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A la conquista del eterno Otro: La reformulacion de masculinidades hegemonicas nacionales en el cine y television de la España post-crisis (2009-2019)

Martinez-Saez, Celia
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1561524982748065

Abstract Details

2019, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Spanish and Portuguese.
This dissertation examines the intertwining of colonial and gender discourses produced by 21st century Spanish mass media. In nations with a history of major racial and sexual discrimination derived from colonialism like Spain, national identity is still produced through the persistence of colonial discourses. Surprisingly enough, very scant scholarly attention has been paid to how Spain as a former colonizing nation is still using colonial narratives to construct contemporary gender and national identity. The wave of right-wing nationalistic politics worldwide including Spain, the waves of immigration from Latin America and Africa to Spain since the 90s, the economic recession of 2008, and the fragmentation of the Spanish State in the last decade with the constant tensions with the Catalan Government, among the most significant factors, are producing a traditionalist backlash in Spanish visual representations. My dissertation aims to bring light to a new line of visual works (especially TV series and movies) that are representing a distorted and non-critical perspective of the violent Spanish (neo)colonizing past in order to promote Spanish national heroism. My hypothesis will demonstrate, through the analysis of 21th century films and TV series, how a new star system of hyper masculine actors is reestablishing former models of hegemonic Spanish masculinities based on the conquest of the Other, especially people from former colonies like Equatorial Guinea, the Philippines, and Northern Africa, but also the national peripheries of Spain (Catalonia and the Basque Country). The millennial obsession with the exhibition of masculine bodies as a marketing strategy creates a relationship of admiration and desire on the part of the spectator for the texts’ male heroes that helps foster a racial and gender national imaginary based on (neo)colonial dynamics. Spanish national identity is thus being defined by the perpetuation of colonial discourses that mobilize a colonial imaginary of exclusion for those who differ from the heroic, white, heterosexual Spanish man. At the same time, the obsessive conquering and fetichization of the Other reveals anxieties about Spanish national identity. In other words, precisely because of the post-imperial condition of Spain after the loss of the empire at the end of the 19th century, Spanish popular culture needs to constantly reproduce heroic narratives to reconfigure its geopolitical power in the national imaginary. Ultimately, the conquering narratives reveal not only the imperialist character of Spanish national culture, but also the difficulties of constructing a coherent identity in post-imperial Spain.
Laura Podalsky (Advisor)
289 p.
Cinematography; Gender Studies; Mass Communications; Mass Media

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Martinez-Saez, C. (2019). A la conquista del eterno Otro: La reformulacion de masculinidades hegemonicas nacionales en el cine y television de la España post-crisis (2009-2019) [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1561524982748065

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Martinez-Saez, Celia. A la conquista del eterno Otro: La reformulacion de masculinidades hegemonicas nacionales en el cine y television de la España post-crisis (2009-2019). 2019. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1561524982748065.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Martinez-Saez, Celia. "A la conquista del eterno Otro: La reformulacion de masculinidades hegemonicas nacionales en el cine y television de la España post-crisis (2009-2019)." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1561524982748065

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

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This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.