Laia Gallego Vila

Laia Gallego Vila is a pre-doctoral researcher (FI-DGR) at the Contemporary History Section of the Universitat de Barcelona, with a degree in Archaeology (2015, Universitat de Barcelona) and a Master in Contemporary History and the Modern World (2017, Universitat de Barcelona and Universitat Oberta de Catalunya), specialising in the archaeology of the contemporary past. In the field of the Civil War, she has researched the destruction and material damage caused by the bombings, as well as the influence of materiality in the construction and transmission of traumatic memories. She is also currently researching industrialisation and domesticity in contemporary societies, specifically abandoned rural villages, industrial colonies and shantyism.
Her research interests revolve around the role of materiality in the construction of memory and its potential as a resource for the transmission of memory and for education. She has taken part in international projects in the field of European historical memory. In 2019 she participated in (Re)viewing european stories, an educational pilot project for the interdisciplinary promotion of historical thinking and European memory formed by Euroclio, EUScreen and European Network Remembrance and Solidarity. In 2017 she participated as a young researcher in the In Between Project on oral memory at European borders, coordinated by European Network Remembrance and Solidarity. She has participated in Civil War archaeology projects in different teams in Spain.

Main publications:

- Gallego-Vila, L. (2019) Edificis ferits: un estudi històrico-arqueològic dels bombardeigs de Barcelona, 16a edición del premio de la Societat Catalana d’Arqueologia: Memorial Josep Barberà i Farràs.
- Gallego-Vila, L.; Solé, Q. (2021) “Spain’s Valley of the Fallen, Where Human Remains Disappear: A Funerary Monument for a Dictator”, Journal of Contemporary Archaeology, 7.2, 227–242.
- Solé, Q.; Gallego-Vila, L. (2021) “Repressed Bodies as a Research Topic: Archaeology, Memory and Political Uses”, Journal of Contemporary Archaeology, 7.2, 149-150.
- González Vazquez, D.; Gallego-Vila, L.; Serrano Jimenez, M. (2020) “Herramientas didácticas para la transmisión de la memoria oral: La experiencia “In between?”” Conference paper, 4th – International Virtual Conference on Educational Research and Innovation (CIVINEDU).
- Gallego-Vila, L.; Solé, Q. (2019) “The impacts of the German and Italian bombings in Barcelona”, en llibre col·lectiu Nazis in the Basque Country and Catalonia, Center for Basque Studies, University of Nevada, Reno (USA).
- Gallego-Vila, L. (2017) “Els bombardeigs de Barcelona durant la Guerra Civil: historiografia i memorialització”, Índice Histórico Español (ISSN en línea: 2339-6989), 130.