INTRODUCTION

Women and discourses on peace. Origins and transformations in Western societies.

The aim of this project is to analyze the following: the origin of the conceptualization and representation of peace as a woman since the early days of Western society (i.e., the classical world and Christianity); the evolution, projection and consolidation of this notion at another key period of Western culture (i.e., the Renaissance and Humanism); and the adoption and transformation of discourses on peace by women when they started to take the floor in public and evolved from being mere representations and symbols of patriarchal discourses to being active creators of discourses on peace.

This implies exploring the various ways in which women have been depicted as representing peace both in written texts and artistic manifestations; it also involves analyzing the reasons that have led women to become active creators of discourses on peace as well as their strategies and different ways of thinking about and expressing peace.

The start of our research is based on the theoretical principles that associate women and peace at the origins of Western culture through the goddesses of Peace and concepts such as mediation, abundance and fecundity, among others. We explore the concept and representation of Peace in early Christianity, with a special focus on the worldviews of orthodox and heterodox authors and their perceptions on how to reach inner peace through a feminine discourse and mindset. We analyze the adoption and reconceptualization of the link between women and peace at the end of the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance and especially the appearance of the first texts authored by women who thought and wrote about peace.

In this regard, we consider how peace was understood in the enlightened and romantic contexts of the 19th century and, particularly, the time when women took the floor as a group, acquired political and social prominence and created their own discourses on peace. At this stage we focus on acknowledging and exploring the ideas about peace of Spanish women in the 20th century and their different ways of thinking about it and representing it.

This journey ends with the study of the discourses on peace of female avant-garde artists as well as the image of women in pacifist narrations during the Spanish Civil War and the messages of peace of female artists in exile.

This is all intended to include the feminist and gender approach and the perspective of research on peace in the analysis of the creation and transformation of discourses on peace in Western societies, thus contributing to more inclusive, innovative and reflective societies. This type of analysis opens up new horizons and changes traditional approaches in the study of History, Philosophy and Arts, with consequences for the development of democratic citizenship.