‘THE RAIN IN SPAIN STAYS MAINLY IN THE PLAIN’

Abstract

As is known, ‘the rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain’ is a famous line from George Bernard Shaw's play, Pygmalion (1912), a witty and highly entertaining study of Victorian class distinctions and social conventions. Broadly speaking, my aim is to exploit the cultural credentials of both the work and its celebrated rhyme by using them as a rhetorical device from which to stake out the position of cultural studies within the Spanish university. The approach I will advance tries to take account of the principles listed by Cary Nelson in his cultural manifesto (1996, pp. 273–86), even though it derives more directly from the immediate conditions of higher education in Spain and specifically from my own experience as a university teacher. As I hope to demonstrate, several connections may be established between ‘the rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain’ and the difficulties that arise in trying to speak/write about cultural studies. Likewise, the rhyme as well as certain details in the comedy's plot can serve as useful cultural analogies for some of the ‘meta-problems’ faced by cultural studies in the Spanish context. And more crucially, the famous line can be put to use in the classroom as a helpful, eye-opening exercise for future cultural agents or ‘producers’ (Striphas, 1998: 457). I shall therefore move from problems of discourse, to inherent power structures and finally unto the actual practice of cultural studies.