Author Archives: Rhys

Miss Peru Pageant as a Platform for Gender-Based Violence

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The Miss Perú 2018 Beauty Pageant was held on October 29 this year. In an interesting turn of events, the 23 contestants recited statistics of violence against women instead of their body measurements. The organizers also displayed media portraying prominent gender-based violence during other sections of the pageant. This was not advertised ahead of time, leaving viewers shocked. When interviewed, the contest organizer Jessica Newton said, “Unfortunately, there are many women who do not know, and think they are isolated cases.” Using the publicized event as a platform for this issue was guaranteed to bring more attention to it. Newton then went on to point out that, out of the 150 contestants that started out, five of them had been victims of violence.

http://https://www.inuth.com/trends/social-virals/the-powerful-reason-why-miss-perus-contestants-listed-crime-stats-during-the-beauty-pageant/

Gender-based violence has long been an issue in Perú. According to the Observatory of Citizen Security of the Organization of American States, Perú is the penultimate perpetrator of violence against women with only Bolivia topping it. More than 700 women have been killed between 2009 and 2015 in Perú. The cause of death has been labeled “femicide”, a term attributed to women killed in certain circumstances. The Miss Perú 2018 Beauty Pageant isn’t the only protest against Perú’s problem with violence against women. Despite congress passing a law in 2015 to prevent and punish violence against women, there were large protests in Lima last year demanding that the authorities do more. The winner of this year’s pageant claimed in her end interview that her plan to help end the violence would be to “implement a database containing the name of each aggressor, not only for femicide but for every kind of violence against women. In this way, we can protect ourselves.”

Latin Americans are portrayed in something of a negative light merely by association to the harsh statistics, but the subjects of the article itself are actively fighting against gender-based violence. Newton and the other organizers took an event generally expected to provide light, easy entertainment and used it to give airtime to a serious problem. This and the article itself paints those involved in a positive light for their activism.

This relates to the themes of our class in that it addresses the treatment of Latino people through the lens of gender. Women in colonial Latin America experienced life differently from men, a fact that perhaps hasn’t changed as much as we might wish. The Spanish have long been notable for their notions of chivalry/chauvinism and strict ideas of the roles of men and women. This article enforces that that’s something that hasn’t changed much.

Links: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-41827062

https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2017/country-chapters/peru

Class Notes 10/18

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Announcements:

  • There will be an in-class debate on Monday
  • Reminder to bring LA&P book to next class period

Latin American History and Culture (2):

We had two LA history and culture posts today. Kate’s focused on the upcoming 2018 election in Venezuela. After Nicolas Meduro was elected president in 2013, the country has been in a state of turmoil – a state that was only heightened after Meduro managed to pass an “alternative assembly” that would allow him unchecked power in May 2017. Although it was hoped that the general outrage at Meduro’s actions would feed the opposition enough that he wouldn’t stand much of a chance in the next election, the most recent election results and analysts’ projections are proving disheartening. Many are questioning the integrity of the election, but it remains to be seen who will come out on top.

Carlos’ post discussed Hurricane Irma’s effects on Cuba, and debated where the blame ought to lie. While hurricanes are unquestionably powerful forces of nature not to be reckoned with, many places that find themselves frequently in the path of hurricanes – such as the Caribbean Islands – find ways to brace themselves. But Cuba’s architecture is worryingly fragile, and with the help of gale force winds, was responsible for some of the deaths that occurred during the disaster. Though it is pointed out that the Cuban government just doesn’t have the resources for this project, some still wonder why they aren’t focusing more effort on attempting to gather those resources for the safety of Cuban citizens.

Class Discussion:

Keep in mind: What role did the priests play in the colonization of Latin America? Try to understand the mindset and what would have been at stake.

We talked about the role of priests in colonial Latin America, and how that role changed over time. Christopher Columbus, for instance, didn’t initially bring any church-affiliated men over with him. Later, however, when Hernán Cortés was establishing his rule, he called for the Franciscans to join him in the New World. By 1559, priests were considered an essential part of the campaign. The tools used by priests in their evangelization of Latin America were: church construct, secular and regular clergy, congregation, and education (catechism).

There was a common idea that the natives of Central and Latin America were a blank slate, with no concept of their own religions or cultures. This assured the Europeans that it was both okay and necessary to bring them into the fold, imprint their own ways onto them. Towards the goal of conquering, the spreading of religion was also a way to organize society and people. However, the priests’ efforts were often met with what they would label betrayal. The native peoples of Latin America would frequently mix Christianity with their own beliefs instead of replacing their beliefs with European ones. Priests were also troubled by their inability to decide which of the twelve tribes of Israel the native were. This fed into an overarching theme tied to race that one could tell another’s worth by their physical appearance. In their descriptions of the New World people, Europeans claimed they had “fine bodies” and that it meant that they would make good servants of the Lord.

Important Terms & Readings for Today:

The Virgin of Guadalupe- a Roman Catholic title for the Blessed Virgin Mary associated with a venerated image enshrined within the Minor Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City

  1. Human Traditions: #1 Gaspar Antonio Chi
  2. Human Traditions: #9 Diego de Ocaña
  3. ARP: Orders Given to the Twelve (1523)

Wikipedia Critique

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Casta

I reviewed an article on casta, the Spanish term for the hierarchical system used to keep track of “blood purity.” This page is part of a series on the history of New Spain and has no banner. Most of the article was relevant, but I was distracted by the solid one-third of the article dedicated to casta paintings. While tangentially related, I believe that casta paintings should have been its own article as that section didn’t add much of note to the rest of the page. Not everyone on the talk page seems to share my opinion, however, because there’s a call to flesh it out. But the same person also goes on to say that it could eventually be its own article. The other conversations on the talk page are minimal. A few things were removed due to lack of sourcing; apparently at one point a group of students from the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey replaced the entire article, only to have it all switched back. The tone didn’t strike me as being particularly biased one way or the other. The links I checked all worked, and most led to peer reviewed journals. Looking over the references, peer reviewed journals seem to make up the bulk of the section, with additional references taken from a handful of books or dictionaries from a variety of writers. All the links I checked backed up what was in the article.

Overall, the article seemed well-researched, if a little too ambitious. The history of the sistema de castas was covered thoroughly, the long list of terms used within the system were explained, and the references section was substantial. The biggest issue was that the article began to get off track toward the end and let the discussion of casta paintings get out of control.

Class Intro

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Hi, I’m Rhys and I’m a sophomore. Up until this semester I attended Arcadia University with the intention of majoring in cultural anthropology. Through Arcadia, I studied abroad in London for a semester. It was during that time that I decided to switch my major to archaeology and ended up here, as Arcadia didn’t have an archaeology program. I’ve lived in Ohio all my life, in a suburb called Maumee that no one seems to have heard of, and I’m afraid I’m not a particularly interesting person.

My interest in this class is very broad. I enjoy learning in general, so I’m happy to take notes on whatever comes up. If I had to pick one specific thing, I suppose I’m interested in the day-to-day living and gender roles of the time period. We covered a little bit of South American history in my high school Spanish classes, but we were overall more focused on the language. In that regard, I’m also interested in how each country (their borders, dialects, etc) came to be as they are now.