The International Congress ‘María de la O Lejárraga (1874-1974) and the Silver Age’ will be held on November 28 and 29 in San Millán de la Cogolla and Logroño. The Minister of Culture, Tourism, Sports and Youth, José Luis Pérez Pastor, the general coordinator of the San Millán de la Cogolla Foundation, Almudena Martínez, the academic director of the IER, Pepa Castillo, and the director of the congress, Juan Aguilera, have released the details.
A meeting that arises, as Pérez Pastor has highlighted, with two main objectives: “to update the recovery work already carried out on the legacy of one of the fundamental pillars of Spanish culture of the 20th century and to open new paths to researchers not only interested in for the figure of María Lejárraga, but also for the very interesting context in which she developed her activity and for the women who were part of it. Of that Silver Age whose history has yet to be precisely defined in its true terms.”
The Congress will commemorate the 150th anniversary of the birth of the writer María Lejárraga, on December 28, 1874 in the Riojan town of San Millán de la Cogolla, as well as the 50th anniversary of her death in Buenos Aires, on June 28, 1974. A meeting that, as Aguilera has confirmed and endorses the title of the congress, “we do not want it to be limited only to her, but also to her context, to all the activities, personalities and events that surround her figure and that, therefore, “They allow us to better understand the greatness and importance it has both in La Rioja and outside.”
Under the direction of Juan Aguilera Sastre, Teresa Cascudo García-Villaraco and Rebeca Lázaro Niso, in addition to the specific study of the life and work of María Lejárraga, the Congress, organized by the San Millán Foundation and the Institute of Rioja Studies, will be structured in around three monographic lines. On the one hand, as Aguilera has outlined, “the role of women in the public space where professionalization will be deepened. The role of women in journalism, feminism, political commitment in the Silver Age, spaces of female sociability and arts. Furthermore, with the title ‘Sons of Paper’, the meeting will analyze the theatrical and literary work written by women in the Silver Age, including approaches that adopt a gender approach.” Likewise, the congress will serve to establish networks of artists and collaborative works such as epistolary relations, inter-artistic collaborations, playwriting and production of theatrical shows, cinema or translation work.
The congress will feature Juan Aguilera himself as speakers; to Alda Blanco from the University of San Diego in California; Teresa Cascudo García-Villaraco, from the University of La Rioja and researcher at the IER; Enrique Fuster del Alcázar, from the Gregorio Martínez Sierra and Catalina Bárcena Archive; Antonio González Lejárraga, from the María Lejárraga Archive; María Luz González Peña, from the Documentation, Archive and Heritage Center (CEDOA), of the SGAE; IER researcher Isabel Lizarraga Vizcarra; Iris Lobo Muñiz, from the University of Oslo; Pilar Nieva de la Paz and María Francisca Vilches de Frutos, from the CSIC; and Emilio Peral Vega and María Dolores Romero López, from the Complutense University of Madrid.
As for the Scientific Committee, it will be made up of Carlos Alvar (CILENGUA), Iris Fernández Muñiz (University of Oslo), Isabel Lizarraga Vizcarra (IER), Pilar Nieva de la Paz (CSIC), Emilio Peral Vega (UCM), María Dolores Romero López (UCM) and María Francisca Vilches de Frutos (CSIC).
As Martínez has detailed, “people interested in participating with a communication in the congress must send a summary of it (maximum 300 words) before May 15 through the form that can be found on the website www.cilengua.es which details the different ways to participate in the congress.
