Community participation and community affirmation. Cultural Association ⟪El Corralón⟫, a case study

In recent years, a deterioration of the community feeling has been noticed due to factors such as the economic and health crisis. Thus, the main objective of this work is to verify whether the sense of community that an associative group presents overcomes these and other adversities through the feeling of belonging shown by its members. In a small municipality of "Empty Spain", Otones de Benjumea (Segovia), currently with barely 50 inhabitants, the Cultural Associ-ation "El Corralon" was informally created in 1976 with the aim of promoting culture for the personal and collective development of its associates and sym-pathizers. Through a case study, data are collected from the Association's own documentary archives, from participant observation and from 16 key informants to learn about the impact this entity among the population related to the munici-pality. The results analyzed indicate that the involvement of its associates is the social capital that has been the driving force behind its good functioning and that culture has become the most characteristic attribute of its proposals. Therefore, the Association has succeeded in being an instrument of community affirmation based on the recovery of heritage and memory, with distinctive attributes that give it identity traits with respect to other associative proposals.