“Women’s Fears and Fantasies as New Commodities During the Spanish Miracle:

The Rising Middle Class in Spanish Musical Film, Comic, and Advertisement”

[res. Javier Guerrero (reader)]

In the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, Spanish society returned to the 19^th-century division of the public and the private sphere, with women overseeing the latter where they were supposedly safe from the negative influence of industrial capitalism. However, during the Spanish Miracle (1959–1974), media and advertisement penetrated Spanish homes leading to a modernization of the private sphere by turning women into a driving force of postwar capitalism. My hypothesis is that, in accordance with the values of the Sección Femenina, Spanish housewives were supposed to become attractive objects in the home just like the numerous commodities that they were enticed to purchase. In my presentation I will showcase this by conducting a close reading of Spanish musical films, comics, and advertisement in women’s magazines from this period. I will particularly focus on the role and perspective of child/adolescent protagonists, who encourage a reading against the grain.