International Journal of Iberian Studies - Volume 21, Issue 2, 2008

This article presents a critical perspective on Galician ethnographic museums as a mechanism for the representation of cultural identities. It argues that the legislation pertaining to ethnographic museums can be seen, in part, as constituting a definition of identities. It also discusses the models of and for the creation of museums known as ethnographic, the official recognition of this type of museum in Galicia, and the corresponding construction of a hegemonic image of Galician identities. Finally, the article considers the process of producing and consuming ideas about Galician self-identity in ethnographic museums.

This article focuses on the visual landscape created by displays of souvenirs for sale in the Galician capital of Santiago de Compostela. It demonstrates that images of St. James and other Catholic symbols compete with more recent representations of the pilgrimage to Santiago, including the modernist mascot O Peregrn created for the 1993 Holy Year. Equally prevalent are souvenirs that constitute reflections on Galician culture, ranging from folklorized images of rural areas as well as kitsch and camp objects commenting on a range of topics from witchcraft to vernacular architecture. The article concludes with a discussion of the expanded presence in recent years of message T-shirts that aim to raise people's consciousness about both local and international matters, including the need to defend the Galician language, environmental protection and fair trade. Through its analysis of the multifaceted role of souvenirs, this article demonstrates that while tourism is linked to cultural appropriation and commoditization, it can also be an avenue for political activism in defence of local cultures and translocal concerns.

Since the 1980s, there has been a steady recovery of the Jacobean pilgrimage involving thousands of people travelling on foot along the routes followed by medieval pilgrims who made the journey to Santiago de Compostela. The aim of this article is to explore the global and local variables that intervene in this revival, as well as the range of social groups and actors that provide the institutional framework for the ritual practices of the pilgrims. This article analyses the secular transformation of the Jacobean pilgrimage paying particular attention to the extension of the Pilgrim's Way to Cape Finisterre, where the transformation reaches its maximum expression and pilgrims ritualise the achievement of their goal in the contemplation of the sun setting over the Atlantic Ocean at Land's End.

The anthropological work published so far on the traditional houses of the Galician countryside has had a significant influence, on one hand, on the development of policies for the cultural conservation of the rural landscape, and, on the other, on the negotiation of urban post-modern identities. This article analyzes the importance of the architectonic forms and spaces of farmhouses, country houses (including those pertaining to religious institutions) in the construction of individual biographies. It demonstrates the importance of representations of space and time in the negotiation of personal identities, in a time period defined by cultural reflexivity.

Churchill and Spain: The Survival of the Franco Regime, 19401945, Richard Wigg (2006) London: Routledge, viii + 211 pp., ISBN 0-415-36052-8 (hbk), 85.00

Constancia de la Mora in War and Exile: International Voice for the Spanish Republic, Soledad Fox (2007) Brighton and Portland: Sussex Academic Press (in association with the Caada Blanch Centre for Contemporary Spanish Studies), 219 pp., ISBN 1-84519-166-8 (hbk), 35.00

The Cinema of Alex de la Iglesia, Peter Buse, Nria Triana-Toribio and Andrew Willis (2007) Manchester: Manchester University Press, ISBN 978-0-71907136-2 (hbk), 50.00