Gender and the Boundaries of Dress in Contemporary PeruSet in Arequipa during Peru's recent years of crisis, this ethnography reveals how dress creates gendered bodies. It explores why people wear clothes, why people make art, and why those things matter in a war-torn land. Blenda Femenías argues that women's clothes are key symbols of gender identity and resistance to racism. Moving between metropolitan Arequipa and rural Caylloma Province, the central characters are the Quechua- and Spanish-speaking maize farmers and alpaca herders of the Colca Valley. Their identification as Indians, whites, and mestizos emerges through locally produced garments called bordados. Because the artists who create these beautiful objects are also producers who carve an economic foothold, family workshops are vital in a nation where jobs are as scarce as peace. But ambiguity permeates all practices shaping bordados' significance. Femenías traces contemporary political and ritual applications, not only Caylloma's long-standing and violent ethnic conflicts, to the historical importance of cloth since Inca times. This is the only book about expressive culture in an Andean nation that centers on gender. In this feminist contribution to ethnography, based on twenty years' experience with Peru, including two years of intensive fieldwork, Femenías reflects on the ways gender shapes relationships among subjects, research, and representation. |
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... practices led me to understand that symbol- ism is more material than abstract . Identity is embodied , and bordados in- corporate meanings into gendered bodies . People dress together as they act together in communities of practice ...
... practices as distinguishing ethnic characteristics helps us better understand how Cayllominos them- selves form their identities . This approach is consistent with G. Carter Bentley's ( 1987 ) call to link practices to ethnicity ...
... practices in other ways that contradict existing fiesta literature . In Caylloma , the ideal is that each community member should fill the cargos in a specific sequence ; in practice , the sequence is not always followed . Many legal ...
Contents
Introduction False Borders Embroidered Lives | xvii |
the Crossroads | 78 |
Process | 103 |
Copyright | |
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