Aurora González Artigao is an early-stage researcher specialized on the narrative of power in al-Andalus and the medieval Maghreb. Graduated in History and with a Master’s Degree on Medieval Hispanic Studies, in 2016 she started her PhD with a contract funded by the Spanish Ministry of Education under the supervision of Maribel Fierro (ILC-CSIC) at the Spanish National Research Council (Centro de Ciencias Humanas y Sociales, CSIC). Her dissertation is titled “From Saragossa to Murcia and Damascus: Extended perspectives on the Banū Hūd (11th-13th centuries)”. This work is a diachronic case study focused on an Andalusi lineage: the Banū Hūd, whose history extends throughout three centuries (11th-13th) and different geographical areas, starting with the Upper Border of al-Andalus. The analysis tries to cluster different periods of this lineage’s history, paying attention to the way in which the narrative sources reflect the family members’ political and religious formulations in fields as genealogy, legitimacy or religious doctrines. The main purpose of this study was to understand how diverse and complex visions surrounding the Banū Hūd were created and how the memory of this lineage was transmitted from the 11th century to later ager, such as the 16th century. 

From the beginning of the PhD, Aurora González was part of international research projects such as AMOI (Contextos locales y dinámicas globales: al-Andalus y el Magreb en el Oriente islámico) FFI2016-78878-R, or the The Balzan Seminar on the formation, maintenance, and failure of states in the Muslim world before 1800, coordinated by professors Michael Cook (Princeton University) and Antoine Borrut (University of Maryland).

Before and throughout the predoctoral contract, she had the opportunity of carrying out three research stays. The first one was right after finishing the Bachelor in History, a two-month stay in the Institut für Islamwissenschaft (Freie Universität Berlin) funded by Maribel Fierro and her Anneliese Maier Research Award (Alexander von Humboldt Foundation). The second stay was part of the FPU programme, funded by the Ministry of Education, a two-month stay in the University of Maryland under the supervision of the professor Antoine Borrut, specialist in memory studies in the field of the Islamic Studies. The networking resulting in this stay had as a product a close cooperation with the association of Middle East Medievalists, where Aurora González was board member (Graduate students’ representative) between 2018 and 2022. The third research stay was possible for the DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) funding. It was a competitive call and it allowed Aurora González to know better the German academic system. After defending the dissertation in April of 2022, Aurora González has been working as an associate professor in the University Isabel I of Burgos and out of the academic world. 

Currently, she holds a postdoctoral position Juan de la Cierva at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra, where she examines her previous research on narratives of power through the lenses of gender studies. Her project revolves around how masculinities are constructed in connection to governing or powerful positions in 11th century al-Andalus. She is also interested in non-binary subjectivities and has published an article on it: "González Artigao, A. (2024). Resolving Gender Ambiguity: An Initial Approach to Hermaphroditism in al-Andalus: The Case of the “Bearded Woman” of Tudela. Al-Masāq, 36(2), 163–175. https://doi.org/10.1080/09503110.2024.2317594”.