The idea of the family has long been explored by a number of disciplines –philosophy, sociology, anthropology, psychology, literary and cultural studies, among others—and it has predominantly been defined as a fundamental unit of society with both ethical and political implications, and a space for exploring human relationships and identities, as Hegel described the concept in The philosophy of life in 1820. In fact, the 19^th century stands as a crucial historical period for exploring the role of the family as an institution defined by intersubjective relationships and power dynamics, dominated by hierarchical structures and continuity between generations. The presidential theme of the 2026 meeting of the MLA is Family Resemblances, a philosophical idea introduced by Ludwig Wittgenstein in 1953 to argue that things which could be thought to be connected by one essential common feature may in fact be connected by a series of overlapping similarities, where no one feature is common to all the elements. This notion of the family as an inclusive but also complicated network of challenges and opportunities where the various resemblances between members of a family overlap but also separate the same members, will be at the center of this session.

In literary studies, the representation and construction of society necessarily includes the unit of the family where love, politics, ethics, biology, religion, marriage, children, gender, power, property and capital are all defining and predominant concepts. Benito Pérez Galdós, Spain’s best-known realist writer, explored the changing concept of family in his narrative works. These introduce the complexities of family relationships as metaphors to raise concerns about the political, social, economic, and religious situation of his time; to explore how social class influences these dynamics in 19^th-century Spain; to critique the prevailing ideology of domesticity; and to examine the different social backgrounds of characters and their experiences within the family.

By placing family at the center of debate, this panel proposes a “family reunion” in which members and presenters are connected by the analysis of the family in Galdós’ works as an essential unit of modern societies where identities are formed, individuals clash, and alternative family arrangements are proposed.

Rafael Núñez Rodríguez´s “Dinero, poder y enfermedad: La familia Bringas en el laberinto burgués” will open the panel with an analysis of the relationship between mother and daughter in La de Bringas (1884), where the sick girl is in desperate need of economic protection and care while her mother squanders the family savings. Núñez Rodríguez will explore this family relationship as a critique of bourgeois consumption and as a symbol of the impossibility of growth of the nation whose economic system, personified in the ailed body of the child, is doomed to fail.

Ana Mateos will draw our attention to Galdós’ fourth series of Episodios nacionales (1902-1906) to examine the Ansúrez family, introduced in the text as representative of the original Iberian, pre-Roman race. The construction of this family as a microcosm of Spain's political and ideological conflicts allows Galdós to reflect on the formation of the national identity through the internal diversity and contradictions within the family, where their distinct yet interrelated characteristics come to represent, Mateos argues, Galdós’ vision of Spain as a fragmented yet interconnected racial political community.

Denise Dupont’s “Spectral Sacraments and Tangential Families in La desheredada” will close the panel by employing a phenomenological approach to the role of the sacraments in Galdós La desheredada (1881). Dupont’s analysis of the sacraments will trace how these signs function as language games (Wittgenstein), being-in-the-world (Heidegger), and markers of belief in Galdós’s secular modernity (Charles Taylor). Dupont will argue that Galdós’ depiction of frustrated channels of grace establishes his familial connections to Wittgenstein, Heidegger, Taylor, and even the anti-modernist Pope Pius X.

In line with the 2026 Convention theme, these presentations and the subsequent discussion will invite presenters and audience alike to form familial connections around a common topic and will promise to mark a turning point in the Asociación Internacional de Galdosistas’ explorations and analysis of 19^th century Spanish society in general and the world of Benito Pérez Galdós and his contemporaries in particular.