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GENDER, WORK AND ORGANIZATION10th Biennial International Interdisciplinary Conference

14-16 June, 2018, Darling Harbour, Sydney, Australia

STREAMIndigenous Knowledge and Organization: Considering Experience, Practice and Methodology

INDIGENOUS AND DECOLONIAL FEMINISMS: ONCE EXISTED GENDER-NEUTRAL COMMUNITY ORGANIZATIONS?

Dra. Ana Guil-BozalDepartment of Social Psychology, University of Seville, SPAIN

http://grupo.us.es/generoysocdelcto/[email protected]

Dra. Ruby Espejo-LozanoPedagogical and Technological University of COLOMBIA

[email protected]


Guil & Espejo

INTRODUCTION

Really, there is no historical record of matriarchies –except mythological ones– but thereare matrilineal societies, that is, communities in which the line of ascription andinheritance was through the maternal route. For ex. the iroquois in North America, thechibchas in Colombia, the mosuo in China, or a multitude of African tribes.

All these vestiges contrast with the type of patriarchal "civilization" imposed by thecolonizers. In this sense, the so called de-colonial feminisms, delve into these questionssearching for indigenous communities in which gender was not an organizing principle, orat least that there were no gender inequalities.

My interest in indigenous knowledge emerged a fewyears ago, from the invitation to give a presentationon Feminist Epistemology in Jamaica.

When I found 99% of population Afro-descendant, I immediately changed my Europeandiscourse, introducing me intersectionally in the black feminisms and later, in thedecolonial and indigenous feminisms. And for me, it was a wonderful discovery.


Guil & EspejoFigure 2: Igbo warrior women

Hazel V. Carby -Professor of African-American Studies at Yale University (ofJamaican and Welsh parents), criticizes the universal assumptions of whitefeminism versus American, African and Asian feminism, based on theexperience of women who have been exploited, not so much by patriarchy,as by colonialism, who used them as a labor force, or prostituted them toservice of the occupation forces.

She analyzed the original strength of Igbo rural women inNigeria (1929) who fought for their rights, those of theAfrican population and against slavery, protesting againstlocal authorities that restricted their political participation.These protests were continued in 1938 and 1956 againsttax increases, and were finally repressed by the Britishgovernment, who imposed their Eurocentric sexist criteriato exclude women, who still largely remain.

Figure 1: Hazel V. Carby

DECOLONIAL FEMINISM VERSUS WHITE FEMINISM


Guil & Espejo

Figure 3: The Warrior Queens of Dahomeyhttp://atlantablackstar.com/2016/08/03/fearless-black-female-

warriors-of-dahomey-kingdom-get-live-action-series/

Certainly, since the seventeenthcentury, in the African West, therewas a female self-defense movementof the population decimated by slavehunts, formed by between twothousand and six thousand brave,disciplined and warrior women.Originally from the Fon tribe, theywere also known as the AmazonasDahomey, or the Mino warriors. Theyremained undefeated until 1894when France colonized the currentRepublic of Benin.

WOMEN WARRIORS AFRICAN

PERSPECTIVA DE GÉNERO EN LA CONSTRUCCIÓN

DEL CONOCIMIENTO CIENTÍFICO

WOMEN PIONEERS OF AFRICAN FEMINISM AGAINST COLONIALISM

Adelaide Casely Hayford (1868-1960) daughter of English

father and Creole mother, founded in 1923 a school for girls

inculcating cultural and racial pride in colonial Sierra Leone

(Fig.4)

Throughout history many African women protested against colonialism, sexism and racism,

vindicating their own culture:

Margaret Ekpo (1914-2006) was a political activist and

feminist, worked for the rights of women in Nigeria (Fig.5)

Noémia de Sousa (1926-2002), Mozambican writer who

praised the strength of black blood transmitted by mothers to

their mestizo daughters and sons (Fig.6)


Guil & EspejoFig. 6: Noémia

de Sousa

Fig. 4: AdelaideCasely Hayford

Fig. 5: Margaret Ekpo

Fig. 7: FatemaMernissi

Fatema Mernissi (1940-2015) writer, feminist and world

specialist in Quranic studies, in her publications she narrates

stories that break the archetypes about submissive and weak

Muslim women, claiming that Muhammad was a feminist

against the misinterpretation of many fundamentalists (Fig.7)



WOMEN PIONEERS OF AFRICAN FEMINISM AGAINST COLONIALISM


Guil & Espejo

Yvonne Vera (1964-2005) writer who addressed issues of proscription, poverty and

repression in Zimbabwe, with great sensitivity and courage. As a form of resistance to

colonial domination, she used Shona, a Bantu language with spelling and uncoded

grammar until the 20th century (Fig.8)

Fig. 8: YvonneVera

And many more women continue to fight in Africa against sexism and racism:

Fig. 9: Paulina Chiziane

Fig. 10: AmaAta Aidoo

Paulina Chiziane (Mozambique, 1955) expert in oral tradition,

technique with which she writes, published in 2002 Niketche, which

aroused great debate by investigating the current machismo,

analyzing the consequences of the intersection between polygamy,

colonization and evangelization (Fig.9).

Ama Ata Aidoo (Ghana, 1942) writer and international university

professor, was Minister of Education in her country in 1982. From a

decolonial position, she defends equality, dismantling in her

characters the stereotype of rural women. In 2000, she created the

Mbaasen foundation to promote and support the work of African

women (Fig.10).


Guil & Espejo

REINTERPRETING THE HISTORY: ORIGINALLY THERE WERE NO GENDER DISCRIMINATION

Oyèrónkẹ Oyěwùmí (Fig.11) is a Nigerian feminist, professor of Sociology in theUSA, author of an interesting monograph: The Invention of Women: Making anAfrican Sense of Western Gender Discourses (1997), "full of questions, with fewanswers and a lot of courage".

From a decolonizing voice, she criticizes Western studies on Africa, asserting thatsexual dimorphism was introduced, since gender was not an organizing principlein Yoruba society in southwestern Nigeria before the arrival of the English in 1862.

Fig. 11: Oyèrónkẹ́ Oyěwùmí

Through an archeology of discourses, she reverses incorrect linguistic interpretations of theYoruba language, documenting how gender differences were implanted by colonizers. Becausebefore entering into contact with Europe, the concept of women did not exist. What did exist wasa common word for both sexes, and consequently, the existence of gender transgressions was notpossible.

When she affirmed that GENDER WAS NOT THE BEGINNING, she discarded that "biology isdestiny" -and the western epistemological anthropological and feminist ideas, which took forgranted the gender and patriarchy as universal categories-, constructing a decolonizingcartography of a social organization whitout gender relationship.


Guil & Espejo

DECOLONIAL AND INDIGENOUS AMERICAN STUDIES

American de-colonial studies are intertwined with Africans in search of their origins, sincepresent-day America would not was the same without human trafficking from Africa.

In addition to Africa, some researchers and indigenous communities, looking in theirorigins using the claim pre-Columbian name of America, ABYA YALA, which means land inbloom, or land of vital blood, although it is not known with certainty if it was named tothe entire continent, or only what is now Panama and Colombia.

In fact there is also the name of the Inca empire, the largest (almost 2 million squarekilometers) and ancient of all South America: TAHUANTINSUYO (from Quechua Tawa -Four- and Suyo -State-). The basic organizing principle of Inca society was the duality"high or low", "right or left", "male or female", "inside or outside", "near or far" and"before or behind". That is why researchers like Ellefsen (1989), Rostworowski (1995) orHernández Astete (2012), find no evidence of sexism in the ancient Andean cultures, buta perfect complementarity, a dual exercise of power in which women were not in asituation inferior to men.


Guil & Espejo

Fig. 12: reconstruction of Cao Lady

The ethnographic studies of Martin and Voorhies*, also found that among theNavajo and the Mohave of North America, as well as among the Azande of EastAfrica, gender attributions existed independently of the biological sex.

In recent years it has been shown thatthere were female systems of pre-Incamatriarchal government and alsopolyandrias. For example in northernPeru the capullanas, the tallanesgovernors, or the Cao Lady, mochicagovernor whose mummy was found in2006 (Fig.12).

DECOLONIAL AND INDIGENOUS AMERICAN STUDIES

* Martín, M. Kay y Voorhies, Barbara. La mujer: un enfoque antropológico. Anagrama 1975.


DEL CONOCIMIENTO CIENTÍFICOLATIN AMERICAN DECOLONIAL AND INDIGENOUS FEMINISMSIndigenous, Chicana and Afro-descendent America also questions Western and ethnocentricuniversalist feminism imposed from Europe and the United States, seeking to subvert coloniality.

Catherine Walsh (Ecuador, Fig.14), militant intellectual feminist, problematizesEurocentrism from the peripheries, proposing a de-colonial pedagogy that subvertscolonialities through insurgent practices of resisting, (re)existing and (re)living.


Guil & Espejo

María Lugones (Argentina, Fig.13) is one of the main representatives of LatinAmerican decolonialism. In Coloniality and Gender (2008) seeks the origin of theindifference of men towards systematic violence against women of color(indigenous, mestizo, chicana, mulatto...) in the subordination, dependence andexploitation to which women were subjected under men colonizers and also undermen who were colonized.

- Abellón, Pamela. “María Lugones, una filósofa de frontera que ve el vacío. Entrevista a María Lugones”. Mora: Revista del Instituto Interdisciplinario de Estudios de Género,

vol. 20, nº 2. Universidad de Buenos Aires, 2014.

- Lugones, M. “Colonialidad y Género: Hacia un feminismo descolonial”. En Walter Mignolo (Comp.): Género y descolonialidad. Buenos Aires: Del signo 2007.

- Lugones, María. “Multiculturalismo radical y feminismos de mujeres de color”. Revista Internacional de Filosofía Política 25, pp. 81-75, 2005

Fig.13: María Lugones

Fig.14: Catherine Walsh

Colonized males "gave in" to "conserve" part of the control intheir societies. The subordination of gender seems to havebeen the currency with which the preservation ofphallocentric power was paid.



Karina Ochoa Muñoz (Mexico), professor at the UNAM, studied

organizational experiences of indigenous women in Guerrero, in front of

the discourses on Amerindian women and men (between bestialization,

feminization and racialization) to rethink the Law and the notion of Indian

subject, from a decolonial perspective (Fig.17).


Guil & Espejo

Yuderkys Espinosa (Dominican Republic), is an academic

activist, who defines decolonial feminism as a production

of contemporary ideas, in full construction, a subaltern

and non-hegemonic voice, which always existed, without

attracting attention (Fig.15).

Ochy Curiel (República Dominicana, 1963) feminist

anthropologist, who constructs feminist methodologies

from decoloniality. She helped create the Afro-Caribbean

LATIN AMERICAN DECOLONIAL AND INDIGENOUS FEMINISMS

Fig.15: YuderkysEspinosa

Fig.16: Ochy Curiel

Fig.17: Karina Ochoa

women's movement; analyzes the intersection gender / ethnicity / class.

She thinks that being a lesbian is a political position (Fig.16).



Julieta Paredes (Bolivia, 1967) considers herself a poet, singer-songwriter,writer, graffiti artist, activist, feminist, lesbian, decolonial and Aymara.Their community feminism is based on the equal participation of womenand men, away from contemporary individualism (Fig.21).

Guil & Espejo


Gladys Tzul Tzul, an academic specialist in the analysis of indigenousgovernments in Guatemala, questions the alleged sexist configuration ofcollective and community political traditions, considering that ordinarylaw is in crisis with respect to indigenous law (Fig.19).

Breny Mendoza (Honduras 1954), professor at the University of California,questions transnational feminisms, detecting their locus -hidden- ofcontrol, even if they present themselves as insurgents. From decolonialism,she proposes not to speak of equality, but of justice (Fig.20).

Sueli Carneiro (Brazil, 1950), feminist of Geledés - Yoruba word aboutfeminine power on the fertility of the earth, procreation and communitywelfare - the “Instituto da Mulher Negra”. She is a writer, professor andworks as a pro-rights activist for women and blacks, being a member ofthe National Council for Women's Rights (Fig.18)

Fig.19: Gladys TzulTzul

Fig.20: BrenyMendoza

Fig.21: JulietaParedes

LATIN AMERICAN DECOLONIAL AND INDIGENOUS FEMINISMS

Fig.18 SueliCarneiro


Guil & Espejo

CONCLUSIONS

TO DENOUNCE THE NO UNIVERSALITY OF THE WESTERN VISION OF GENDER, is one of themain objectives of black, indigenous and decolonial feminisms, which accuse Westernfeminism of monopolizing women's discrimination, without taking into account the visionof "other ", marginalized not only because they are women, but also because of their race,religion, culture, class ...

The concept of intersectionality came to fill this gap, but recognizing the prejudicessuffered by women of color is not enough. It is also necessary to fully understand theexploitation and how ONLY THOSE WHO HAVE PRIVILEGES HAVE THE FREEDOM TOQUESTION THEIR OWN IDENTITY.

Oyèrónkẹ Oyěwùmí, in her analysis of the Yorùbá society of southwestern Nigeria,considers that the category of women was imposed on an ORIGINAL SOCIETY IN WHICHTHERE WERE NO DISCRIMINATORY GENDER DIFFERENCES. Hazel V. Carby also verifies theGENDER DISCRIMINATIONS IMPOSED BY THE COLONIAL SYSTEM in America, Asia andAfrica. Various ethnographic studies have also shown the absence of discrimination in pre-Columbian America.


Guil & Espejo

CONCLUSIONS

Therefore, in order to get out of the patriarchal labyrinth that subjected the colonized peoples,we must realize an epistemic insubordination capable of transcending the concept of culture. Wemust look far beyond the folklore product of exploitation and slavery. It is necessary to look atthe origins in terms of the primordial transcendence of humanity born in Africa.

The “third world women” feel strong backed by their ancestral cultures, in which they utopicallywant to find egalitarian models not contaminated by colonialism. With "subaltern" voices, whichthey say were always there, even if they did not get attention, they are beginning to thinkdifferently about women, analyzing their own subjectivities and emotions to, from there, makearticulating political proposals that contemplate the complexity cultural constituent thatcharacterizes them.

Apart from the existence or non of primitive egalitarian communities, the fact is that thesewomen are determined to continue investigating new forms of social organization adapted totheir diverse cultural environments, where gender is not a discriminatory category. Because, asAudre Lorde (1934-1992) very well said in one of the most repeated quotes in the history ofAfrican-American feminist activism: "THE TOOLS OF THE MASTER (LORD, CHIEF, BOSS..) WILLNEVER DESTROY THE MASTER'S HOUSE".


Guil & Espejo

REFERENCES

• Aguilo ́, Federico. Los cuentos, tradiciones o vivencias? La Paz: Editorial Los Amigos del Libro, 1980.

• Alvarado, Mariana. “Epistemologías feministas latinoamericanas: un cruce en el camino junto-a-otras pero no-junta-a-todas”.RELIGACION. Revista de Ciencias Sociales y Humanidades. Vol I, nº 3, Quito 2016, pp. 9-32.

• Carby, Hazel. «White Women Listen! Black Feminism and the Boundaries of Sisterhood», en CCCB (ed.), The Empire Strikes Back: Raceand Racism in 70s, Hutchinson, Londres 1982.

• Curiel, Ochy (2014) “Construyendo metodologías feministas desde el feminismo decolonial”. En: Irantzu Mendia Azkue, Marta Luxán,Matxalen Legarreta, Gloria Guzmán, Iker Zirion y Jokin Azpiazu Carballo (edit): Otras formas de (re)conocer. Reflexiones, herramientas yaplicaciones desde la investigación feminista. EGOA.

• - “La Crítica Poscolonial desde las Prácticas Políticas del Feminismo Antirracista”, en: Colonialidad y Biopolítica en América latina.Revista NOMADAS, nº 26, 2007. Bogotá: instituto de estudios sociales contemporáneos-universidad central.

• Ellepsen, Bernardo. Matrimonio y sexo en el incario. Cochabamba: Los Amigos del Libro 1989.

• Espinosa, Yuderkys el al. (edit): Tejiendo de otro modo: Feminismo, epistemología y apuestas descoloniales en Abya Yala. Popayán:Editorial Universidad de Calcuta 2014.

• Guil, Ana. “Feminismos post y de-coloniales”. III Coloquio Internacional Historias de Vida de Maestras rurales, indígenas, africanas yafrodescendientes. Universidad Simón Bolivar, Barranquilla, COLOMBIA 2017.

• Hernández Astete, Francisco: Los Incas y el poder de sus ancestros. Lima: Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, 2012.

• Lorde, Audre. “Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches”. Crossing Press, Feminist Series, 2007 (original: 1984).

• Martín, M. Kay y Voorhies, Barbara. La mujer: un enfoque antropológico. Anagrama 1975

• Oyěwùmí, Oyèrónkẹ́. The Invention of Women: Making an African Sense of Western Gender Discourses (1997).

• - African Women and Feminism: Reflecting on the Politics of Sisterhood (2003)

• - Gender Epistemologies in Africa: Gendering Traditions, Spaces, Social Institutions, and Identities (2010).

• Rostworowski, María. La mujer en el Perú prehispánico. Lima: Instituto de Estudios Peruanos, 1995.

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