“In Andalucía, there are no foreigners”: andalucismo from transperipheral critique to colonial apology

Abstract

This article explores the ideological legacy of Blas Infante (1885–1936), hailed today as the “Padre de la Patria Andaluza.” In post-Franco Spain, Infante's legacy of political andalucismo (Andalusian nationalism) has become inexorably linked with the myth of Andalusi convivencia: the supposedly harmonious coexistence of Christians, Muslims, and Jews in medieval Iberia. Yet Infante's posthumous fame as an avatar of intercultural tolerance masks two understudied aspects of his work and its afterlife: his repudiation of Catalan nationalism and his influence on the discourse of Spanish colonialism in Morocco. In this article, I develop the concept of the “transperipheral” to analyze Andalusian nationalism's evolving debate with Catalan nationalism — and, more broadly, to propose a new model for the study of Iberian peripheral nationalisms. My notion of the transperipheral aims to revise the center–periphery binary that has dominated the study of Iberian peripheral nationalisms. Blas Infante was assassinated by Rebel troops in the early days of the Spanish Civil War. His writings, nonetheless, exerted significant influence over the discourse of Spanish colonialism in Morocco in the 1940s and 1950s. In the last section of the article, I show how Infante's andalucista ideology migrated into the work of Rodolfo Gil Benumeya (1901–1975), a leading theoretician of Spanish colonialism under Franco. My article therefore traces the uneven trajectory of Andalusian nationalism from transperipheral critique to colonial apology.

Keywords:

• Andalusian nationalism
• peripheral nationalism
• Blas Infante
• Rodolfo Gil Benumeya
• Enric Prat de la Riba
• Morocco

Acknowledgments

This article originated as a conference paper presented at a panel on “Critical Regionalisms” at the 2014 MLA convention in Chicago. I would like to thank the panel organizer, Cristina Moreiras-Menor, and the other panel participants, Annabel Martín and Teresa M. Vilarós-Soler, for the lively discussion that helped to shape the article.

Notes on contributor

Eric Calderwood is an Assistant Professor of Arabic Studies and Comparative Literature at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His research focuses on the politics of representing the past in modern Spanish and Arabic literature and culture. His academic articles have appeared in the International Journal of Middle East Studies and The Journal of North African Studies, and his creative non-fiction has appeared in such publications as The American Scholar, Virginia Quarterly Review, and McSweeney's. Email: [email protected]

Notes

1. I have based my narration of Blas Infante's travels in Morocco on Iniesta Coullaut-Valera's account (205–240), which quotes extensively from Infante's manuscripts. Infante was declared “Padre de la Patria Andaluza” by a decree from the Parliament of Andalucía on April 14, 1983 (Parlamento de Andalucía).

2. For al-Mu‘tamid's supposed tomb in Aghmat and the pilgrimage of Andalusi writers to it, see García Gómez.

3. Infante appears to confuse the Arabic word qaṣba (citadel or casbah) with the ka‘ba (Kaaba), the main shrine in Mecca.

4. For an introduction to scholarly debates about the concept of convivencia, see Martin-Márquez (300–307) and Akasoy.

5. For the use of convivencia in contemporary debates about tourism and Islam in Andalucía, see Calderwood, Rogozen-Soltar, and Rosón Lorente.

6. For the history and discourse of andalucismo, see Lacomba (Cuatro; Regionalismo), Stallaert (88–126), Fernández-Montesinos, and González Alcantud. Of these scholars, González Alcantud is the only one who explicitly addresses the relationship between andalucismo and Spanish colonial discourse in Morocco (77–103).

7. In this article, I will insist on referring to andalucismo as a nationalism, although scholars have oscillated between calling it a “regionalism” (Lacomba Regionalismo) and a “nationalism” (Fernández-Montesinos). It is not surprising that scholars have had trouble categorizing andalucismo, given that the historical andalucistas themselves referred to their movement as both a “regionalism” and a “nationalism.” I will address the evolving terminology of Andalusian nationalism later in this article. Although andalucismo is generally left out of critical conversations about Iberian peripheral nationalisms, there are important exceptions. Stallaert compares the discourses of Basque and Andalusian nationalisms (70–126), and Martin-Márquez presents an overview of nineteenth-century theories about the racial origins of Spain across a number of peripheral-nationalist traditions (39–50).

8. For the concept of Volksgeist in post-1898 literature, see Serrano (353–363).

9. For Costa's influence on the discourse of Spanish colonialism in Morocco – with a particular emphasis on the trope of the “Hispano-Moroccan brotherhood” –, see Martin-Márquez. For the participation of Moroccan soldiers in the Spanish Civil War, see Madariaga (325–335) and Balfour (268–317).

10. For an introduction to Gil Benumeya's life and work, see González Alcantud (82–85; 93–95).

11. Bertuchi remains one of the most understudied figures of Spanish colonial history. For an introduction to his life and work, see Serna et al.

12. For representations of immigration to contemporary Spain, with a focus on Andalucía, see Flesler, Rogozen-Soltar, and Calderwood.