This book narrates how, beginning in 1936, bodies buried in mass graves during the Spanish War and subsequent dictatorship were turned into monuments. The book describes how the production of monuments evolved and what forms this process and these monuments took; it examines how the monuments were incorporated into society and used to influence public opinion; and it argues that this process was not simply based on the formal logic of tradition but instead reflected a conscious plan with a specific and rational end goal. As such, this book puts forward the idea that the monument as a material object became an expression of the historical consciousness of its producers, relating how different actors communicated their memories into meaningful gestures while limited by the material reality of integrating the bodies into a novel artefact. Finally, it contends that the people creating these monuments did not just bury their dead according to a funerary tradition but also sought to influence society.
- Cover
- Table of Contents
- Introduction: Et in Arcadia Ego
- 1 From Violence to Resistance
- A Place in Memory and a Mark on the Landscape
- Remembering During the “War” that Began After the War
- Mourning Rituals and Resistance
- 2 Recovering Bodies and Places
- Back to the Mass Graves in the Struggle for Democracy
- Building Monuments on Mass Graves
- Bones as a Requirement for Remembrance
- 3 The Forensic Turn and Return to Monuments
- Scientific Paradigms and Postmodern Discourses
- Post-Exhumation Monument Practices
- Returning to Monuments and Politics
- Final Chapter: Mass Graves in Dispute
- Bibliography
- Methodological Appendix
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