Women, Ethnicity and Nationalisms in Latin America

The relationship between gender and nationalism is a compelling issue that is receiving increasing coverage in the scholarly literature. This is the first book to explore these links in the context of Latin America. With contributions from Latin American scholars, and case studies covering Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia and Mexico, it offers a unique and revealing view of important political and cultural issues. The book opens by outlining four dimensions in the relationship between gender and nationalism. These are: women's contribution to nation building and their exclusion from it by the state and its institutions; the role of women in contemporary ethnic and nationalist movements; the place of the female body in the myths and traditions surrounding the nation; and the role of women in forging the intellectual and artistic culture of the nation. The book goes on to offer both theoretical and empirical explorations of these themes, with chapters covering the debate on multiculturalism and gender in the construction of the nation, the struggles of ethnic women to participate politically in their communities and studies of the first Mexican filmmaker, Mimi Derrba and the indigenous heroine Dolores Cacuango from Ecuador.