Conclusion

This book attempts to study feminist, queer, indigenous, and other practices of resistance to dominant power structures. We explore diverse themes ranging from the resistance of Zapatista women to the representation of Latinas in US media. It is our hope that these essays may reflect both the diversity of the Latin American region and the common threads between movements. The following is a brief summary of each essay.

Resistance in Everyday Life: Care Work

In this section, we explore how feminist movements are combating gender inequalities in domestic and care work. We felt it was important to start here because of the significant amount of time and mental energy such labor takes up for the majority of Latin American women.

Coruh investigates how COVID-19 exacerbated women’s burden of domestic care and how social movements and intergovernmental organizations responded. Due to the pandemic, the focus shifted away from physical gatherings and towards media and outreach strategies. Although there remains much work to be done in the adoption, recognition, and implementation of policies, social movements and intergovernmental organizations were successful in compelling governments in Ecuador, Cuba, Argentina and Uruguay to adopt measures lessening the toll of care work on women.

Groom examines the lack of reproductive rights and the gender-based pay inequity in rural Ecuador. He highlights the success of strategies such as collecting testimonios of women subjected to unfair reproductive and labor structures and disseminating those stories through media such as Nuestra Palabra.

Resistance in Everyday Life: Media and Entertainment

In the following section, we turn to an analysis of media and entertainment, exploring both the representation of Latina women in US media and the creations of Latin American artists. These essays highlight the role of media in shaping how women are perceived and perceive themselves. The authors offer visions of what more transformative media and art could look like.

Gill analyzes the portrayal of Latina women in US media, focusing on how popular TV shows hypersexualize and exoticize Latinas. This reproduction of harmful stereotypes is dehumanizing and serves to justify unequal power relations in society. Gill demonstrates that negative media representation of Latinas supports public policies that harm Latinas, such as cuts in welfare benefits and social services to the undocumented. In addition, oversexualization in the media leads to higher rates of sexual violence against Latina women. She emphasizes the importance of expanding representation to include more stories that showcase Latinas’ full complexity and humanity.

DeForest provides a refreshing example of what positive media representation can look like in his examination of the TV show One Day at a Time. He highlights how the show tackles issues of gender, sexuality, and power in relationships among Cuban Americans through its construction of the relationships between Elena, Lydia and Penelope. This show opens the door for expanded media positive representation of Latinas.

Ali offers an example of positive media creation by analyzing the music of Renata Flores. Flores is an indigenous Peruvian woman who raps in Quechua and focuses on the untold stories of female figures in Peruvian history. Her music works to combat the loss of Quechua and instills pride in the identities of being indigenous and female, taking part in a collective resistance identity.

Resistance Through Social Movements: The Latin American Feminist Movement

While the first two parts of the book focused on resistance within everyday life, in terms of both care work and media and entertainment, the second two parts of the book explore how groups have come together to resist patriarchy and colonialism through social movements. This section explores movements that define themselves as feminist.

Weidner analyzes the trends and tensions in the 21st century Latin American feminist encuentros. He traces debates over institutionalization, autonomy, globalization, and representation to demonstrate their critical importance to Latin American feminist movements. In order to move forward, he suggests, feminists need to make space for diversity of opinion, but above all, they must center the voices of the most marginalized within their midst.

Guaman provides a great example of what feminist movements can look like in practice by studying the “green wave” or “marea verde” of feminist activists who have fought to legalize and ensure access to safe abortions. She highlights the importance of coalition building and forming relationships between movements and the state, especially in the face of active resistance from the Catholic and Evangelical churches.

Butler examines how the Haitian feminist movement was impacted by the 2010 earthquake, exposing how the lack of women’s power in decision-making about foreign aid allocation worsened structural inequalities that disproportionately affect women. His paper underscores both the importance and shortcomings of feminists in poor countries working with foreign governments and intergovernmental organizations.

Goldfarb highlights the power of conscientización in the movement against patriarchal authoritarianism in Chile. She traces how feminist understandings of patriarchy as a matrix operating at all levels of life were disseminated to the public through consciousness-raising meetings. That concientización combined with hybrid state-society relationships created positive change for feminists and democracy. Goldfarb’s case study of Chilean feminism demonstrates how important feminist understandings of power are in the fight against authoritarianism and patriarchy worldwide.

Resistance Through Social Movements: Third Genders, Indigenous Women, and Racial Discrimination in Latin America

In this section, we focus on social movements which cannot necessarily be identified as feminist but which are fighting their own struggles against the hegemonic gender system. Specifically, we examine social movements specific to “third genders,” indigenous women, and racial discrimination. We wanted to end with this to emphasize the importance of these groups, which can often be marginalized within mainstream feminist movements.

In “Resistance and Resilience of Brazilian Travestis,” the author documents how travestis resist patriarchal and queer-fobic culture through organizing protests and direct actions, civic organizations, and taking demands to the  judicial system. The strength and victories of travesti organizing, which come in spite of severe violence, can serve as an important guide for social movements that serve all marginalized people.

In “Transformation and Liberation: Women in the EZLN,” the author explores the relationship between Zapatista women and feminism. While these women are deeply committed to the transformation of systems around them, including the gender system, and have worked with and inspired indigenous feminist movements, they do not identify with feminism themselves. To identify them as such would reinforce colonial misunderstandings of indigenous communities. This piece is an important addition to previous essays that emphasize feminist unity and consciousness; it shows that there are other ways for marginalized groups to enact transformative change that might be better suited to their needs.

Skigen examines another aspect of indigenous identity that is often misrepresented through a Western lens: what we might call gender deviance. Focusing on the case of the Zapotec Muxes from the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Mexico, Skigen demonstrates how indigenous understandings of gender are often forced into a colonial binary worldview. This case highlights the importance of understanding people through their own lens, which may require recognizing what we cannot understand.

In the final essay, Urfig examines the historical relationship between the United States, the Dominican Republic, and Haiti to demonstrate how US imperial involvement has created and perpetuated racialized hatred and border patrol. Although specific to these three countries, the case study is reflective of US involvement with other Latin American countries in the 20th century. Urfig’s essay addresses the reasons that certain histories go untold, which is a relevant conclusion to our series of essays on marginalized groups within Latin America.

A Final Note

The topics treated here were many and diverse, but it is our hope that we have illuminated the connections between them. This book attempts to tell the stories of the “forgotten continent,” focusing on groups who challenge dominant power relations. We hope that the practices of resistance and organizing studied here may be a guiding light to social movements in the US and across the world.