Intersections of Race, Class, Gender, and Nation in Fin-de-si鋃le Spanish Literature and Culture

This volume focuses on intersections of race, class, and gender in the formation of the fin-de-siecle Spanish and Spanish colonial subject. Despite the wealth of research produced on gender, race (largely as it relates to the themes of nationhood and empire), and social class, few studies have focused on how these categories interacted, frequently operating simultaneously to reveal contexts in which dominated groups were dominating and vice versa. Such revelations call into question metanarratives about the exploitation of one group by another and bring to light interlocking systems of identity formation, and consequently oppression, that are difficult to disentangle. The authors included here study this dynamic in a variety of genres and venues, namely the essay, the novel, theater, the genero chico (light plays with music, including zarzuelas), and the illustrated periodical press. These essays cover canonical authors such as Benito Perez Galdos and Emilia Pardo Bazan, and understudied female authors and playwrights such as Rosario de Acuna. The volume builds on recent scholarship on race, class, and gender by focusing specifically on the intersections of these categories, and by studying this dynamic in popular culture, visual culture, and in the works of both canonical and lesser-known authors.

Lisa Nalbone is Associate Professor of Spanish at the University of Central Florida, USA.

Jennifer Smith is Associate Professor of Spanish at Southern Illinois University Carbondale, USA.