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Racism in Spain

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Historical roots

Limpieza de sangre

During the Spanish Inquisition, the descendants of Jews and Muslims were targeted the most. This policy was called Limpieza de sangre (Blood Cleansing). Even after a Jew or a Muslim (Muwallad, an Arab or a Berber) converted to Christianity, the contemporary Spanish authorities referred to them and their descendants as New Christians, and as a result, they were the targets of popular and institutional discrimination and they were also the targets of suspicion by the Spanish Inquisition. New Christians of Muslim heritage were referred to as moriscos, meaning Moor-like. Those of Jewish heritage were termed Conversos and those who secretly continued to practice Judaism were referred to as marranos (either from the Spanish word marrar which means "to err/deviate" or from the Spanish word marrano which means "swine"). After the Reconquista, many Mudéjars (individual Moors, who remained in Iberia after the Christian Reconquista but were not converted to Christianity) remained in Spain as practicing Muslims and Sephardic Jews were required to convert to Catholicism or leave the country in 1492. Attitudes towards Moriscos varied in different regions, but they were never the main targets of the Inquisition. A few decades after the War of the Alpujarras, during which the Muslim-majority population of Granada rebelled, the King of Spain ordered the Expulsion of the Moriscos from Spain, which was successfully implemented in the eastern region of Valencia and was less successfully implemented in the rest of Spain. While Medieval persecutions of Jews and Muslims were aimed at converting or eliminating non-Christians, limpieza de sangre was linked to the ancestry of the new Christians, regardless of their fervor or their lack of it.

Enslavement of Africans

During the Late Middle Ages and during the Modern era, a small number of Sub-Saharan Africans were captured or bought and sold as slaves. The slaves who were born in Sub-Saharan Africa were called bozales. Their descendants were called Black Ladinos because they had a better command of the Spanish language. During the Spanish colonization of the Americas, the territories which were inhabited by Native Americans were massively depopulated as a result of mass genocide, Old World illnesses and the hardships which were caused by the conquest and the exploitation which followed it. Sub-Saharan African slaves were taken to the Indies as laborers. Initially, they were taken from Spain and later, they were taken from Sub-Saharan Africa. Today, the descendants of these enslaved black people still populate the former Spanish colonies and as a result, they constitute a major community within the African diaspora.

Gran Redada

The project of «extermination» of the Gitanos, the descendants of Romani people who arrived to Spain in the late Middle Ages, was known as the Gran Redada (Great Roundup). Gypsies lived a nomadic lifestyle and were blamed for crime by the sedentary population. The raid was authorized and organized by the Spanish Monarchy and led to the arrest of most Roma in the region and the genocide of 12,000 Romani people. Although a majority were released after a few months, many spent several years imprisoned and subject to forced labor.

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