Cultura, estética y práctica deportiva de las mujeres catalanas durante el primer franquismo (1939-1961)

This research aims to analyze and compare the life histories of 32 Cata-lan women and their perceptions about the influences of cultural and aesthetic conditions that prevailed doing physical activities and sports in Catalonia during the first stage of the Franco dictatorship (1939 -1961), especially during the postwar period and its progressive evolution to the weakening of the regime. To address this study, we use oral history as historiographical method and technique. Subsequently, a con-tent analysis of information obtained from computer support software at-las.ti 7 has been conducted. Based on deductive and inductive methods, we have identified several categories of analysis that have enabled us to build a story about women's experiences in sports during the first stage of the Franco dictatorships. The interviewed voices refer to the low visibility of women's sport in the context of Spanish Catholicism considered as an ally of Franco, highly influenced by more traditional and orthodox Catholic Church, which limited women's sport. The ideological discourse of the regime based on religious, scientific, medi-cal and educational arguments pre-sented an ideal model of woman who got away from the practice of sport and physical activity. The perception of esthetic and body stereotypes dur-ing the dictatorial period is refer-enced by the athletes, which refer to a closely related feminine vision to the perception of the body, the role culturally assigned and the use of modest clothing that affected the de-velopment of their sports practices between 1939 and 1961.