Episode 9- Writing the History of Modern Spain

UC San Diego Professor Pamela Radcliff has recently published a new history of modern Spain entitled Modern Spain: 1808 to the Present. In this episode, we discuss the challenges overcome and insights gained from this project, starting with how Radcliff developed a new framework for the history of modern Spain that neither told a narrative of failure nor presented a revisionist story that ignored the darker sides of the modernization process. Instead, she explains how she provides a history of Spanish “modernity with all its warts” even as she navigates the politically polarized historiographies of the Second Republic and Civil War periods and concludes by grappling with the current situation in Catalonia, for instance. In short, the episode provides a behind-the-scenes look at the development of a book that is sure to prove a new foundation for students and scholars of modern Spain.