Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1998. The historian has to see the context in which the story is told. A 2006 court decision that also allowed doctors to refuse to perform abortions based on personal beliefs stated that this was previously only permitted in cases of rape, if the mother's health was in danger, or if the fetus had an untreatable malformation. Death Stalks Colombias Unions.. Corliss, Richard. In spite of a promising first chapter, Sowells analysis focuses on organization and politics, on men or workers in the generic, and in the end is not all that different from Urrutias work. Generally speaking, as one searches for sources on Colombia, one finds hundreds of articles and books on drugs and violence. Often the story is a reinterpretation after the fact, with events changed to suit the image the storyteller wants to remember. In reading it, one remembers that it is human beings who make history and experience it not as history but as life. Your email address will not be published. Labor Issues in Colombias Privatization: A, Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, 34.S (1994): 237-259. andLpez-Alves, Fernando. There is room for a broader conceptualization than the urban-rural dichotomy of Colombian labor, as evidenced by the way that the books reviewed here have revealed differences between rural areas and cities. As never before, women in the factories existed in a new and different sphere: In social/sexual terms, factory space was different from both home and street. It was safer than the street and freer than the home. While they are both concerned with rural areas, they are obviously not looking at the same two regions. These narratives provide a textured who and why for the what of history. Some indigenous groups such as the Wayuu hold a matriarchal society in which a woman's role is central and the most important for their society. With the introduction of mass production techniques, some worry that the traditional handcrafted techniques and styles will eventually be lost: As the economic momentum of mens workshops in town makes good incomes possible for young menfewer young women are obligated to learn their gender-specific version of the craft. Thus, there may be a loss of cultural form in the name of progress, something that might not be visible in a non-gendered analysis. Activities carried out by minor citizens in the 1950's would include: playing outdoors, going to the diner with friends, etc. French, John D. and Daniel James. History in Three Keys: The Boxers as Event, Experience, and Myth. Male soldiers had just returned home from war to see America "at the summit of the world" (Churchill). This definition is an obvious contradiction to Bergquists claim that Colombia is racially and culturally homogenous. The move generated a scandal in congress. If La Violencia was mainly a product of the coffee zones, then the role of women should be explored; was involvement a family affair or another incidence of manliness? Many men were getting degrees and found jobs that paid higher because of the higher education they received. Throughout the colonial era, the 19th century and the establishment of the republican era, Colombian women were relegated to be housewives in a male dominated society. The reasoning behind this can be found in the work of Arango, Farnsworth-Alvear, and Keremitsis. , (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986), ix. Dr. Friedmann-Sanchez has studied the floriculture industry of central Colombia extensively and has conducted numerous interviews with workers in the region., Colombias flower industry has been a major source of employment for women for the past four decades. Labor in Latin America: Comparative Essays on Chile, Argentina, Venezuela. The book begins with the Society of Artisans (, century Colombia, though who they are exactly is not fully explained. Policing womens interactions with their male co-workers had become an official part of a companys code of discipline. Friedmann-Sanchez, Greta. Pedraja Tomn, Ren de la. The blue (right) represents the male Mars symbol. in contrast to non-Iberian or Marxist characterizations because the artisan occupied a different social stratum in Latin America than his counterparts in Europe. Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1998. The same pattern exists in the developing world though it is less well-researched. Feriva, Cali, 1997. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1997. Gender Roles in Columbia in the 1950s "They knew how to do screen embroidery, sew by machine, weave bone lace, wash and iron, make artifical flavors and fancy candy, and write engagement announcements." Men- men are expected to hold up the family, honor is incredibly important in that society. The supposed homogeneity within Colombian coffee society should be all the more reason to look for other differentiating factors such as gender, age, geography, or industry, and the close attention he speaks of should then include the lives of women and children within this structure, especially the details of their participation and indoctrination. Many have come to the realization that the work they do at home should also be valued by others, and thus the experience of paid labor is creating an entirely new worldview among them., This new outlook has not necessarily changed how men and others see the women who work. Leah Hutton Blumenfeld, PhD, is a professor of Political Science, International Relations, and Womens Studies at Barry University. Most of the women who do work are related to the man who owns the shop., Womens work supports the mans, but is undervalued and often discounted. Greens article is pure politics, with the generic mobs of workers differentiated only by their respective leaders and party affiliations. She received her doctorate from Florida International University, graduated cum laude with a Bachelors degree in Spanish from Harvard University, and holds a Masters Degree in Latin American and Caribbean Studies from the University of Connecticut. Womens role in organized labor is limited though the National Coffee Strikes of the 1930s, which involved a broad range of workers including the escogedoras. In 1935, activists for both the Communist Party and the UNIR (Unin Nacional Izquierda Revolucionaria) led strikes. The efforts of the Communist Party that year were to concentrate primarily on organizing the female work force in the coffee trilladoras, where about 85% of the workforce consisted of escogedoras. Yet the women working in the coffee towns were not the same women as those in the growing areas. Bergquist, Charles. During American involvement in WWII (1941-1947), women regularly stepped in to . Keremetsiss 1984 article inserts women into already existing categories occupied by men. The article discusses the division of labor by sex in textile mills of Colombia and Mexico, though it presents statistics more than anything else. Again, the discussion is brief and the reference is the same used by Bergquist. Not only is his analysis interested in these differentiating factors, but he also notes the importance of defining artisan in the Hispanic context, in contrast to non-Iberian or Marxist characterizations because the artisan occupied a different social stratum in Latin America than his counterparts in Europe. The value of the labor both as income and a source of self-esteem has superseded the importance of reputation. I get my direct deposit every two weeks. This seems a departure from Farnsworth-Alvears finding of the double-voice among factory workers earlier. The book goes through the Disney movies released in the 1950s and how they reinforced the social norms at the time, including gender norms. It shows the crucial role that oral testimony has played in rescuing the hidden voices suppressed in other types of historical sources., The individual life stories of a smaller group of women workers show us the complicated mixture of emotions that characterizes interpersonal relations, and by doing so breaks the implied homogeneity of pre-existing categories.. Junsay, Alma T. and Tim B. Heaton. In the two literary pieces, In the . Saether, Steiner. A man as the head of the house might maintain more than one household as the number of children affected the amount of available labor. Duncan, Crafts, Capitalism, and Women, 101. The weight of this responsibility was evidently felt by women in the 1950's, 60's and 70's, as overall political participation of women between 1958 and 1974 stood at just 6.79%. According to French and James, what Farnsworths work suggests for historians will require the use of different kinds of sources, tools, and questions. Like!! Only four other Latin American nations enacted universal suffrage later. These living conditions have not changed in over 100 years and indeed may be frightening to a foreign observer or even to someone from the urban and modern world of the cities of Colombia. , have aided the establishment of workshops and the purchase of equipment primarily for men who are thought to be a better investment.. Even by focusing on women instead, I have had to be creative in my approach. Keremitsis, Dawn. Even today, gender roles are still prevalent and simply change to fit new adaptations of society, but have become less stressed over time. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1997, 2. In spite of this monolithic approach, women and children, often from the families of permanent hacienda workers, joinedin the coffee harvest. In other words, they were not considered a permanent part of the coffee labor force, although an editorial from 1933 stated that the coffee industry in Colombia provided adequate and almost permanent work to women and children. There were women who participated directly in the coffee industry as the sorters and graders of coffee beans (escogedoras) in the husking plants called trilladoras.. In the early twentieth century, the Catholic Church in Colombia was critical of industrialists that hired women to work for them. Oral History, Identity Formation, and Working-Class Mobilization. In The Gendered Worlds of Latin American Women Workers. The nature of their competition with British textile imports may lead one to believe they are local or indigenous craft and cloth makers men, women, and children alike but one cannot be sure from the text. There is a shift in the view of pottery as craft to pottery as commodity, with a parallel shift from rural production to towns as centers of pottery making and a decline in the status of women from primary producers to assistants. The only other time Cano appears is in Pedraja Tomns work. Again, the discussion is brief and the reference is the same used by Bergquist. Since the 1970s, state agencies, like Artisanas de Colombia, have aided the establishment of workshops and the purchase of equipment primarily for men who are thought to be a better investment. The reasoning behind this can be found in the work of Arango, Farnsworth-Alvear, and Keremitsis. This roughly translates to, so what if it bothers anyone? both proud of their reputations as good employees and their ability to stand up for themselves. None of the sources included in this essay looked at labor in the service sector, and only Duncan came close to the informal economy. The men went into the world to make a living and were either sought-after, eligible bachelors or they were the family breadwinner and head of the household. Depending on the context, this may include sex -based social structures (i.e. What was the role of the workers in the trilladoras? It is difficult to know where to draw a line in the timeline of Colombian history. While he spends most of the time on the economic and political aspects, he uses these to emphasize the blending of indigenous forms with those of the Spanish. The assumption is that there is a nuclear family where the father is the worker who supports the family and the mother cares for the children, who grow up to perpetuate their parents roles in society. Writing a historiography of labor in Colombia is not a simple task. Most union members were fired and few unions survived., According to Steiner Saether, the economic and social history of Colombia had only begun to be studied with seriousness and professionalism in the 1960s and 1970s. Add to that John D. French and Daniel Jamess assessment that there has been a collective blindness among historians of Latin American labor that fails to see women and tends to ignore differences amongst the members of the working class in general, and we begin to see that perhaps the historiography of Colombian labor is a late bloomer. In the same way the women spoke in a double voice about workplace fights, they also distanced themselves from any damaging characterization as loose or immoral women. While women are forging this new ground, they still struggle with balance and the workplace that has welcomed them has not entirely accommodated them either. The Ceramics of Rquira, Colombia: Gender, Work, and Economic Change,1. R. Barranquilla: Dos Tendencias en el Movimiento Obrero, Crafts, Capitalism, and Women: The Potters of La Chamba, Colombia. Women Working: Comparative Perspectives in Developing Areas. The variety of topics and time periods that have been covered in the literature reveal that it is underdeveloped, since there are not a significant number on any one era or area in particular. Together with Oakley Bolvar is narrowly interested in union organization, though he does move away from the masses of workers to describe two individual labor leaders. Dr. Blumenfeld has presented her research at numerous academic conferences, including theCaribbean Studies AssociationandFlorida Political Science Association, where she is Ex-Officio Past President. Bergquist, Labor in Latin America, 315. In the early twentieth century, the Catholic Church in Colombia was critical of industrialists that hired women to work for them. Employment in the flower industry is a way out of the isolation of the home and into a larger community as equal individuals. Their work is valued and their worth is reinforced by others. Retrieved from https://pulitzercenter.org/projects/south-america-colombia-labor-union-human-rights-judicial-government-corruption-paramilitary-drug-violence-education. Gerda Westendorp was admitted on February 1, 1935, to study medicine. Sowell, The Early Colombian Labor Movement, 14. Squaring the Circle: Womens Factory Labor, The Gendered Worlds of Latin American Women Workers. Farnsworth-Alvear, Dulcinea in the Factory, 4. In G. [10] In 2008, Ley 1257 de 2008, a comprehensive law against violence against women was encted. 40 aos del voto de la mujer en Colombia. The use of oral testimony requires caution. In the 2000s, 55,8% of births were to cohabiting mothers, 22,9% to married mothers, and 21,3% to single mothers (not living with a partner). I am reminded of Paul A. Cohens book. Sowell, David. At the same time, others are severely constrained by socio-economic and historical/cultural contexts that limit the possibilities for creative action. Throughout the colonial era, the 19th century and the establishment of the republican era, Colombian women were relegated to be housewives in a male dominated society. Many indigenous women were subject to slavery, rape and the loss of their cultural identity.[6]. Variations or dissention among the ranks are never considered. Familial relationships could make or break the success of a farm or familys independence and there was often competition between neighbors. French and James think that the use of micro-histories, including interviews and oral histories, may be the way to fill in the gaps left by official documents. Masculinity, Gender Roles, and T.V. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986. Conflicts between workers were defined in different ways for men and women. " (31) For Farnsworth-Alvear, different women were able to create their own solutions for the problems and challenges they faced unlike the women in Duncans book, whose fates were determined by their position within the structure of the system. According to Freidmann-Sanchez, when women take on paid work, they experience an elevation in status and feeling of self-worth. Most are not encouraged to go to school and there is little opportunity for upward mobility. New work should not rewrite history in a new category of women, or simply add women to old histories and conceptual frameworks of mens labor, but attempt to understand sex and gender male or female as one aspect of any history. [11] Marital rape was criminalized in 1996. Really appreciate you sharing this blog post.Really thank you! In the 1940s, gender roles were very clearly defined. Most union members were fired and few unions survived., According to Steiner Saether, the economic and social history of Colombia had only begun to be studied with seriousness and professionalism in the 1960s and 1970s., Add to that John D. French and Daniel Jamess assessment that there has been a collective blindness among historians of Latin American labor, that fails to see women and tends to ignore differences amongst the members of the working class in general, and we begin to see that perhaps the historiography of Colombian labor is a late bloomer. Indeed, as I searched for sources I found many about women in Colombia that had nothing to do with labor, and vice versa. This idea then is a challenge to the falsely dichotomized categories with which we have traditionally understood working class life such as masculine/feminine, home/work, east/west, or public/private., As Farnsworth-Alvear, Friedmann-Sanchez, and Duncans work shows, gender also opens a window to understanding womens and mens positions within Colombian society. A reorientation in the approach to Colombian history may, in fact, help illuminate the proclivity towards drugs and violence in Colombian history in a different and possibly clearer fashion. Gender Roles in 1950s Birth of the USA American Constitution American Independence War Causes of the American Revolution Democratic Republican Party General Thomas Gage biography Intolerable Acts Loyalists Powers of the President Quebec Act Seven Years' War Stamp Act Tea Party Cold War Battle of Dien Bien Phu Brezhnev Doctrine Brezhnev Era In spite of a promising first chapter, Sowells analysis focuses on organization and politics, on men or workers in the generic, and in the end is not all that different from Urrutias work. They were interesting and engaging compared to the dry texts like Urrutias, which were full of names, dates, and acronyms that meant little to me once I closed the cover. It assesses shifting gender roles and ideologies, and the ways that they intersect with a peace process and transitions in a post-Accord period, particularly in relation to issues of transitional justice. The Early Colombian Labor Movement: Artisans and Politics in Bogota. Since women tend to earn less than men, these families, though independent, they are also very poor. At the end of the 1950's the Catholic Church tried to remove itself from the politics of Colombia. Urrutia, Miguel. Duncan, Ronald J. Oral History, Identity Formation, and Working-Class Mobilization. In, Gendered Worlds of Latin American Women Workers, Lpez-Alves, Fernando. One individual woman does earn a special place in Colombias labor historiography: Mara Cano, the Socialist Revolutionary Partys most celebrated public speaker. Born to an upper class family, she developed a concern for the plight of the working poor. She then became a symbol of insurgent labor, a speaker capable of electrifying the crowds of workers who flocked to hear her passionate rhetoric. She only gets two-thirds of a paragraph and a footnote with a source, should you have an interest in reading more about her. The number of male and female pottery workers in the rural area is nearly equal, but twice as many men as women work in pottery in the urban workshops. In town workshops where there are hired workers, they are generally men. The body of work done by Farnsworth-Alvear is meant to add texture and nuance to the history of labor in Latin American cities. Latin America has one of the lowest formally recognized employment rates for women in the world, due in part to the invisible work of home-based labor.Alma T. Junsay and Tim B. Heaton note worldwide increases in the number of women working since the 1950s, yet the division of labor is still based on traditional sex roles. This phenomenon, as well as discrepancies in pay rates for men and women, has been well-documented in developed societies. Man is the head of the Family, Woman Runs the House. For example, it is typical in the Western world to. The research is based on personal interviews, though whether these interviews can be considered oral histories is debatable. Viking/Penguin 526pp 16.99. Gender roles are timeless stereotypes that belong in the 1950s, yet sixty years later they still exist. By the middle of the sixteenth century, the Spaniards had established a major foothold in the Americas. While pottery provides some income, it is not highly profitable. In a meta-analysis of 17 studies of a wide variety of mental illnesses, Gove (1972) found consistently higher rates for women compared to men, which he attributed to traditional gender roles. The author has not explored who the escogedoras were, where they come from, or what their lives were like inside and outside of the workplace. Dulcinea in the Factory: Myths, Morals, Men, and Women in Colombias Industrial Experiment, 1905-1960. Pablo and Pedro- must stand up for their family's honor New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1969. Sibling Rivalry on the Left and Labor Struggles in Colombia During. Women didn't receive suffrage until August 25th of 1954. Duncan is dealing with a slightly different system, though using the same argument about a continuity of cultural and social stratification passed down from the Colonial era. He cites the small number of Spanish women who came to the colonies and the number and influence of indigenous wives and mistresses as the reason Colombias biologically mestizo society was largely indigenous culturally.. The research is based on personal interviews, though whether these interviews can be considered oral histories is debatable. She is able to make a connection between her specific subject matter and the larger history of working women, not just in Latin America but everywhere. Education for women was limited to the wealthy and they were only allowed to study until middle school in monastery under Roman Catholic education. Women in Colombian Organizations, 1900-1940: A Study in Changing Gender Roles. Journal of Womens History 2.1 (Spring 1990): 98-119. Labor History and its Challenges: Confessions of a Latin Americanist. American Historical Review (June 1993): 757-764. Latin American feminism focuses on the critical work that women have undertaken in reaction to the . Paid Agroindustrial Work and Unpaid Caregiving for Dependents: The Gendered Dialectics between Structure and Agency in Colombia,. Junsay, Alma T. and Tim B. Heaton. Bergquist also says that the traditional approach to labor that divides it into the two categories, rural (peasant) or industrial (modern proletariat), is inappropriate for Latin America; a better categorization would be to discuss labors role within any export production. This emphasis reveals his work as focused on economic structures. Bergquist also says that the traditional approach to labor that divides it into the two categories, rural (peasant) or industrial (modern proletariat), is inappropriate for Latin America; a better categorization would be to discuss labors role within any export production., This emphasis reveals his work as focused on economic structures. This book talks about how ideas were expressed through films and novels in the 1950s and how they related to 1950s culture. The author has not explored who the. Bergquist, Labor in Latin America, 318. Womens work in cottage-industry crafts is frequently viewed within the local culture as unskilled work, simply an extension of their domestic work and not something to be remunerated at wage rates used for men.. A 1989 book by sociologists Junsay and Heaton. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1997. and, Green, W. John. The Early Colombian Labor Movement: Artisans and Politics in Bogota, 1832-1919. Vatican II asked the Catholic Churches around the world to take a more active role in practitioners' quotidian lives. In La Chamba, as in Rquira, there are few choices for young women. One individual woman does earn a special place in Colombias labor historiography: Mar, Cano, the Socialist Revolutionary Partys most celebrated public speaker., Born to an upper class family, she developed a concern for the plight of the working poor., She then became a symbol of insurgent labor, a speaker capable of electrifying the crowds of workers who flocked to hear her passionate rhetoric., She only gets two-thirds of a paragraph and a footnote with a source, should you have an interest in reading more about her. Bolvar Bolvar, Jess. In Latin America, factory work is a relatively new kind of labor; the majority of women work in the home and in service or informal sectors, areas that are frequently neglected by historians, other scholars, and officials alike. Assets in Intrahousehold Bargaining Among Women Workers in Colombias Cut-flower Industry, Feminist Economics, 12:1-2 (2006): 247-269. Sofer, Eugene F. Recent Trends in Latin American Labor Historiography. Latin American Research Review 15 (1980): 167-176. . Bolvar is narrowly interested in union organization, though he does move away from the masses of workers to describe two individual labor leaders. Farnsworths subjects are part of an event of history, the industrialization of Colombia, but their histories are oral testimonies to the experience. Double standard of infidelity. The interviews distinguish between mutual flirtations and sexual intimidation. Divide in women. The 1950s saw a growing emphasis on traditional family values, and by extension, gender roles. If, was mainly a product of the coffee zones,, then the role of women should be explored; was involvement a family affair or another incidence of manliness? Friedmann-Sanchezs work then suggests this more accurate depiction of the workforce also reflects one that will continue to affect change into the future. In both cases, there is no mention of women at all. In 1936, Mara Carulla founded the first school of social works under the support of the Our Lady of the Rosary University. Bergquist, Charles. Talking, Fighting, and Flirting: Workers Sociability in, , edited by John D. French and Daniel James. Bergquist, Labor History and its Challenges: Confessions of a Latin. Eugene Sofer has said that working class history is more inclusive than a traditional labor history, one known for its preoccupation with unions, and that working class history incorporates the concept that working people should be viewed as conscious historical actors. If we are studying all working people, then where are the women in Colombias history? Dr. Blumenfeld is also involved in her community through theMiami-Dade County Commission for Women, where served as chair of its legislative committee and as elected Member-at-large of the executive committee, and the Miami Beach Womens Conference, as part of the planning committee during its inaugural year. Dr. Blumenfeld has presented her research at numerous academic conferences, including the, , where she is Ex-Officio Past President. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1997. andDulcinea in the Factory: Myths, Morals, Men, and Women in Colombias Industrial Experiment, 1905-1960, (Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2000). Pedraja Tomn, Ren de la. Junsay, Alma T. and Tim B. Heaton. 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