Malena López Palmero

2025-2026
Francois Chevalier
Universidad de San Martín (UNSAM) y Universidad de Buenos Aires (UBA)
Florida en la encrucijada: estrategias de colonización y representaciones
Malena López Palmero is a History Teacher in Middle and High Education (2005) and PhD in History (2014) at the University of Buenos Aires. She teaches History of the United States of America at the University of Buenos Aires, National University of San Martín and the National Pedagogic University in Buenos Aires, Argentina. She has been invited as a professor at École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (París, Francia), at the Southwest University (Chongquing, China), and at the Universidade Federal de Mina Gerais (Belo Horizonte, Brasil). She has specialized in the early colonization of Virginia (XVI-XVII centuries), and she currently researches the origins of the colonization of Florida (XVI century). She is the author of numerous articles on her specialty and the book Del paraíso ultramarino al infierno colonial: Virginia (siglos XVI-XVII) (2023).
Projet de recherche
The research inquiries into the strategies deployed by the colonizer agents, both French (1562-1565) and Spanish (1565-1600), and the way in which they transmitted their experiences in textual and visual testimonies, with the aim of presenting the account of the early colonization of Florida that focuses both on global and local aspects. For that purpose, three analytical axes will be taken into account: 1) the relationship between settlers and native populations, along with their representations; 2) the balance of forces between France and Spain in their Overseas campaigns, which involves both diplomatic actions and the wider spread of discourses articulated with the so-called “Black Legend”; and 3) the agency of certain historical characters who, along with their social networks, had a remarkable position in the process of affirmation of the Spanish rule in Florida.
Sélection de publications
2023. Del paraíso ultramarino al infierno colonial: Virginia (siglos XVI-XVII), Valencia, Universitat de València.
2023 “Fracaso colonial y estrategia editorial: el caso del capitán John Smith”, in María Luz González Mezquita, Antonio Álvarez-Osorio Alvariño, James Amelang, Saúl Martínez Bermejo (coords.), Vidas fallidas. Aproximaciones al concepto de éxito y fracaso individual en la modernidad, Mar del Plata, EUDEM, pp. 76-93.
2021 “La colonización española de Florida: de iniciativa real a gestión privada”, in María Luz González Mezquita (ed.), Hacer Historia Moderna: Nuevos métodos, nuevas corrientes historiográficas y desafíos, Mar del Plata, Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata, pp. 123-135.
2022 “Apuntes para una metodología de la imagen: Florida y Virginia en el siglo XVI”, in Pablo Pozzi et al, Haciendo Historia, Herramientas para la investigación histórica, Buenos Aires, Clacso, pp. 165-199.
2020 “Apropiaciones simbólicas y ejercicio de la violencia en los viajes de circunnavegación de Francis Drake (1577-1580) y Thomas Cavendish (1586-1588)”, Prohistoria, año XXIII, n° 34, pp. 41-74.