ABSTRACT
Cantaoras born after the first decade of the twentieth century would live and perform in a world very different from that of their predecessors. This chapter explores the social conditions that affected women’s lives in twentieth-century Spain. I briefly discuss important political and social movements and their impact on women, from the progressive project of the Second Republic, to the repression of the Franco years and finally to the last several decades in Spain that have been a time of accelerated change. How these social and political conditions were revealed in the media (folkloric film) and in the realm of flamenco performance, in particular how women were portrayed in these genres and the use of the media to reinforce stereotypes about women and Andalusians will be examined. Franco’s use of Nacionalflamenquismo to promote propaganda of the regime and the subtle resistance to this co-option by Franco in the television series Rito y Geografía del Cante Flamenco is also discussed. My intention in this chapter is to place the discussion of women in flamenco in the larger picture of what was occurring in Spain in this tumultuous century.
