University of Liverpool: Manuel Irujo Lecture 2021

On February 10th the Manuel Irujo Chair will host a lecture entitled ‘Liverpool Basques and the Spanish Colonial Project: from Mundaka to Manila (via the Mersey)’ led by Kirsty Hooper from the University of Warwick. The event will begin at 3pm UK time.

In the second half of the nineteenth century, a dense network of social, economic and maritime connections bound Liverpool to the port cities of the Hispanic world. Among the many Anglo-Hispanic merchant and maritime companies based in the city, the largest and most prominent was Olano, Larrinaga & Co., founded in 1862 by three Basque businessmen: Ramón de Larrinaga, José Antonio de Olano, and Juan Bautista de Longa. Prof Hooper will talk about the role that Liverpool’s Basque community played in the Spanish colonial project in the Philippines, tracing the connections binding both company and community to Manila during the company’s most active, profitable and controversial period. Hooper will also take a look at the bitter controversies the company’s ambition generated back in Spain.

You can follow the conference online. A username (915 0794 5889) and a password (Zm9vB#hU) will be required.

Professor Kirsty Hooper is a specialist in Spanish, Anglo-Spanish and Galician cultural history since 1800. Her particular interests include the global nineteenth century, mobility, genealogies, and microhistories. Her books include ‘The Edwardians and the Making of a Modern Spanish Obsession’, ‘Mondariz-Vigo-Santiago: A Brief History of Galicia’s Edwardian Tourist Boom’ and ‘Writing Galicia into the World: New Cartographies, New Poetics’. She is currently completing work on a book about Liverpool Basques and the Spanish Colonial Trade.

The Manuel Irujo Fellowship was created in 2015 to promote the study of Basque exile. The programme runs every year by a joint collaboration between the Etxepare Basque Institute and the University of Liverpool.