Landscape and Nation in the Formation of the Spanish Liberal State (1850-1890)

This dissertation investigates the relevance of the landscape as a cultural tool in the nation-building processes of the nineteenth century. Within this general frame, I focus on Spanish nation-building with an emphasis on the conflict between the nation�s center and its periphery, the conflict between rural and urban areas, as well as the integration of regional territories within the national project. In particular, this work studies how several writers treat the landscape as a political tool used in opposition to the centralism of the Liberal State within the cultural discourse. With this in mind, my investigation is divided into four chapters that analyze the work of different regionalist authors geographically separated from one another.