School of Modern Languages and Cultures
Angel Smith
Reader in Modern Spanish History
0113 343 3526
Research Interests
My work has centred on three major areas. First, I have researched on social and political conflict in early twentieth-century Spain, focusing in particular on the reasons behind the growth of revolutionary left-wing ideologies and the difficulties faced in establishing systems of collective bargaining and reaching political compromises. Second, I have studied nationalisms and nation identities during the same period, analysing such aspects as regionalism and nationalism in Catalonia, and class and national identities. I am at present writing a book on the origins and rise of Catalan nationalism between the 1830s and 1930s. Most of my monographic work has focused on Catalonia, though I have also written on Spain as a whole in several more general studies.
Major Publications
- Angel Smith, Historical Dictionary of Spain, 2nd ed. (Lanham, Maryland: Scarecrow Press, 2009), 745pp. I-XXXVi
- Angel Smith, Anarchism, Revolution and Reaction: Catalan Labour and the Crisis of the Spanish State, 1898-1923 (Oxford: Berghahn, 2007), 402pp
- Angel Smith, 'The Catalan Counterrevolutionary Coalition and the Primo Rivera coup, 1917-1923', European History Quarterly, vol. 31, no. 1 (2007), pp. 7-34
- Angel Smith, (ed.), Red Barcelona: Social Protest and Labour Mobilization in the Twentieth Century (London: Routledge, 2002)
- Angel Smith and Emma Dávila-Cox (eds), The Crisis of 1898: Colonial Redistribution and Nationalist Mobilization (Macmillan: Basingstoke, 1999)
- Stefan Berger and Angel Smith (eds), Nationalism, Labour and Ethnicity, 1870-1939 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1999)
- Clare Mar-Molinero, and Angel Smith (eds), Nationalism and the Nation in the Iberian Peninsula: Competing and Conflicting Identities (Oxford: Berg, 1996)
- Angel Smith, 'Social Conflict and Trade Union Organisation in the Catalan Cotton Textile Industry, 1890-1914', International Review of Social History, vol. XXXVI, no.3 (1991), pp.331-375
Invited Lectures and Forthcoming Activities
- ' Who killed Eduardo Dato? Pistolerismo and the Barcelona labour wars. 1916-1923', Association for Contemporary Iberian Studies, University of Essex, 6-8 September 2001
- 'Clase y nación en España, 1898-1936', in, Cursos Internacionals de la Biblioteca Valenciana, 'Nación y Nacionalismo en La España Contemporánea, Valencia, 2-5 December 2002
- 'Gremialismo y lucha de clases en los oficios catalanes (1898-1923)', in El Trabajador de Oficio: Entre El Gremio y la Resistencia, Cuarto Coloquio Internacional de Historia Social, Benicassim-Castellón, 1-3 de Octuber 2003
- 'Spanish Textile Workers, 1650-2000' International Conference at the Institute of Social History, Amsterdam, 11-14 December 2004
- 'The Catalan Counter-revolutionary Coalition and the Primo de Rivera Coup, 1917-1923', Cañada Blanch Centre for Contemporary Spanish Studies, 11 May 2005
Major Research Projects and Grants
- October-December 1999 British Academy Small Grant
- November 2004-February 2005 British Academy Small Grant
- July-December 2006 British Academy Small Grant
- 18-month Leverhulme Research Fellowship (Jan 2009-June 2010) to write a book entitled The Forging of the Catalan Nation, 1880-1936
Teaching
- SPPO1042: The Historical Development of Spain and Spanish America (Co-ordinator)
- SPPPO2390 & SPPO2391: Spain Under the Franco Regime, 1939-1975 (Co-ordinator)
- SPPO3240: The Crisis of the Spanish Nation? Nationalisms and National Identities in Spain 1868-1978 (Co-ordinator)
Postgraduate Research Supervision
All areas of modern Spanish history including:
- Labour and the left
- Nationalism and national identities
- The Spanish authoritarian Right
