Existence, Repression and Resistance of Sexual and Gender Dissidents in Rural Andalusia during the Franco Regime and the Transition to Democracy

Abstract

The limited research on the memory of sexual and gender dissidence in Spain has focused on gay men, especially those living in cities. Little attention has been paid to sexual and gender dissidents in small towns, on the assumption that the entire rural context is inherently repressive. Those who do not conform to the gay/lesbian model of identity have been ignored. In this article, we address the repression of queer subjectivities in rural areas of Andalusia during Franco’s regime and the transition to democracy. We show that repression also took place in the villages, although it took on different characteristics from those in the big cities.