Preliminary Programme

The history of empires, during the transition from the Ancien Régime to liberalism, has been written from a historiographical standpoint which considers that states were built by metropolitan groups of power from their metropolises. However, in recent years, some writers have shown us how, in the process of assembling states during the nineteenth century, some people of the so-called ‘colonial peripheries’ confronted the state projects that reduced them to the category of colony, and tried to get a more advantageous situation for their territories. This paper is at the heart of this debate and it aims to clarify the form in which it was settled in the foundations of a Cuban identity project which gave a conscious identity to a region of the Spanish Empire, the island of Cuba, that had lacked it until then. This cultural network was developed by a group of ‘intellectuals’ which objective was to seek a more advantageous position for the island of Cuba in the framework of the Spanish liberal state that was under construction throughout the nineteenth century. Due to censorship, this ‘intellectual faction’ could not use political speech making to achieve its aims. This meant that the group had to look for an alternative way to express its ideas, and literature became the weapon. The aim of this research is to deepen knowledge of that process through the study of a literary work, Sab, written by Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda. (Show less)

As Argentines struggled to create a nation after independence in 1816 they faced numerous foreign relations challenges. The British had long held an influential foothold in the Río de la Plata and, in 1825, they signed a Treaty of Friendship and Navigation with the Argentine government that gave the British special privileges in the region. Indeed, Great Britain was the dominant force in Latin America as a whole in the nineteenth century. The French, however, wanted to challenge British dominance in Latin America and reestablish themselves as a force in the New World. The most well-known examples come from Mexico, where France initiated what came to be known as the “Pastry War” in 1839, and then invaded Mexico in 1862 and helped set up the rule of Maximillian of Hapsburg. Less well-known are the French activities in the Río de la Plata region where, from the Argentine perspective, France was involved in some of the gravest violations of Argentine sovereignty in its history. In 1829, for example, French warships burned three Argentine ships in the river near the city, which was under siege by the strongman Juan Manuel de Rosas. In the late 1830s France blockaded the port of Buenos Aires and supported an uprising against Rosas, now the leader of the Argentina Confederation. In 1845 French warships, along with British, attempted to force open trade in the Río de la Plata, and fought Rosas’ forces in the famous battle at Vuelta de Obligado.
As seen in these examples, France had numerous conflicts with Rosas during his rule. The British, on the other hand, supported Rosas because he had granted them privileged status. France opposed Rosas in hopes of gaining ground against the British. This paper will examine the vital role of French imperialism during this key period in Argentine history, and how French intrigue influenced the development of Argentine identity and politics. (Show less)

The main of this paper is to evaluate social mobility patterns in a pre modern society in the Río de la Plata region. The focus is in a rural society because in the rural registers we have data about who controls the agro productive factors (owners) and who receives a salary (workers).
We use population registers from Montevideo, Buenos Aires and surroundings between 1760 and 1860.
The methodology is an occupation classification in which the agrarian producer is differentiated from the agrarian worker. From this classification we can evaluate social mobility patterns in a pre modern society before and after the independence. (Show less)