Introductory Remarks

The digital exhibit "Reframing the Colonial Library: Equatorial Guinea Archives in the Museum" engages with the country's colonial library. Following the approach of Benita Sampedro Vizcaya, the re-evaluation of the colonial library demands “dislocating the traditionally central and privileged role of metropolitan texts and neo-colonial discourses in order to engage, instead, with the cultural and intellectual production of Guinean intellectuals themselves (341).” The project embraces her emphasis on re-locating canonical texts and privileged categories of analysis such as race, capitalism, empire, or nation. This way, the exhibit attempts to reconfigure, appropriate, transform, and transgress the colonial, historical, and linguistic inheritance of which 'the local' is also a conduit, as explained by Sampedro Vizcaya. The revision of the colonial library requires “awareness of the power of those sites, not only in terms of the day-to-day functioning of the empire-colony relationship but also in regard to the epistemic and representational weight they carry in broader cultural and political practices and projects, both colonial and neocolonial (343).” This way, the exhibit turns “to the potential of the archive and the colonial library as sites from which the seemingly irreversible power of colonialism can simultaneously be enacted and contested (343).”

This exhibit is divided into three parts, chronologically interconnected, that cover Equatorial Guinean colonial and neocolonial history. The sections are: "The Temptation of Empire", “Neocolonial Politics in the Museum and Conflicting Identities in Eguatorial Guinea" and “Alternative Conservation and Heritage Practices in Equatorial Guinea. The Case of the Museum Felipe Osá Angüé." This organization aims to deconstruct visitors' perception of the colonial archive and its uses from a transhistorical and global angle. Each section addresses the ideological uses of the archive both in the metropolis and the former colony, questioning the Spanish civilizational mission that still persists beneath the language of institutional collaboration and modernization in cultural spaces.

The completion of this digital project has been made possible through the 2024 Mellon Doctoral Summer Fellowship awarded by the Price Lab for the Digital Humanities at the University of Pennsylvania. The exhibition portal will be available indefinitely thanks to the support of Van Pelt Libraries.

Bibliography:

Sampedro-Vizcaya, Benita. "Rethinking the Archive and the Colonial Library: Equatorial Guinea." Journal of Spanish Cultural Studies, vol. 9, no. 3, 2008, pp. 341-363.

The Instituto de Estudios Africanos (IDEA) in the Spanish Guinea

Title: The Instituto de Estudios Africanos (IDEA) in the Spanish Guinea
Subject: Colonial Science in Equatorial Guinea during Francoism
Description: The Instituto de Estudios Africanos (IDEA), founded in 1945, was a Spanish institution dedicated to the study and promotion of African cultures, histories, and geographies, primarily to support and legitimize Spain's colonial ambitions in Africa, particularly in Equatorial Guinea. Active until the end of the colonial regime, IDEA conducted and published extensive research portraying Spanish colonialism as a civilizing mission. The IDEA brought together scientists from different disciplines and fields—such as geology, ethnology, archaeology, medicine, history, and law—and other colonial ‘experts’ such as missionaries or generals, seasonally commissioned for specific scientific expeditions.

The institute was run by a combination of academics, colonial administrators, and policymakers who were aligned with Francoist ideologies. Notable figures included scholars such as historian and Africanist Julio Caro Baroja, who contributed to the ethnographic and cultural studies promoted by IDEA. The institution played a significant role in creating and disseminating knowledge that supported the colonial narrative, influencing both colonial policy and public perception in Spain regarding its African territories.

In summary, the institute’s aim was to create ‘total knowledge’ about the colonies from a ‘plurality of angles.’ Visual elements were crucial for audiences’ intellectual and emotional activation regarding their 'expository science'. This institute served as a hub for scholars and officials who produced extensive studies on African societies, resources, and environments, framing them within a narrative of Spanish benevolence and developmentalism. The institute's publications and activities were crucial in maintaining the ideological support for colonial rule within Spain, portraying the colonial project as a scientific and civilizing endeavor.
Creator: Alexis Hernando Cubas
Source: Díaz de Villegas, José. ‘Labor del Instituto de Estudios Africanos’, África, 3a época, 85, 1949, pp. 2–6.

Stehrenberger, Cécile S. "Science Images and Colonialism in Equatorial Guinea." Bulletin of Spanish Visual Studies, vol. 6, no. 2, 2022, pp. 239-258.
Publisher: Price Lab for the Digital Humanities
Date: 2024
Rights: Creative Commons
Relation: Aixelà Cabré, Yolanda. Spain's African Colonial Legacies : Morocco and Equatorial Guinea Compared. Leiden: Brill, 2022.

Martin-Márquez, Susan. Disorientations : Spanish Colonialism In Africa and the Performance of Identity. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008.
Format: Digital Text
Language: English
Coverage: Spain, Equatorial Guinea

Original Format: photo

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Archivos del Instituto de Estudios Africanos. 3. Numero Extraordinario Abril 1948.jpg

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1. The Temptation of Empire

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Alexis Hernando Cubas, “The Instituto de Estudios Africanos (IDEA) in the Spanish Guinea,” Reframing Archives: Equatorial Guinea's Colonial Library, accessed November 3, 2026, https://hernando.upenn.domains/items/show/14.

Introductory Remarks

The Instituto de Estudios Africanos (IDEA) in the Spanish Guinea

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