Exiles, Migrants and Citizens: Narrating and documenting displacement in contemporary Spain

Learning Outcomes

Migration has been a recurrent theme that has characterized Spain’s social, political and cultural history since its emergence as a modern nation. This module will focus on the study of migration movements in the 20th and 21st century. Case studies could include: a) Spanish Republican exile of the Spanish Civil War b) Evacuation and exile of Spanish refugee children c) Spanish emigration during the Franco regime d) The migration reversal: Spain as a country of immigration since the mid 1980s In analysing these migration episodes and movements the course will focus on key contextual issues, theoretical concepts and research methodologies used in the study of forced and voluntary migrations. The aim is to provide you with an overview of the political and socio-economic contexts that triggered these migrations and the dynamics that sustained them, as well as an understanding of the impact that the presence of exiles and migrants had on the receiving societies. More specifically, the course encourages you to reflect upon the impact that migration and exile have on individual and collective forms of identity, something that you will explore through analysis of a variety of primary sources, including personal testimonies, interviews, documentaries, migrant periodical publications and media representations of migrants and exiles. In doing so, a key concern will be to consider the ways in which individuals and societies experience, remember and interpret their memories of dislocation and displacement.

Teaching methods include -Weekly double period seminar in which students present analysis of primary texts guided by sedondary theoretical and contextual readings -Tutor-led informal lectures -Individual tutorials Learning activities include -Student-led seminars and class discussion -Group presentations -Individual research -Accessing online resources Innovative or special features of this module -Visiting speakers when appropriate