Feeding the City and Making the Revolution: Women and Urban Agriculture in Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939)

The everyday difficulties faced by working-class women, including access to food, are aggravated in critical periods, such as wars and economic crises. However, the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) was accompanied by a revolution, in the Republican zones, where women opened spaces for their emancipation. By examining social reproduction practices surrounding food in Barcelona during the years 1936-1939, we contribute to critical research on food sovereignty in the urban contexts. Our core findings inform the role of women in food provision and production, through individual subsistence agriculture, involvement in Barcelona's anarcho-syndicalist agricultural collective, as well as in agriculture education and training programmes. Our research is based on original archival data, historical press and interviews with witnesses of the war. We conclude that revolutionary and transformative actions, including current food sovereignty practices, need to make gender justice a central goal.