Join us to celebrate with a good tasting!
Two years of the Observatory of Mexico in Spain

Dr. Karina Pizarro Hernández
Professor-researcher and coordinator of the PhD in Social Sciences

December is the second anniversary of the Observatory of Mexico in Spain (ObsMex) based in Barcelona, whose main purpose is research, dissemination and training of human capital through the web.

It is a digital portal of great importance that hosts studies on Mexico, as well as of Mexicans living in Spain, and that has the substantivity and balance of great scope, besides being an excellent indicator of the exchange of knowledge between two nations of long intercultural history.

A month before its genesis, I was on a research stay in the city of Barcelona. It was at the presentation of the work Visions of Mexico in Spain (2018) that I met the author, José Ramón Santillán. A learned man and concerned about making known from the academic field the presence of Mexicans in the Iberian territory.

José Ramón has a degree in Journalism from the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico and a PhD in Political Science and a master's degree in Political and Social Theory from the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona. The month after that meeting, he made his dream a virtual reality by founding and directing the Observatory of Mexico in Spain. That literary evening among friends was joined by many more with the always pleasant amphitrony of Sonia García, the Veracruz journalist and cultural promoter, who invited us to various cultural gatherings and tastings at the BlibioMusiCineteca, which she runs on Vila i Vila street, in the Pueblo Sec neighborhood. From there was born a relationship half friendship and half academic, which focused on the objective of the Observatory, for which today I am happy to boast.

A link of opportunity

The Observatory is an academic, cultural, economic and political digital window that aims to make known the media image of our country to the world, but above all the solid relationship between Mexico-Spain, under three guiding principles: a) the image projected by the country; b) the cultural power of the Mexican, and c) the dynamics of the Aztec community in Spain.

The above, through our own research, the dissemination of other academic contributions, as well as consulting and linking projects to promote studies in this binational relationship.

First-class collaborators

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Throughout its first two years, the ObsMex work and research team has been joined by great talents from different latitudes. We first introduce Kenia del Orbe Ayala, PhD in Political Communication and professor at the Universidad Rey Juan Carlos. She has participated with the Center for Municipal and Metropolitan Studies of the Facultad de Estudios Superiores Acatlán of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma Mexicana (UNAM).

Alberto Zuart Garduño holds a degree in Political Science from the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey. A CONACYT Fellow in 2017, he received his PhD (Cum Laude) from the Complutense University of Madrid. He is the author of the book Adiós democracia de partidos? A look from political communication and public opinion.. He is currently a research professor at the Instituto de Investigaciones Jurídicas of the Universidad Autónoma de Chiapas.

Gabriela Lozano Venegas is a specialist in social networks with English studies in London and San Francisco. She has been living in Barcelona for the past three years where she collaborates with Mexican migrant groups.

Marina Acosta, PhD in Social Sciences from the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina; Master in Communication from the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City and member of the Latin American School of Social Sciences (FLACSO) in Spain. She is the author of a dozen scientific articles on communication and public opinion.

As special contributor is Diego Gómez Pickering, internationalist from the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM). Correspondent for Sub-Saharan Africa for the Mexican weekly Proceso. He holds a Master's degree in Cultural Development from Columbia University in New York, United States, and a Master's degree in Development Journalism from the Indian Institute of Mass Communication in New Delhi, India. He was Ambassador of Mexico to the United Kingdom and Consul General in New York. Finally, journalist Margarita Morales has been collaborating as an analyst for the past two months.

Mexico through the eyes of the media

Given the profile of its members, the central and constant theme of the team's research is the critical study of Mexico's presence among the most widely circulated newspapers in the Iberian Peninsula.

Hence the publication of the book Mexico, en la prensa catalana (Mexico, in the Catalan press) (2017)and three consecutive editions of exhaustive reports on the same subject, but contextualized to the historical moment of recent years.

From 2012 to 2018 they analyzed the six-year term of Peña Nieto in Spanish newspapers. The second Report addressed the presence and image of Mexico during 2019. Finally, they reflected on the first year of López Obrador's government.

In addition to these results, a variety of articles, papers and book chapters were presented, in which the results of statistical data on Mexican immigration and the cultural contributions of filmmakers in the Spanish context, among many other topics, were presented.

Under an agile design of its website, the dissemination of research work can also be found under the podcast format. It is highly recommended and very pleasant to listen to Gabriela Lozano, who addresses a wide range of topics, ranging from the presence of Mexico in the Prince Asturias and Alfaguara awards, through gastronomy, financial investments and the Day of the Dead, to talk about Mexican soccer players in the Spanish league. As he says in one of his contributions "Let's talk about Mexico and Spain, encounters and misunderstandings".

Academic contributions

The second main objective of the Observatory is the dissemination of other academic contributions, always within the general framework of the Mexico-Spain relationship. Hence, the excellent selection of academic texts by various authors that give us access to an important repository of Ibero-Mexican studies. All of them add up to 14 books, 20 articles, six research reports, 36 academic articles, 15 theses, plus nine papers.

It is truly an extremely important compilation that paves the way for documentary research for both specialists and the general public. We invite you to immerse yourselves in this very interesting offer of materials.

As a final goal, there is the formation of human capital by providing advice and links for the design and development of research work. We also provide specialized methodology workshops in communication, journalism and political science, as well as training in the handling of statistical data through the tool known as SPSS.

Visit the Observatory website

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This pandemic year prevented me from returning to enjoy in person the talks, research plans and cultural events with friends in the Catalan capital. Unfortunately, my research stay in those places was cancelled. Having started to investigate, three years ago, the Mexican population in Barcelona has been really a very pleasant satisfaction.

So I invite scholars and the general public to explore a part of this great world of Mexicans in Spain through the website of the Observatory of Mexico in Spain.

Lose yourself in the nooks and crannies of its tabs to read, see and listen to the great offer of Hispanic American research that it provides. We encourage you to participate and initiate research in this great vein of research and frontier. Connect https://www.obsmex.com/ and start your tour from the multicolored mosaic terrace of the characteristic Park Güell, by the incomparable and unmistakable Gaudí, the image with which he welcomes us.