Spain's Liberal Imperialism

Las narrativas historiográficas neoliberales que surgieron al fin de la Guerra Fría presentaron la guerra como un factor desglobalizador. ¿Pero es la realidad histórica tan sencilla? En este episodio, conversamos con Ángel Alcalde y José Escribano sobre cómo la guerra puede ser, de hecho, un factor globalizador. Ellos son autores del artículo reciente “War and globalisation in the modern era (1500s–2000s): actors, technologies and spaces” (https://doi.org/10.1080/07292473.2026.2717789), publicado en la revista War & Society . Además, nos ofrecen varios ejemplos de esta dinámica en el mundo ibérico.

The horrors of the bombing of civilians during the Spanish Civil War were made known to the world by Picasso's famous painting Guernica, but Nationalist forces bombed cities throughout Republican Spain through the whole course of the war. In this episode, David Messenger, author of Civilian Bombing and Civil Defence in the Spanish Civil War, discusses the untold story of Republican efforts to protect their citizens from these bombings by building bomb shelters and even training for a gas attack. He also examines efforts in recent years to open some of these shelters to the public as sites for preserving the historical memory of the war.

Episode 74 by Historias Podcast

El movimiento anarquista es uno de los fenómenos más importantes en la historia contemporánea de España, pero fue prohibido entre 1871 y 1881. Pero ya legal, en 1882-83, fue acusado falsamente de ser una organización terrorista, conocida como la Mano Negra. En este episodio, la profesora Clara Lida habla de cómo los anarquistas sobrevivieron los largos años de persecución, gracias a diversos mecanismos de movilización y vínculos transnacionales. Concluimos con una discusión de los conceptos de anarco-comunismo y propaganda por el hecho.

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 Spanish Civil War to find out. They explore the origins of the organizational culture of the Civil Guard going back to the mid-19th century, the relations between civil guards and local townspeople, incidents of political violence involving the Civil Guard during the Second Republic, and the role of the Asturias rebellion of 1934 in shifting civil guards' attitudes towards the public.

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 movement during the Transition to democracy, and what are the greatest challenges facing the movement today? These are some of the questions that Mahaney addresses as we discuss one of the most central and contested social movements defining Spanish society today.

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 an Atlantic entrepôt before the Great Earthquake of 1755.

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 Africa. Along the way, he unpacks Spanish liberals’ views on race and religion within the context of the second wave of European imperialism in the 19th century.

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 the artisan behind many of the striking fashions of Spain’s Golden Age. We discuss many aspects of Aguado’s life and career, including the process of royal dressmaking and the evolving political implications of his creations.

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 Risco’s unique and incredible story of how he went from Civil War fighter to exile in France to concentration camp survivor to Francoist. She also discusses how she rediscovered this important memoir and dealt in the critical edition with its more problematic aspects.