Anthropology and image in colonial contexts: the scientific expedition to Spanish territories in the Gulf of Guinea (1948)^*

PRESENTATION

On 2 June 2021, five black researchers working at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab-USA) published the statement “Change Now,” demanding the managers of this scientific institution to do their utmost to achieve racial justice and equality in the laboratory. This led to an initiative (https://changenowphysics.com) that has triggered a process of reflection in many institutions. This was one of the many antiracist statements caused by the murder of George Floyd at the hands of a police officer. This death sparked numerous protests and, in an interesting spin-off, a significant movement that requested the revision of historical narratives marked by colonialism, racism,¹ This revision of colonial pasts includes an important movement for the study and possible repatriation of material culture/art to their original countries. In this sense, a statement by French President Emmanuel Macron in Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso), on 28 November 2017, about the need to “return African heritage,” is particularly significant. See Felwine Sarr and Bénédicte Savoy (2018). Restituer le patrimoine africain. Paris: Philippe Rey/Seuil, The Restitution of African Cultural Heritage. Toward a New Relational Ethics. Ministère de la Culture. Núm. 2018-26 and http://restitutionreport2018.com/sarr_savoy_en.pdf (consulted 21 Aug. 2022). Complementarily, see Nora Philippe (2021) “Restitution. L’África en quête des chefs d’ouvres.” https://www.tv5monde.com/programmes/fr/programme-tv-restituer-l-afrique-en-quete-de-ses-chefs-d-oeuvre/125360/. and slavery,² Several factors, including the recognition of so-called ‘fragmented pasts’, have triggered a revision of colonialism. Especially significant are exhibits like “Slavery” (Rijkmuseum, Amsterdam, 9 June-29 August 2021) and “Human zoos” (African Museum, Tervuren, December 2021-March 2022). The number of publications of the issue has grown exponentially. See, for instance, Josep Maria Fradera. “Esclavitud, servidumbre y usos del pasado.” El País (27 April 2022), p. 11 and Josep Playà Maset. “El pasado esclavista de Catalunya.” La Vanguardia (22 June 2020), pp. 34-35. as well as denouncing ongoing institutional racism.³ See the series “Racismo en Europa,” published by La Vanguardia in 2020: United Kingdom (Rafael Ramos, 14 June, p. 12); France (Eusebio Val, 15 June, p. 7); Belgium (Jaume Masdeu, 16 June, p. 4); Germany (María-Paz López, 17 June, p. 8); Italy (Anna Bui, 18 June, p. 6), Scandinavia (Núria Vila, 19 June, p. 8), Hungary (Félix Flores, 20 June, p. 4).” See also Núria Vila Masclans. “Desterrados del gueto.” La Vanguardia (21 June 2020), pp. 16-17.

Some may wonder why I begin a text about a scientific expedition to Spanish Guinea in the 1940s with this. The answer to this question is that I am convinced that historical knowledge is key to understanding the roots of things that, well into the 21^st century, are still with us. Among them, a growing revisionist trend for change, conceal, and even negate past forms of discrimination, exploitation,⁴ See Francesc Peyrón. “La victoria de Ota venga. El zoo del Bronx pide perdón 116 años después de exhibir a un pigmeo en una jaula de monos.” La Vanguardia (4 August 2020), p. 7. and so-called ‘silent colonial violence’, which still affect native populations, for instance, in terms of health.⁵ For instance, the accumulation of toxins, like chlordecone, in the blood of inhabitants of the former colonies in the French Antilles, which has a direct impact on prostate cancer, is a result of colonial agricultural practices. See Luc Multigner et al. “Chlordecone Exposure and Risk of Prostate Cancer.” Journal of Clinical Oncology, vol. 28, nº 21 (20 July 2010), pp. 3457-3462. Another significant example is colonial policy in New Caledonia, where the authorities forced Canacos to destroy their traditional houses, imposing a model of house made with tremolite, a type of asbestos that, in the long run, caused innumerable cases of pleural cancer. See P. Goldberg et al. (1995). “Rôle potentiel de l’exposition enviromental et domestiques à la tremolite dans le cancer de la plèvre en Nouvelle-Calédonie.” Revue d’épidemiologie et de santé publique, n.º 43, pp. 444-450.

As often stated (Gallerano, 2007Gallerano, N. (2007) “Historia y uso público de la historia.” Pasajes. Revista de pensamiento contemporáneo, 24, pp. 87-97.), past and present are intertwined so intimately that many current situations can hardly be understood without looking back from a certain presentist perspective. In this regard, we may still rally behind Marc Bloch when he stated that ignoring the past is not only detrimental to our understanding of the present but even compromises present action.⁶ See Claire Judde de Larivière. “L’historien ne connaît pas la fin de l’histoire.” Le Monde (2 de febrero de 2019). https://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2019/02/02/l-historien-ne-connait-pas-la-fin-de-l-histoire_5418359_3232.html (consulted 2 August 2022). In the case at hand, several studies have emphasised the need to delve in the past to understand: “… the impact of Spanish colonialism in modern Morocco and Equatorial Guinea, by activating the relationship between colonialism and post-colonialism” (Aixelà-Cabré, 2015, pp. 16-17Aixelà-Cabré, Y. (ed.) (2015) Tras las huellas del colonialismo español en Marruecos y Guinea Ecuatorial. Madrid: CSIC.).

For this reason, in addition to presenting the expedition, with special emphasis on its graphic production, this text aims to raise, again, awareness about situations that seemed something of the past but which, sadly, are still very present in our social, cultural, and political dynamics.

THE SCIENTIFIC EXPEDITION TO THE SPANISH TERRITORIES IN THE GULF OF GUINEA

Since the beginning of the process of institutionalisation of Spanish anthropology in the 1970s, numerous authors have written about the history of the discipline in the country. Despite this, some aspects of Spanish anthropology’s history remain little known, although they deserve more attention, not only in their own right but because this avenue of research can contribute, albeit modestly, to the aims stated above. Methodologically, it should be pointed out that the research presented in this article follows the examination of significant and unpublished documents in the archives of the Museu Etnològic de Barcelona.

SCIENTIFIC CONTEXT AND ANTHROPOLOGICAL WORK OF THE EXPEDITION

One of the things that is worth emphasising is the intensive scientific work undertaken by the expedition members. For instance, Gómez’s report indicated that:

The same applies to Alía Medina’s geological report:

Concerning the disciplinary and theoretical principles followed, the anthropological work was heavily based on historicist perspectives. As such, biological anthropology and archaeology were regarded as the basic sources of evidence for the biological, historical, cultural, and psychological understanding of the population groups under study. For this reason, the anthropology and ethnology groups - basically Alcobé, Fernández Cabeza, and Panyella - focused on defining evolutionary stages, in both biological and cultural terms: “By registering the origin of individuals, we could observe the known tribal exogamy of the groups in Continental Guinea, an ethnological feature that makes the task of the anthropobiologist easier” (Alcobé, 1955, p. 93Alcobé Noguer, S. (1955) “Informe de la labor realizada por la expedición científica a los Territorios españoles del Golfo de Guinea, organizada por la Dirección General de Marruecos y Colonias.” Archivos del IDEA, VIII, 32, pp. 85-95.).

In response to the political-institutional context, the close links between physical anthropology and ethnology responded to “the oft-repeated idea of ‘scientific unity.’ At the same time, this became a key problem for the autonomous development of ethnology and cultural anthropology” (Sánchez Gómez, 1992, p. 31Sánchez Gómez, L. A. (1992) “La antropología al servicio del Estado. El Instituto Bernardino de Sahagún del CSIC (1941-1970).” Revista de Dialectología y Tradiciones Populares, XLVII, pp. 29-44. doi: https://doi.org/10.3989/rdtp.1992.v47.i1.241 ).

In this way, biological and cultural principles, archaeology and ethnology, were constant points of reference in the expedition’s research design:

With regard to ethnology, it is important to emphasise the conceptual, rather than formal subordination to archaeological and prehistoric views of cultural and social evolution. In fact, ethnology was perceived as an auxiliary to archaeology-prehistory:

It can be said that this idea of “primitive humanity” was, de facto, one of the keystones of research, putting the archaeological record at the forefront, along with the ethnological one. This was a central tenet of the foundation of the Ethnological and Colonial Museum of Barcelona (MEB) (Calvo, 2021Calvo Calvo, L. (2021) “Sociedad, política y ciencia en la museografía española del siglo XX: el Museo Etnológico de Barcelona como estudio de caso.” Aula, Museos y Colecciones, 8, pp. 13-25.), which housed the first pieces collected by the 1948 Guinea expedition:

It is worth mentioning that this notion of ‘primitive humanity’ has now been replaced by other concepts, such as ‘shared humanity’, which better explain past and present realities (Stolcke, 2019Stolcke, V. (2019) “Prefacio.” In: Y. Aixelà-Cabré, La gestión de la diversidad religiosa, étnica y cultural en Europa en el siglo XXI. La variedad de las visiones nacionales. Barcelona: Bellaterra Edicions, pp. 9-13.).

Concerning physical anthropology, the expedition, with the help of Spanish colonial healthcare infrastructure, collected data from 1398 “individuals” or “types” (Calvo, 1998Calvo Calvo, L. (1998) “Fotografía y antropología en España (1839-1936): entre el estereotipo y la sistemática.” Revista de dialectología y tradiciones populares, 53, 2, pp. 115-142. doi: https://doi.org/10.3989/rdtp.1998.v53.i2.391 ) divided by ethnic group: Pamues (454 men and 115 women), Combes (206 men), Bubi (429 Men and 172 Women).

Similarly, samples were taken from 22 individuals for the genetic study of pigmentation. Specifically:

Concerning the general parameters that guided Alcobé and Panyella’s work, two significant aspects are worth stressing: first, although the texts do not make this explicit, some scientists felt the tension of making science in a context that was highly influenced by Catholicism, for instance, the prominent geneticist and Alcobé’s disciple, Antonio Prevosti (Florensa, 2013Florensa, C. (2013) “Más allá del genetista. Otra mirada a Antoni Prevosti Pelegrín.” In: L. Calvo, A. Girón, and M. A. Puig-Samper, eds., Naturaleza y laboratorio. Barcelona: Residencia de Investigadores CSIC-Generalitat de Catalunya, pp. 351-389.). Second, Alcobé’s scientific approach, in contrast to Pérez de Barradas’s, director of IBSAE, followed disciplinary avenues which, over time, were to consolidate a new approach to research in Spain (Tomás Cardoso, 2015Tomás Cardoso, R. P. (2015) El desarrollo de la Antropología Física española en el contexto de la Historia de la Antropología Física y las teorías bioantropológicas europeas y americanas: una historia de conactos, desarrollo paralelos y convergencias. Tesis doctoral. Madrid: Universidad Complutense. Available at: https://repositorio.uam.es/bitstream/handle/10486/672395/tomas_cardoso_rafael.pdf [accessed 21 Aug. 2022].). Currently, once historical genetics is a set field and its cultural and social implications are well understood, Alcobé’s first steps can be regarded as pioneering; for instance, the biological-cultural connection made by Alcobé and Panyella and their precise analysis of the close relationship between biology and culture through exogamy, which was based on the data collected by the expedition as well as published material: “Matrimonial reciprocity between men and women is attested in some tribes, contributing to social stability and cohesion, while, from a biological perspective, this limits the expansion of exogamy by reducing genetic variability” (Alcobé and Panyella, 1951, p. 77Alcobé Noguer, S. and Panyella, A. (1951) “Estudio cuantitativo de la exogamia de los Pamues (fang) de la Guinea continental española.” Archivos del I.D.E.A., 18, pp. 53-77.).¹⁸Both presented a paper at the Sociology International Conference held in Rome in September 1950. See Alcobé and Panyella, 1951.

Panyella’s ethnological results were embodied by the acquisition of 550 objects for the incipient MEB¹⁹On 31 January 1949, Alcobé, as director of the expedition, and Francisco Pardillo, director of Instituto de Ciencias Naturales, Ayuntamiento de Barcelona, agreed for the materials collected to be deposited at the MEB, waiting for the decision of the Dirección General de Marruecos y Colonias. Afterwards, some of these materials were relocated to the African Museum and, when this museum closed, to the National Anthropology Museum (Fondo documental MEB)., as well as musical objects for the Museum of Music of Barcelona. He also collected material used in Fang tattoos: “which are rapidly disappearing, although they are among Africa’s most interesting tattoos” (Alcobé, 1955, p. 95Alcobé Noguer, S. (1955) “Informe de la labor realizada por la expedición científica a los Territorios españoles del Golfo de Guinea, organizada por la Dirección General de Marruecos y Colonias.” Archivos del IDEA, VIII, 32, pp. 85-95.).

Panyella also took numerous field notes, which were largely responsible for his future appointment as director of the MEB and constituted the basis of further expeditions to Spanish Guinea and other territories from the 1950s on. This work turned Panyella into one of the most prominent Spanish ethnologies in the 1950s and 1960s, in the run-up of the institutionalisation of the discipline in Spain, which took off with the creation of the first Cultural Anthropology Department at the University of Barcelona in 1972, under the direction of Claudio Esteva Fabregat.

In addition, as the expedition’s ethnologist, Panyella paid attention to other issues, such as the influence of the Fang from Cameroon on “our Pamues,” as well as the transition of groups such as the Balengue, Bujeba, and Combe from hunting-gathering to fishing. Obviously, this frantic activity - he visited over 100 settlements, collected items, and carried out surveys about tattoos, among other things - could not follow the principles of modern fieldwork. Rather, his studies were guided by traditional ideas on foreign studies, based on brief visits to collect data with which to build a vision - or confirm an existing one - about the groups under study. It is highly significant that when he addressed: “the problem, political and ethnological, of contacts with Europeans could only be briefly addressed” (Alcobé, 1955, p. 95Alcobé Noguer, S. (1955) “Informe de la labor realizada por la expedición científica a los Territorios españoles del Golfo de Guinea, organizada por la Dirección General de Marruecos y Colonias.” Archivos del IDEA, VIII, 32, pp. 85-95.).

Beyond the data compiled, which in principle were, in themselves, innocuous, and their later processing, which lead to several publications (vid. Alcobé, 1950Alcobé Noguer, S. (1950) “Los pamues en el complejo racial del África negra.” Archivos del IDEA, IV, 13, pp. 17-35.; Alcobé and Panyella, 1951Alcobé Noguer, S. and Panyella, A. (1951) “Estudio cuantitativo de la exogamia de los Pamues (fang) de la Guinea continental española.” Archivos del I.D.E.A., 18, pp. 53-77.; Pons, 1951aPons Rosell, J. (1951a) “Huellas dactilares en negros de la Guinea española.” Archivos del IDEA, 18, pp. 79-88. and 1951bPons Rosell, J. (1951b) Impresiones dermopapilares de indígenas de la guinea española en relación con otras poblaciones. I. Muestras dactilares, II. Impresiones palmares. Madrid: IDEA.; Veciana, 1956Veciana Vilaldach, A. (1956) Contribución al estudio antropológico del negro africano: los bujeba (bisio) de la Guinea española. Madrid: CSIC-IDEA.), some relevant aspects are worth mentioning. First, Pons and Veciana’s publications were based on data collected by the expedition but they had not taken part in it. And second, the fact that the object of the expedition, that is, what was collected and studied, and how; the decision of what to study and the mode of studying is a reflection of a research approach (Edwards, 2000Edwards, E. (2000) “Exchanging Photographs: Preliminary Thougts on the currency of Photography in Colleting Anthropology.” Journal des anthropologues, 80-81, pp. 21-46. doi: https://doi.org/10.4000/jda.3138 ; Edwards and Scorer, 2017Edwards, E., and Scorer, J. (2017) “Visualizing Traces of the Past in Latin America.” Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies, 26, 2, pp. 131-139. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13569325.2017.1309314 ):

Finally, we must point out another relevant point: the objects acquired by the expedition were purchased, not stolen or otherwise appropriated, as was unfortunately so often the case after Africa was partitioned by colonial powers after the Berlin Conference of 1885, although the doubt remains as to what extent locals could refuse to let go of objects that might have been symbolically important.

Within this wider framework, images taken during the expedition reflected the scientific, cultural, and political universe that drove expedition members when they took photographs or films.

ANTHROPOLOGY AND IMAGE DURING THE EXPEDITION

Research on the role played by photography in colonial processes, specifically concerning Spain, is making enormous progress (Gallo and Arbaiza, 2022Gallo González, D., and Arbaiza, D. (2022) “El archivo colonial bajo el foco: representaciones audiovisuales de Guinea Ecuatorial.” Bulletin of Spanish Visual Studies, 6:2, pp. 159-174. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/24741604.2022.2088923 ). In the 1948 expedition, images were to play a prominent part. Graphic representations can be regarded as “labyrinthine connections” (Edwards, 2014Edwards, E. (2014) “Photographic Uncertainties: Between Evidence and Reassurance.” History and Anthropology 25 (March 2014): 171-188. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/02757206.2014.882834 ), that is, photographs, especially anthropometric ones, expose the close relationship between colonial powers and political worldviews and science, which become especially blatant in colonial environments (vid also Plasencia, 2017Plasencia Camps, I. (2017) Imagen y ciudadanía en Guinea Ecuatorial (1861-1937): del orden fotográfico al orden colonial. Tesis doctoral. Madrid: Universidad Complutense.; Stehrenberger, 2022Stehrenberger, C. S. (2022) “Science Images and Colonialism in Equatorial Guinea.” Bulletin of Spanish Visual Studies, 6:2, pp. 239-258. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/24741604.2022.2090804 ).

These “labyrinthine connections” become obvious when we consider that Guineans were, from a legal perspective, a “subject” and not a “citizen” population (Carrasco, 2022, pp. 248-252Carrasco, A. M. (2022) Guinea Ecuatorial. Historia de la colonización española. Córdoba: Almuzara.). The metropolitan power had created political and ideological conditions that allowed Spanish expedition members to carry out their research without obstacle; they could study, document, interview, collect, etc., all individual and collective cultural and biological features of the groups under study.

In this way, measuring, weighting, taking blood, photographing, and filming were tasks designed to establish specific kinds of information that could confirm ideas about native populations developed in the 19^th century (Aranzadi, 2021Aranzadi, J. (2021) “Estereotipos étnicos de los indígenas en los primeros estudios coloniales sobre la Guinea española (1900-1936).” BÉROSE - Encyclopédie internationales des histoires de l’anthropologie. Paris: Bérose. Available at : https://www.berose.fr/article2347.html?lang=fr ; Sá, 2015Sá, A. L. (2015) “La construcción de la imagen del indígena en los territorios españoles del Golfo de Guinea.” In: Y. Aixelà-Cabré, Tras las huellas del colonialismo español en Marruecos y Guinea Ecuatorial. Madrid: CSIC, pp. 89-112.).

As noted, the expedition was assigned funds to purchase photographic and filmographic material. Following the ideas noted above, along with the collection of anthropometric, serological, and other anatomical data (fingerprints, palmprints):

What do the images taken in Spanish Guinea in 1948 reflect? Aside from the anthropometric photographs, we must take Santos Zunzunegui’s (vid. Limón Serrano, 2021Limón Serrano, N. (2021) “Una fotografía no es la realidad, y nunca es mal momento para recordarlo.” The Conversation (29-12-2021). Available at: https://theconversation.com/una-fotografia-no-es-la-realidad-y-nunca-es-mal-momento-para-recordarlo-167384 [accessed 23 Aug. 2022].) cue about the other images:

In fact, photography acts as: “the imprint of something real, which creates the belief that the image is, in itself, a natural and inevitable phenomenon, the result of a determination that is independent on the individual will and the cultural context” (Del Río, 2021, p. 123Del Río, V. (2021) La memoria fotográfica. Historia, documento y ficción. Madrid: Ediciones Cátedra.).

This guiding principle of photography allows for a more detailed analysis of images, be it from a conceptual point of view - photography equals scientific evidence - or from the perspective of how images were taken. In this way, scientists create knowledge in the process, expanding knowledge to appeal to an informed public (Kjellman, 2016, p. 7Kjellman, U. (2016) “To document the undocumentable: Photography in the scientific practice of physical anthropology and race biology.” Journal of Documentation, 72 (5), pp. 813-831. doi: https://doi.org/10.1108/jd-09-2015-0116 ).

As such, given the anthropological aim of most images (Ortiz García and Cea Gutiérrez, 2005Ortiz García, C., Cea Gutiérrez, A., and Sánchez-Carretero, C., coords., (2005) Maneras de mirar: lecturas antropológicas de la fotografía. Madrid: CSIC.), the subjects are represented in isolation from their social and cultural but not their natural, context; skull and face are emphasised, facilitating subsequent interpretations that connect biology and culture, that is, endorsing what has been referred to as the biological nature of culture (Calvo, 1997bCalvo Calvo, L. (1997b) “Imagen y ciencia: en torno a la indagación sobre la búsqueda de la naturaleza biológica de la cultura.” Quark: Ciencia, medicina, comunicación y cultura, 9, pp. 25-35., 2005Calvo Calvo, L. (2005) “Las ‘otras imágenes’ o la fotografía como referente antropológico.” In: C. Ortiz García, A. Cea Gutiérrez, and C. Sánchez-Carretero, coords., Maneras de mirar: lecturas antropológicas de la fotografía. Madrid: CSIC, pp. 161-168.), which pervades, in one way or another, all these studies about Spanish Guinea: “The usual principles of research, for instance, in Spain, do not apply to Guinea, which is a different environment, totally different people in terms of nature and education” (González Echegaray, 1964, p. 14González Echegaray, C. (1964) Estudios Guineos. Madrid: IDEA, vol. II (Etnología).).

In fact, the interaction of photography, race, and visual perception strongly contributed to hierarchise and underline the essential and racial aspects of native communities (López Sanz and Sánchez Durá, 2021López Sanz, H. and Sánchez Durá, N. (2021) “Imaginación colonial y formas de aproximación gráfica de las poblaciones negro africanas. El caso de la Guinea española (1880-1968).” In: BÉROSE. Encyclopédie internationale des histoires de l’antropologie. París: Bérose. Available at: https://www.berose.fr/article2345.html?lang=fr ). In this regard, visual products such as racial atlases played a crucial role in consolidating this process in the West. It has been written that

As noted, this emphasis on racial features necessarily implied the objectification of human beings, turning them into ‘things’, which, according to Kisukidi, could be entered into the equation of colonial economies. This ‘racial accounting’ or ‘racial economy’ allowed the measuring, calculating, and planning of the type and quantity of food needed for a certain task, as analysed by Bajohr and Löw (2016)Bajohr, F. and Löw, A., ed. (2016) The Holocaust and European societies. Social processes and social dynamics. London: Palgrave Macmillan London, Center for Holocaust Studies. for Nazi Germany, another prominent example of the fetishization of human objectification.

In addition, this type of photograph obscured other aspects of the ways of life of the subjects, neglecting a basic tenet of fieldwork, the ‘sequence of images’ that has the potential to yield more detailed knowledge. In this way, these photographs contributed nothing to the so-called ‘ethnography of experience’, that is, research that brings the researcher closer to a more precise understanding of the ways of life and worldviews of the individuals and communities under study. Graphic records, in whatever format, can greatly help us to understand the “density of experience” of people (Edwards, 1995, p. 142Edwards, E. (1995) “Exhibition reviews. Temps d’ahir.” Journal of Museum Ethnography, 7, pp. 140-142.). In this regard, it must be pointed out that, in all of the IDEA’s publications, the graphic record largely betrays this disconnection with the cultural realities of people, as they chiefly consist of images of material culture (Robles Mendo, 1946Robles Mendo, C. (1946) “Exploradores científicos de la Guinea.” Trabajos del Instituto Bernardino de Sahagún de Antropología y Etnología, IV (Etnología), pp. 69-85.) or the classic racial ‘types’ (Bonelli y Rubio, 1949, p. 187Bonelli y Rubio, J. (1949) “Notas sobre la geografía humana de los territorios españoles de Guinea.” In: J. Díaz de Villegas, A. Marín and Bertrán de Lis, A. Ochoa Iglesias, E. Hernández-Pacheco, G. Bullón Diaz, J. de Lizaury y Roldán, J. Bonelli y Rubio, and M. Lombardero Vicente, España en África. Madrid: IDEA, pp. 179-191.).

In this way, the graphic record of the expedition only confirmed the alleged connection between biology and culture, turning preconceived stereotypes into incontrovertible fact. In any case, it must be stated that, in contrast with 19^th-century anthropometric photographs, these were taken in nature, without using neutral backgrounds with scales. This is interesting, because, as the photographs illustrate (Fig. 3), despite the anthropobiological discourse that enveloped them, the pose of the subjects already reveals a different view from that betrayed by classic 19^th-century anthropometric photographs.

For all of these reasons, it can be argued that the photographs acted as a certificate of authenticity, and contributed to confirming the backward cultural stage of “primitive” or “natural” peoples, in F. Ratzel’s terminology (1888)Ratzel, F. (1888) Las Razas Humanas. Barcelona: Montaner y Simón Editores..

This, again, confirmed the need for western civilisational and evangelising intervention, with European culture as the universal reference: “Pamues are the only ones in the region to practice some craft […] they work copper and brass, which they do not produce but harvest from Europeans in the form of old cauldrons” (Pérez de Barradas, 1947, p. 72Pérez de Barradas, J. (1947). Guia del Museo Etnológico. Madrid: CSIC, Instituto Bernardino de Sahagún de antropología y Etnología.).

Although the remaining non-anthropobiological photographs have proven impossible to locate, photographs from other expeditions sponsored by the MEB to Guinea (1959) (Fig. 4) are clarifying concerning the context in which they were taken. These images reveal the condescending and paternalistic attitude of Spanish officials - probably health workers - and Guineans dressed European-style vis-à-vis the ‘performers’, which represent traditional rituals and dances: we may even speak of certain indifference and even glee before the ‘western camera’. In any case, the staged nature of the scenes, which confirm cultural stereotype and exoticism, is hard to miss.

CONCLUSIONS

As noted in the opening paragraphs, this text aimed to answer such questions as: to what extent did science help to consolidate Spanish colonial power in Guinea? What were the scientific parameters followed in the study of Guinean society? Why did the scientific (from the methodological and conceptual perspective) expedition adopt the tenets that it did? What is the distance between 19^th-century ‘primitive humanity’ and 21^st-century ‘shared humanity’?

I have tried to answer these questions with a view on the principle that travellers discover that which they already carry with them (Onfray, 2016Onfray, M. (2016) Teoría del viaje. Poética de la geografía. Madrid: Taurus.). In this way, the scientific principles of the 1948 expedition mirrored the political, cultural, social, and scientific context of post-war Spain, for instance, by vindicating Spain’s role in Africa and following a notion of science in which biology and culture walked hand-in-hand. Some central aspects have been emphasised, such as the biological nature of culture, the keystone of the expedition’s anthropological doctrine. This principle implied that human beings could be objectified as both cultural and natural beings, just like any other object or piece of data. Objectification was an expression of colonial hierarchies, which allowed racial features to remain one of the pillars of social organisation.

For all of this, it can be argued that the Expedición Científica a los Territorios Españoles del Golfo de Guinea of 1948, sponsored by Dirección General de Marruecos y Colonias, is a clear exponent of the scientific and political-colonial worldview that prevailed in post-war Spain, which, among other things, helped to consolidate Spanish colonial power.