Help Spain by showing films. British film production for humanitarian aid during the Spanish Civil War

Laura López-Martín

doi:10.3989/chdj.2019.019

Authors

Laura López-Martín Universidad Rey Juan Carlos https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1532-5134

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.3989/chdj.2019.019

Keywords:

Refugees, Children, Great Britain, Cinematography, Propaganda, Aid, Solidarity

Abstract

The Spanish Civil War mobilised a wide spectrum of the British population, a mood which materialised in the despatch of humanitarian aid, mainly to republican Spain. To this end, there were meetings and rallies in which the use of film was customary. Films made it possible to show a different reality from that which appeared on the newsreels, provided an opportunity for fund-raising and showed the deployment and results of the aid received. The distribution of the films, and occasionally their production, was undertaken by progressive film organisations, close to the Communist party, which raised doubts vis-à-vis the real intentions of the humanitarian organisations.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Aldgate, Anthony (1979) Cinema & History. British Newsreels and the Spanish Civil War. Scolar Press, London.

Alpert, M. (1984) "La repuesta inglesa humanitaria y propagandística a la Guerra Civil Española", Revista de estudios internacionales, enero-marzo 5(1): 27-38.

Baxell, Richard (2012) Unlike warriors: the British in the Spanish Civil War and the struggle against fascism. Aurum, London.

Braskén, K. (2015) The International Workers' Relief, Communism and Transnational Solidarity. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.

Bruley, S. (1980) Socialism and Feminism in the Communist Party of Great Britain, 1920 - 1939. Thesis submitted for the degree of PhD, London School of Economics and Political Science, University of London.

Buchanan, Tom (1991) The Spanish Civil War and the British labour movement. University Press, Cambridge - New York. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511896149

Burton, Alan George (2000), The British Consumer Co-operative Movement and Film, 1896-1970. Thesis submitted for the degree of PhD. Montfort University.

Campbell, Russell (2004) "Film and Photo League: Radical Cinema in the 1930s". Jump Cut, 14: 23-25.

Crusells, Magí (2001) Las Brigadas Internacionales en la pantalla. Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, Ciudad Real.

Crusells, Magí (2003) La Guerra Civil española: Cine y propaganda. Ariel Cine, Barcelona.

Crusells, Magí (2004) El papel de las Brigadas Internacionales en el cine documental extranjero. Ayer 56 (4): 143-163.

Del Amo García, Alfonso and Ibañez Ferradas, María Luisa (1996) Catálogo general del cine de la guerra civil. Cátedra - Filmoteca Española, Madrid.

Dickinson, Thorold (1984) "Experiences in the Spanish Civil War, 1938". Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, 4(2):189-193. https://doi.org/10.1080/01439688400260181

Edwards, Ben (2013) With Good on our side: British Christian responses to the Spanish Civil War. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.

Faber, Sebastiaan (2010) "«L'atroç crim» d'ésser antifeixista. L'ajuda des dels Estats Units d'Amèrica als republicans espanyols". In Martínez Vidal, Àlvar (coord.) Exili, medicina i filantropía. L'Hospital Varsòvia de Tolosa de Llenguadoc (1944-1950). Editorial Afers, Barcelona: 37-49.

Faber, Sebastiaan (2016) "Image Politics: U.S Aid to the Spanish Republic and its Refugees". Forma: revista d'estudis comparatius: art, literatura, pensament, 14: 21-34.

Fyrth, J. (1986), The Signal was Spain. The Spanish Aid Movement in Britain, 1936-1939. Lawrence and Wishart, London.

Fyrth, J. (1993) "The Aid Spain Movement in Britain, 1936-39", History Workshop, 35: 153-164. https://doi.org/10.1093/hwj/35.1.153

García Fernández, Hugo (2006) "El turismo político durante la Guerra Civil: viajeros británicos y técnicas de hospitalidad en la España republicana 1936-1939", Ayer 64 (4): 287-308.

García Fernández, Hugo (2007) "Seis y media docena: propaganda de atrocidades y opinión británica durante la Guerra Civil Española". Hispania. Revista Española de Historia, vol. LXVII (236): 671-692.

García Fernández, Hugo (2008) Mentiras necesarias. La batalla por la opinión británica durante la Guerra Civil, Biblioteca Nueva, Madrid.

García Fernández, Hugo (2016). Transnational History: A New Paradigm for Anti-Fascist Studies? Contemporary European History, 25(4), 563-572. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0960777316000382

García López, Sonia (2013) Spain is us: La Guerra civil española en el cine Popular Front, 1936-1939. Publicacions de la Universitat de València, Valencia.

Gubern, Román (1986) La guerra de España en la pantalla. De la propaganda a la Historia. Filmoteca Española, Madrid. Hogenkamp, Bert (1976) "Film and the Workers' Movement in Britain, 1929-39", Sight and Sound; London, 45 (2).

Hogenkamp, Bert (1986) Deadly Parallels. Film and the left in Britain, 1929-39. Lawrence and Wishart, London.

Holmes, Rose (2019) "Make the situation real to us without stressing the horrors: children, photography and Humanitarianism in the Spanish Civil War". In Paulmann, Johannes Humanitarianism & Media, 1900 to the present, Berghahn New York-Oxford: 67-89.

Jackson, A. (2011) Las mujeres británicas y la Guerra Civil española. Universidad de Valencia, Valencia.

Jeger, George (1937) Medical Aid for Spain: The work of the Spanish medical Aid Committee. Spanish Medical Aid Committee, London.

Low, Rachel (1979) "Political Propaganda", The History of the British Film 1929-1939. Films of Comment and Persuasion of the 30s. George Allen & Unwin, London.

Mates, Lewis H. (2007) The Spanish Civil War and the British left: political activism and the popular front. London; Tauris Academic Studies, New York.

McNair, John (1936) In Spain Now! A first-hand Story of the Fight against Fascism and the use of Workers' Power for Socialism. London: Independent Labour Party. Maitland Sara Hallinan collection, Modern Records Centre (MRC), 15X/2/209/99.

Mendlesohn, Farah (2002) Quaker relief work in the Spanish Civil War. Edwin Mellen Press, Lampeter.

Norris Nicholson, Heather (2006) "Shooting in Paradise: Conflict, Compassion and Amateur Filmmaking during the Spanish Civil War". Journal of Intercultural Studies, 27 (3): 313-330. https://doi.org/10.1080/07256860600779329

Palfreeman, Linda (2012) ¡Salud!: British volunteers in the republic medical service during the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939. Sussex Academic Press, Brighton.

Palfreeman, Linda (2014) Aristocrats, Adventurers and ambulances. British Medical Units in the Spanish Civil War. The Cañada Blanch -Sussex Academic studies on contemporary Spain, Brighton.

Paulmann, Johannes (2019) Humanitarianism & Media, 1900 to the Present. Berghahn, Oxford.

Preston, Paul (2008), We Saw Spain Die: Foreign Correspondents in the Spanish Civil War. Constable and Robinson, London.

Ryan, Trevor (1986) Labour and the media in Britain 1929-1939. A study of the attitudes of the labour movement towards the new media, film and radio, and of its attempts to use them for political purposes. Thesis Leeds University, School of History.

Sánchez Alarcón, Inmaculada (2009) La Guerra Civil española y el cine francés. Amelia Romero, Barcelona.

Sánchez Dura, Nicolás (2007) Todos muertos. La guerra total imaginada. Guerra en la ciudad, 1936-1939. Colección Monreal-Cabrelles. Diputación de Valencia, Valencia.

Vance Kepley, Jr. (1983) "The Worker's International Relief and the Cinema of the Left, 1921-1935", Cinema Journal 23(1): 7-23. https://doi.org/10.2307/1225069