Electric light and the visualization of Catholic power in Spain during the Restoration Era (1874-1931)

Bibliographic Data

ID3868025
AuthorsDaniel Pérez-Zapico (0000-0002-5751-3734, University of Leeds, corresponding author)
Year2021
Volume9
Issue2
Pages209-228
Publication date2021-08-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueCritical Research on Religion (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2050-3032 • E-ISSN: 2050-3040
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/20503032211015304
OpenAlexW3160520518
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited19

This article analyses the contested adoption of electric lights by the Spanish Catholic church during the Bourbon Restoration era (1874-1931). Through a careful reading of primary sources, namely Catholic popular magazines, and official documents, it will show how Catholic authorities and practitioners resisted, negotiated and, ultimately, engaged with electricity in religious spaces. The article argues that electric light contributed to wider exchanges in a non-monolithic Spanish Catholicism on the observance of traditional values or the possibilities of the church's modernization. However, amid a particularly tense moment regarding the secular-clerical relations, the systematic use of electric lights in churches at the turn of the twentieth century-but also in other public ceremonies-contributed to the making of religious sensations aimed at attracting new believers and reasserting the presence of the institution in a disputed public space

Institution · Modernization theory · Political science · Public space · Sociology · Engineering · Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis · Law · Religious Tourism and Spaces · Visual Culture and Art Theory

Tools

Open DOI