Digital Humanities and the Presence of Female Characters in Spanish Golden Age Comedia

Abstract

This article showcases how Digital Humanities projects, such as the Rolecall, DICAT and CATCOM databases and the EMOTHE digital library, can enrich the analysis of the stage dynamics in the Spanish comedia during the late 16th and early 17th centuries, coinciding with the career span of its most prominent standard-bearer, Lope de Vega. In particular this essay focuses on the presence and the protagonism of female characters, and examines the factors that helped shape the fluctuating gender dynamics of the early modern stage.