Liberal Imperialism, 1841-1881, crisscrosses the Atlantic world to tell of these ventures in Morocco, the Dominican Republic, Mexico and West...

The dresses worn by members of Spain’s royal family are indelible features of Diego Velázquez’s famous paintings, but what is the story of the creation of these remarkable fashions? In this episode, Prof. Amanda Wunder, author of Spanish Fashion in the Age of Velázquez: A Tailor at the Court of Philip IV, tells us the story of Mateo Aguado, the tailor for the queens of King Philip IV’s court and t...

Several thousand Spaniards were imprisoned in the notorious Nazi concentration camp of Mauthausen. While there are many memoirs from survivors of the camp, only one published his account just a year after liberation, Carlos Rodríguez del Risco. In this episode, Prof. Sara J. Brenneis, who has just released a critical edition of this forgotten account, returns to the podcast to share Rodríguez del...

El Camino de Santiago is a historic pilgrimage route, a long-distance hiking trek and one of Spain's most iconic tourist attractions all at the same time. In this episode, Beatriz Gomez Acuña, a professor at Elmhurst University and a veteran of the camino, discusses the history behind these routes to Santiago de Compostela as well as the challenges and rewards of walking the camino in the modern e...

Como parte de nuestra serie Historias para BSPHS, en este episodio hablamos con el prof. Javier Moreno Luzón sobre la vida política del rey Alfonso XIII, el último rey de la época de la Restauración. Moreno Luzón lo presenta desde la perspectiva de la historia cultural de la política y discutimos diferentes influencias en su visión política, como la Iglesia y el Ejército, así como su papel en el c...

In this episode, Patricia Schechter, a professor of history at Portland State University, joins the podcast to discuss the history of Pueblonuevo del Terrible, a rough-and-tumble mining town in Spain’s Córdoba Province. Starting with an overview of the landscape of the town and the story of its unusual name, Schechter then traces the history of its struggles to obtain recognition and build a sense...

En este episodio, como parte de nuestra serie sobre los nazis en España, hablamos precisamente de este tema con José Luis Rodríguez Jiménez, catedrático de historia contemporánea en la Universidad Rey Juan Carlos y autor del nuevo libro Bajo el manto del caudillo: Nazis, fascistas y colaboracionistas en la España franquista. Consideramos por qué nazis de varios países huyeron a España después de l...

Spanish football (soccer) teams like FC Barcelona and Real Madrid have become household names around the world. But how did Spanish sport become a global phenomenon? In this episode, Andrew McFarland, a professor of history at Indiana University Kokomo, explores the origins of sport as mass entertainment in Spain, from the influence of English footballers to the question of bullfighting as a moder...

Whether Rioja, Ribera del Duero or Albariño, Spanish wine has become a major component of the country's image internationally, but this wasn't always the case. In this episode, Karl Trybus, a professor of history at Limestone University, traces the history behind Spain's wines from the nineteenth century to the present day, including the the effects of the oidium and phylloxera epidemics in the co...

Cuando en los años ochenta los capos colombianos buscaban ampliar su negocio más allá del continente americano e introducirse en el mercado europeo, en los gallegos encontraron los perfectos socios para trasportar la cocaína, no solo por su condición de marineros innatos, sino también por su experiencia en el contrabando y, sobre todo, por su discreción. En este episodio con Sabrina Laroussi, prof...

In this episode, we begin by discussing the origins of the Crown of Aragon. Then, we transition into a conversation about the role and treatment of religious minorities in the Late Middle Ages not only in the Crown of Aragon, but across medieval Europe more broadly. Within this broad topic, we focus on the role of royal processions and what they can tell us about religious minorities and their pla...

As part of our continuing series on Spain and Morocco, in this episode Eric Calderwood returns to the podcast to discuss his new book On Earth or in Poems: The Many Lives of Al-Andalus and the many ways in which the idea of al-Andalus, the medieval period of Muslim rule in the Iberian Peninsula, has been taken up by groups as varied as Arabs, Berber/Amazigh people, feminists and Palestinians. In t...

In this second part of our two-part series on Equatorial Guinea, we're joined by Michael Ugarte and Benita Sampedro Vizcaya to take a look at the literature of this West African nation, considering everything from European travel writers to European settlers, authors from Equatorial Guinea, and women writers. We pay special attention to the subject of exilic writing and highlight a few of the coun...

In this episode, we explore the development of Jewish identities during the Medieval and Early Modern Periods. Amongst other topics, we discuss the origins of Jewish communities in Europe, the creation and impact of Judeoconversos in medieval Iberia, and the development of a unique Jewish civilization and identity during the Early Modern Period.

In this episode, we explore the development of Jewish identities during the Medieval and Early Modern Periods. Amongst other topics, we discuss the origins of Jewish communities in Europe, the creation and impact of Judeoconversos in medieval Iberia, and the development of a unique Jewish civilization and identity during the Early Modern Period.

Como parte de nuestra serie sobre España en África, en este primer episodio de dos episodios bilingües sobre Guinea Ecuatorial, hablamos con el profesor Gonzalo Álvarez Chillida sobre la colonización española en Guinea Ecuatorial. Empezamos con una revista de la geografía y la economía del país y de la historia de los principios de su colonización por varios poderes europeos. A continuación, exami...

In this second part of our series on slavery in Spain's colonies in North Africa, we speak with Ali Al Tuma about slavery in the Spanish Sahara. Al Tuma provides an overview of how slavery formed part of the social and economic structures in the Sahara and discusses the Spanish colonial policy towards slavery. He then shares some of the stories he has uncovered of slaves who navigated this complex...

En este primero de dos episodios sobre la esclavitud en las colonias españolas en África, hablamos con el profesor Josep Lluís Mateo Dieste sobre la esclavitud en el protectorado español de Marruecos, enfocándonos en Tetuán, la capital. Discutimos las diferencias entre la esclavitud en el mundo árabe y en las Américas, la vida diaria de estas personas esclavizadas en Tetuán y su cultura única. Ade...

As part of our Historias for BSPHS series, in this episode we interview Katie Harris and Pamela Radcliff, the editors of a new special issue of the Bulletin for Spanish and Portuguese Historical Studies entitled New Currents in Iberian History, about the divisions that they noticed in the field of Iberian history when editing this issue and how recent work is attempting to bridge these gaps. We’ll...

From streaming music to Tictok videos to podcasts, recorded sound is ubiquitous in our lives, but few of us give much thought to how it all started. In this episode, we’re joined by Eva Moreda Rodríguez, a reader in music at the University of Glasgow, to do just that. We follow the origins of the recording all the way back to Edison’s first phonograph, tracing its path in Spain through scientific...

In this episode, we discuss the importance of the Biblical story of Cain and Abel on medieval Spanish literature. This story was told and retold throughout the ancient in medieval worlds. In medieval Iberia, it formed an important backdrop to the composition of historical narratives and often served as a model for their accounts of disputes between kings and members of the royal family. Along with...

Any visitor to Spain today will be familiar with the Cortes Inglés department store as the anchor of Spanish commercial cityscape. But how did department stores take hold in Spain and what there the political implications of their rise? In this episode, Alejandro Gómez del Moral tells their story in the context of Spain’s turbulent early-twentieth century and long Francoist dictatorship. In Part I...