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Toward a Feminist Pedagogy for Chicana Self-Actualization

1980; University of Nebraska Press; Volume: 5; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.2307/3346035

1536-0334

Sylvia Gonzales,

Latin American and Latino Studies

Any serious study of the Chicana is a study in contradictions. On the one hand, the Chicana is viewed as passive and submissive and on the other, she is described as the strength of the family and community. Why the contradiction? Is the Chicana the passive and submissive recipient of macho oppression-and if she is, how then is she perceived as the source of strength that has held her community together through poverty and discrimination? It has been the tradition of women to be the helpmate of men in most cultures. Men are the aggressors, the decision-makers, the actors. But do they act upon the women? To an extent they do, but mostly they act upon each other. Women find themselves on the periphery of a male-dominated, male-invented world. They neither decide nor influence national policy except in isolated cases. Thus it would seem that to be inactive, one would have to be acted upon; how is the Chicana acted upon in a way that makes her passive and submissive? One of the most popular themes in contemporary Chicana poetry and scholarship is that of La Malinche. Chicana feminist poets ask that their audiences reevaluate this historical figure. La Malinche, the name given to the Indian woman who became the mistress of Her-