Kenneth S. Kang
January 26, 1999
Anthropology 9 - Dubin
Differences in gender and sex are universal among human cultures. These differences are sometimes used to divide human activities and can be used to categorize other human agencies. During the conquest of Mesoamerica, the European views on gender were used to categorize and justify the subjugation of the indigenous populations. Although the Aztec and other indigenous Mesoamericans had comparable gender stereotypes, they did not and could not invoke them to help understand the Spanish invasion. Using corporate imagery, the roles of European men and women, as well as the Biblical references to gender, the Spanish naturalized their actions.
Describing the prevailing gender view during the European Renaissance, Dr. Amy Burce outlined the one gender model. In this model, qualities like intellectualism and logic set men apart from women. Moreover, women were considered inferior because they were nurturers and tended to be more emotionally driven. These biases are evident especially in the European witch hunts where women, more often than men, were suspected to witches. While men could fend for themselves from the devil with their "superior" intellect and logic, women were said to "have weak memories and it is a natural vice in them not to be disciplined, but to follow their own impulses without any sense of what is due..." (Malleus 1971 [1486] 45).
In indigenous cultures, the misogynist tradition also existed. In Broken Spears, the female Nahuatl translator is vilified as a traitor to the people of Tenochtitlan. The comparison between the translator and Eve could be drawn as both women bring about the downfall of their cultures. Modern Mesoamerican societies refer to Viuda who often is attributed as a young and beautiful widow who tempts men. Viuda uncannily resembles the witches of Europe who also conspired with the devil and lured men to their demise. These two representations of women in indigenous writings could result from the syncretism of the Nahuatl and Spanish cultures. However, the integration of the myths and the apparent divide between the Christian and native religions which continues today suggests that the misogynic tendencies were at least present previous to the encounter between the two cultures.
The church tried to preserve the sanctity of marriage. To the church, fidelity during marriage and virginity before marriage were key elements to Christianity and could not be compromised. For their own legacies, however, the Spanish stressed the fidelity of a man's wife because it is not as important for a family's faith but essential for a family's legacy. An honorable and devoted wife prevented speculation over the legitimacy of heirs. Without a legitimate birth, a bastard could never inherit his father's lands or title.
The colonizing Spanish thought of the indigenous women as mere objects. The Spanish settlers thought it was their right to be able to collect tribute from the indigenous populations in the form of women. They extracted the tribute for their own enjoyment leaving the consequences, the mixed-race children, as bastards who would remain at the social standing of their mother. Similar to the lay conquistadors, friars who were to help establish utopian communities for indigenous people abused their subjects. Most Spanish would have found the violation of indigenous women disturbing. The play Fuente Ovejuna has an overlord who take advantage of his local female subjects. In the play, his actions cause a revolt, yet those same acts are tolerated in America. Obviously, the concepts of a woman's honor do not exist for indigenous women.
Later, in the Spanish Colonies, marriage became important to ensuring the continuation of the Spanish American Empire. Initially, the colonization effort began with the conquistadors searching for gold, Christian converts, and land in the name of God and the Spanish Empire. Although it was easy for the soldiers to claim the land and gold and for the first missionaries to find converts, the crown needed to rule the land. Helms, noting the lack of eligible Peninsular Spanish women, mentions, "the crown was seriously concerned that the colony be stabilize by married settlers" (Helms 1975 172). Thus women are a stabilizing force and allow the continuation of mankind in the newly conquered colonies. Without women, a conquistador could not create a family and heirs which would inherit his land and title and remain loyal to the Spanish king.
The ideas that the cultures had about gender allowed them to gender ideas compare men. For the Spanish, women were inferior to men and had to rely upon men for direction and management. Men had their own role to fill: to govern fairly and to provide protection for his constituents. In Broken Spears, the Aztec men also had a duty to protect the city much like the Spanish ideas of the lords. The Spanish characterized the Aztec men as more feminine because they had less facial hair. Because the Spanish were powerful and masculine, they were able to invade the Aztecs who were not able to defend themselves. The corporal imagery of the community which was present during the Renaissance makes the Aztec society look inferior and feminine. Moreover, the Aztecs as a race was a race that had fallen from Christianity much as Eve had fallen from faith. Aztecs, however, did not adopt gender stereotypes for the Spanish. Their cosmology did not accommodate the Spanish easily so the initial conclusion was that the Spanish were Gods. As time passed, Aztecs characterized the Spanish as underworld creatures.
During the conquest of Tenochtitlan, the roles of men and women were briefly reversed. The women were asking the men when it would be time to defend their city. The men of the city were warriors who were considered honorable if they were willing to die for their city. In Fuente Ovejuna, a similar situation where the women of the city complain about the comportment of their overlord to their husbands.
The legalization of interracial marriages created several mixed breed classes which did not easily fit into the hierarchy that had formed during the conquest of Mesoamerica. Because the differing social status of the married couple, the legitimacy, for the purposes of inheriting the land and any title, of the heirs of interracial marriages was in question. Moreover, by marrying someone of a lower casta, the higher class individual gives some legitimacy to the lower castas. The honor of the family is easily challenged because the lower casta would be considered untrustworthy. Because of this dichotomy, the children created from these marriages and interracial affairs could not fit in either as members the white upper class nor as traitors in the indigenous peoples.
The conquest of Mesoamerica saw the exploitation of indigenous women who, in the eyes of the Europeans, lacked even basic honor and were considered objects of conquest. The gender roles of the conquered society were slowly supplanted by the ideology of the Spaniards. The ideas of hierarchies and status in marriage became a new element into the lives of the Aztec. However, the Spanish sought to keep their superiority over the inferior and feminine native populations which had been conquered. Thus laws were made and ideologies cast to keep the separate strata of the tributary society apart. Gender which had justified an intense system of oppression now was required to stablize the new Spanish dominated power structure.
Helms, Mary W. 1975. "Land and Society." Middle America: A Cultural History of Heartland and Frontiers. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, Inc., 168-175.
Kramer, Heinrich and James Sprenger. 1971 [c. 1486]. The Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of the Witches). Trans. Rev. Montague Summers. New York: Dover Publications.