The image of Latin America disseminated in Spain by the Franco Regime: Repercussions in the configuration of a national identity

The aim of this work is to refute the assertions that the Franco regime did not have a definite ideology or that it did not have racialism. To that end this study analyzes the image of the discovery and conquest of America presented in the history textbooks, elementary reading books and comic-strips distributed among children and youth during the Franco regime (1939-1975). This analysis assesses the function of the relationship between Latin America and Spain in the creation of the national identity which Franco's regime sought to transmit to Spanish children and teenagers.;There were three reasons why the image of Latin America played a key role in the formation of that national identity. In first place, this image of Latin America encompassed the Spanish empire and therefore reflected what Spanish power had been in the past. Throughout this study I will analyze the way in which the kinds of texts mentioned above utilized this "glorious" past in order to define a Francoist Spanish national identity.;In the second place, the image of Latin America was critical because the discovery and conquest of American territory entailed numerous confrontations between the Spanish conquerors and different "others" represented by the "Indians." This work analyzes the way in which these confrontations were reinterpreted and used in children's literature by the Francoist regime to establish the traits it sought to define as part of the "genuine" national Spanish character.;Lastly, this Latin-American image was important because it allowed Francoist ideology to utilize religion, language and culture--elements shared by the Latin-American nations and Spain--to posit the existence of a transnational community: the Hispanic Community of Nations.;And yet these three reasons were internally contradictory. This study elucidates the mechanisms used by Francoist discourse to resolve the contradictions which emerged when the "Indians" were simultaneously presented both as the "other" against whom the Francoist regime defined Spanish national identity and as the ancestors of the Latin-Americans with whom Franco's regime wished to found the Hispanic Community of Nations.