Under-fire history academy director faces sexism claim

Over 1,000 people, including 622 teachers from Valencia University, are supporting a campaign to demand the resignation of Gonzalo Anes, director of the Royal History Academy, over sexist statements he made in an interview with Papallones earlier this month.

For Anes, the sexism claims come on top of a public controversy over the recently published Diccionario Biográfico Español, a 50-volume compendium of biographies of relevant Spaniards, which is accused of inaccuracy and a right-wing bias. In it, Franco is not once described as a dictator; Luis Suárez, who wrote that entry, was for years the only researcher given access to the Francisco Franco Foundation archive.

Anes, 77, told Papallones that the Academy lacks women, but that "a historian needs many hours for archive research. And alas, for women those thousands of hours are spent raising their children and being housewives."

The Valencia professors are asking university rector Esteban Morcillo to take up their protest with the Conference of Spanish University Rectors. Another 10 universities have expressed support for the motion.