Alfredo MARTÍNEZ EXPÓSITO
2018-2019
University of Melbourne (Australia)
The Image of Spain in Catalan Cinema
Alfredo Martínez Expósito earned his Doctorate in Hispanic Philology in 1991 from the University of Oviedo. Since 1993, Alfredo Martínez Expósito has been a Professor of Hispanic Studies at the Universities of Queensland and Melbourne.
Between 2011 and 2018 he directed the Department of Languages and Linguistics of the University of Melbourne; and from 2006 to 2010, he was Director of the Department of Languages and Cultural Studies at the University of Queensland, where he had taught Spanish and Hispanic Studies since 1993.
Research project
This project seeks to further develop the concept of country-image in order to explore an alternative methodology for the study of the cultural roots of contemporary separatism. The country-image paradigm has proved to be crucial in recent post-identity studies of national cultures.
The project hypothesises that the construction of a negative cultural image of the host country is a strong predictor of political separatism. The project will focus on the case of Catalonia’s push for independence from Spain and the specific cultural practice of Catalan cinema to test this hypothesis.
The project aims to reach a systematic understanding of the ideological and rhetorical processes that have resulted in a radical modification of Spain’s image in Catalan film culture over the last three decades.
The proposed study will methodically examine the evolution of national discourses and country images embedded within influential key cinematic texts (and also examples of literary and TV texts for contextualisation). This analysis will enable a reappraisal of the conflicting meanings of ‘Spain’ in contemporary Catalonia and offer greater insight into the underlying motivations for contemporary separatism.
Selected Publications
- Martínez Expósito A., Cuestión de imagen: cine y Marca España, Vigo, 2015.
- Martínez Expósito A., Fouz-Hernández S., Live Flesh: The Male Body in Contemporary Spanish Cinema. London-New York, 2007.
- Martínez Expósito A., “Características identitarias del cuento infantil ‘queer’ en España”, in Ingenschay D. (coord.), Eventos del deseo: Sexualidades minoritarias en las culturasliteraturas de España y Latinoamérica a fines del siglo xx, Frankfurt, 2018, pp. 141-154.
- Martínez Expósito A.,“Homophobia, Ethical Witnessing, and the Matrix of Gendered Violence: Issues of Intersectionality in Luppi/Hornos’s Pasos”, in Gámez Fuentes M.J., Maseda García R., Gender and Violence in Spanish Culture: From Vulnerability to Accountability, New York, 2018, pp. 161-176.
- Martínez Expósito A., “Elements of Nation and Place Branding in Ocho apellidos vascos (2014)”, International Journal of Iberian Studies, 30/3, 2017, pp. 183-197.