On March 10th, the documentation centre Centro Documental de Memoria Histórica (CDMH), in Salamanca, hosted the presentation of the “Map of Women Writers” of Castilla y León, an event held in commemoration of International Women’s Day. The initiative, promoted by the association “El legado de las mujeres”, traces the legacy of the most important women writers of this autonomous region, such as Beatriz Galindo, Teresa de Jesús and Lucía de Medrano.
This association, which is based at the secondary school Vaguada de la Palma, in Salamanca, and receives support from the Junta de Castilla y León, participates in Women’s Legacy as one of the eight international partners, the Erasmus+ project that is based on Ana López-Navajas’ research into the lack of female references in educational content. For this reason, the occasion was used to explain what the Women’s Legacy consists of, whose objective is closely linked to the initiative “El legado de las mujeres”.
According to the authors of “Map of Women Writers”, the maps allow a sociological analysis of literature, given that the conditions of education are directly related to female literary production and also serve to establish literary networks or generational groups among women writers.
The event on the “Map of Women Writers” was chaired by the CDMH’s Director of Dissemination, Marta Marcos Orejudo, who moderated the interventions of the representatives of the association “El legado de las mujeres”.
The first speaker was Trinidad Sánchez Muñoz, vice-president, who presented the organisation as a national teachers’ association whose main aim is to make women visible in secondary education.
Mercedes Gómez Blesa, also vice-president of the association, focused her speech on the women writers’ maps project, which aims to make female authors visible by compiling all the women writers in each autonomous community with at least two published works.
Then, ach of the representatives of “El legado de las mujeres” spoke about the women writers selected to appear on the map of each province of Castilla y León:
Carmen Teresa Martín put the spotlight on the women of Ávila, focusing on the importance of Teresa de Ávila or Teresa de Jesús, because from her onwards, female authors multiplied and hundreds of nuns left a record of their religious belief.
Reyes Arenales introduced women writers from Burgos, such as Teresa de Cartagena, a medieval author of mystical treatises; Florencia Pinar, a poet of songs; Mari Cruz Ebro, a writer of regionalist literature; Carmen Plaza or María Velasco.
Trinidad Sánchez took the floor again to present the authors from León, one of the most prolific provinces, including Egeria, a 4th century Hispanic-Roman writer about whom almost no biographical information remains; Eva González Hernández, Josefina Rodríguez Álvarez, Elena Santiago and Raquel Lanseros.
The event continued with Begoña Alonso talking about women writers from Palencia. Belén Coloma spoke about the women from Salamanca, followed by Gloria Lázaro on women authors from Segovia. Finally, Asunción Cortés focused on the women writers of Soria and Dolores Fidalgo on those of Zamora.
In addition to “El legado de las mujeres”, Women’s Legacy has the collaboration of the Conselleria d’Educació, high-schools and universities in Spain, Italy, Lithuania and Scotland, as well as different textbook publishers. The aim is to carry out five intellectual projects over three years, including a database of female references in literature, music and science with work activity sheets to be used in schools and included in textbooks, three catalogues of women artists and several training courses in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics).
