He studied Industrial Engineering in Madrid (1959-1967), translation in Barcelona (1969-1974) and a PhD in History in Santiago de Compostela (1987). He is currently a professor of Contemporary History at the USC (University of Santiago de Compostela), of which he was vice-rector (1990-1994). He was a co-founder of the Museo do Pobo Galego and is the current president of its Governing Board. He is a founding member of the Castelao Foundation and director of the political thought section of the Vicente Risco Foundation. He participated in the creation of the magazines Negaciones (Madrid, 1977), A Trabe de Ouro (Santiago, 1990) and Tempos Novos (Santiago, 1997). He retired in the year 2012.

Specialized in the history of ideologies and nationalisms, he was editor of the works of Losada Diéguez, Ramón Villar Ponte, Peña Novo, Castelao and Vicente Risco. He organized and co-edited the proceedings of the Nationalisms and Regionalisms in Restoration Spain (1983), Castelao (1986), Nationalisms in Spain of the Second Republic (1988), and Nationalisms in Europe conferences. Past and Present (1993) and Memory and Identity (2004).