The Memory of Al-Andalus and Spanish Colonialism in Morocco, 1859-1956

FAIN: FA-232445-16

Eric Calderwood
Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois (Champaign, IL 61801-3620)

A book-length study on how Spanish and Moroccan writers used the history of al-Andalus (medieval Muslim Iberia) as a framework for understanding Spanish colonialism in Morocco (1859-1956).

My book explores how Spanish and Moroccan writers used the history of al-Andalus (medieval Muslim Iberia) as a framework for understanding Spanish colonialism in Morocco (1859-1956). During the colonial period, Spanish writers revived the historical memory of al-Andalus in order to justify Spain’s colonial projects in Morocco. Moroccan nationalists appropriated the Spanish celebration of al-Andalus and repurposed it as a tool of anti-colonial resistance. Thus, the Spanish insistence on Morocco’s Andalusian legacy, which had served as a justification for Spanish colonialism, sowed the seeds of the Moroccan national culture that would supplant colonial rule. My book illuminates the surprising intersections of Spanish colonial discourse and Moroccan nationalist discourse, and it also highlights how the historical memory of al-Andalus has been used to structure debates about Europe’s evolving relationship with the Muslim world.
 

Media Coverage

Al-Andalus in Spanish and Moroccan Identity (Media Coverage)
Publication: Historias: The Spanish History Podcast
Date: 10/6/2020
URL: https://historiaspodcast.org/2020/10/06/al-andalus-in-spanish-and-moroccan-identity/

The Legacy of al-Andalus: A Conversation with Eric Calderwood (Media Coverage)
Publication: Eclectic Intellection
Date: 8/21/2020
URL: https://eclectic-intellection.simplecast.com/episodes/the-legacy-of-al-andalus-a-conversation-with-eric-calderwood

Colonial al-Andalus: An Interview with Eric Calderwood (Media Coverage)
Author(s): Liz Matsushita
Publication: Bulletin of the Spain-North Africa Project
Date: 7/8/2019
URL: http://www.spainnorthafricaproject.org/bulletin/2019/7/7/inaugural-snap-bulletin-summer-2019

Eric Calderwood: La celebración de al-Andalus también fue una parte importante de la cultura fascista (Media Coverage)
Author(s): Marta Jiménez
Publication: Cordópolis
Date: 8/5/2019
Abstract: Interview with Spanish newspaper Cordópolis.
URL: https://cordopolis.eldiario.es/cordoba-hoy/eric-calderwood-celebracion-andalus-parte-importante-cultura-fascista_1_7078868.html

Cuando Franco era considerado ‘un buen musulmán' (Media Coverage)
Author(s): Giulio Maria Piantadosi
Publication: El Independiente
Date: 5/11/2018
Abstract: Interview with Spanish newspaper El Independiente.
URL: https://www.elindependiente.com/tendencias/2018/05/11/franco-buen-musulman-meca/

The Odd Couple: Franco’s Alliance With Muslims (Media Coverage)
Author(s): Thomas Graham
Publication: New Lines
Date: 11/19/2021
URL: https://newlinesmag.com/essays/the-odd-couple-francos-alliance-with-muslims/

Associated Products

Colonial al-Andalus: Spain and the Making of Modern Moroccan Culture (Book)
Title: Colonial al-Andalus: Spain and the Making of Modern Moroccan Culture
Author: Eric Calderwood
Abstract: Through state-backed Catholicism, monolingualism, militarism, and dictatorship, Spain’s fascists earned their reputation for intolerance. It may therefore come as a surprise that 80,000 Moroccans fought at General Franco’s side in the 1930s. What brought these strange bedfellows together, Eric Calderwood argues, was a highly effective propaganda weapon: the legacy of medieval Muslim Iberia, known as al-Andalus. This legacy served to justify Spain’s colonization of Moroc¬co and also to define the Moroccan national culture that supplanted colonial rule. Writers of many political stripes have celebrated convivencia, the fabled “coexistence” of Christians, Muslims, and Jews in medieval Iberia. According to this widely-held view, modern Spain and Morocco are joined through their shared Andalusi past. Colonial al-Andalus traces this supposedly timeless narrative to the mid-1800s, when Spanish politicians and intellectuals first used it to press for Morocco’s colonization. Franco later harnessed convivencia to the benefit of Spain’s colonial program in Morocco. This shift precipitated an eloquent historical irony. As Moroccans embraced the Spanish insistence on Morocco’s Andalusi heritage, a Spanish idea about Morocco gradually became a Moroccan idea about Morocco. Drawing on a rich archive of Spanish, Arabic, French, and Catalan sources—including literature, historiography, journalism, political speeches, schoolbooks, tourist brochures, and visual arts—Calderwood reconstructs the varied political career of convivencia and al-Andalus, showing how shared pasts become raw material for divergent contemporary ideologies, including Spanish fascism and Moroccan nationalism. Colonial al-Andalus exposes the limits of simplistic oppositions between European and Arab, Christian and Muslim, that shape current debates about European colonialism.
Year: 2018
Primary URL: http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674980327
Primary URL Description: The book description on the Harvard University Press website.
Secondary URL: https://www.amazon.com/Colonial-al-Andalus-Making-Moroccan-Culture/dp/0674980328
Secondary URL Description: The book's page on Amazon.com.
Access Model: The book is not open access.
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Type: Single author monograph
ISBN: 9780674980327
Copy sent to NEH?: Yes

Prizes

L. Carl Brown AIMS Book Prize in North African Studies
Date: 11/14/2019
Organization: American Institute for Maghrib Studies

Honorable Mention for the 2019 Nikki Keddie Book Award
Date: 11/15/2019
Organization: Middle East Studies Association

Silver Medal, 2020 Laura Shannon Prize in Contemporary European Studies
Date: 12/20/2019
Organization: Nanovic Institute for European Studies at the University of Notre Dame

Al Ándalus en Marruecos (Book)
Title: Al Ándalus en Marruecos
Author: Eric Calderwood
Abstract: Spanish translation of "Colonial al-Andalus: Spain and the Making of Modern Moroccan Culture," published by Harvard University Press in 2018.
Year: 2019
Primary URL: https://almuzaralibros.com/fichalibro.php?libro=4354&edi=1
Primary URL Description: Webpage for Spanish translation of "Colonial al-Andalus."
Publisher: Almuzara
Type: Translation
ISBN: 978-84-17797-4
Translator: Óscar Mariscal
Copy sent to NEH?: No

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