Gender in Abya Yala Part 1

gender roles

“all of those things that a person says or does to disclose himself or herself as having the status of boy or man, girl or woman”

gender

refers to social behavior and identify, which may or may not have biological sex

performativity

• the idea that gender is “act” that is “performed”

• from “___” in lingustics

• critiques of agency

iterability

• identifies (gender, race, ethnicity) are the products of a large number of small, often unconscious acts

• each ___ reinforces or undermines a particular identity

intersectionality

a framework to understand how social and political identites overlap to produce unique combinations of discrimination and privileges

parallelism

the independent development of similar physical traits, cultural pratices, or social structures in different human populations or linages that share a common ancestry or face similar environmental pressure

complemterity

• two halves “constituting a whole”

• the sense taht man and women complement each other to produce effects in concert that are different from those produced separately

mesoamerican gender

they thought was based around several binary oppositions, including men/women and mother/father

Mayan Moon Goddess

• historian Pete Sigal suggests that the Mayan Moon goddess was a bi-erotic figure portrayed in the Dresden Codex

• the text states that the Moon goddess could engage in sexual acts with those whom she desired, regardless of gender

costal ecuador

• figures were produced in __ __ for more than 5000 years

• some include representations that seem to be of nonbinary or transgender people

gender and empire

the expansion of the Aztec and Inka empire, as well as incessant warfare among Maya states, tilted complementarily and parallelism towards gender hierarchy

Aclla

was a symbolically important class of young, virgin and holy woman

• the most beautiful selected as sacrifies to Inti (male sun deity)

• given in marriage, or worked as producers of luxury goods, weaver, or in ritual food preparation

sexuality, marriage and power

• precolombian societies had different sexual more than Europe

• in mesoamerican and Andean societies, a period of martial cohalbilation or trial marriages were common

  • monogamy was preferred by nonelities

  • polygynous marriage allowed elites to deepen political and economic alliances

• ritualized bisexualty was common, especially for male elites