Women and Change (Chapter 4)

Abortion is an issue that will always be disagreed upon in every group. Abortion in Mexico is a legally prosecutable crime, however, across the border it is a constitutional right. This reading explains an analysis of the women taking the San Diego- Tijuana transborder as a specific case. Lifestyles emerge and conflict at the border. There are many differences between the border communities. Both the San Diego and Tijuana have a combined population of 2,493,077 and they have a high degree of diversity in both cities. Crossing to the other side of the border to have an abortion is a part of the border life for many women. Mexican women who wish to have an abortion see the border as an opportunity to cross over to the country where they are allowed to decide to go through with the abortion or not. Coming to the United States to have an abortion where it is legal is possible only for those women who have the money, a passport, and a necessary reason. Because of these regulations it works against the majority of the Mexican women.

Women and Change (Chapter 7)

Working mothers from Mexico struggle with their everyday lives trying to make a living off minimum wage jobs. A lot of their low wage pay is used to feed their children and pay rent for usually a small run down apartment. Their everyday challenge consists of trying to balance their children and family responsibilities as well as work full-time jobs. They are faced to develop strategies for dealing with their double work days. Some of the mothers who do work full-time struggle the most with finding child care. Working for minimum wage or below has made it difficult to pay for child care on a consistent basis. Most mothers who struggle to find child care rely on the caring labor of other women. Many immigrant women get hired to clean houses in upscale neighborhood usually make about $40 a day. Some immigrant women get hired to work as a live in household worker which is hard because they end up spending little to no time at home with their own families.

Women and Change(Chapter 10 Presentation)

Chapter 10
Border Women’s NGOs and Political Participation in Baja California
This chapter analyzes female political participation through the study of the social movement in the Mexican State of Baja California.
The feminist movement is diverse and involves people from different social classes, rural and urban origins, and from different occupational sectors.
Because of Mexican Women’s movements three general varieties of feminism have developed in Mexico.
1. Historical Feminism include middle-class women who emphasized women’s subordination, and centered their fight on domestic work, abortion, sexuality, and violence.
2. Popular Feminism is dominated by women from popular but low-income sectors who face poverty and marginality and are in vulnerable economic situations.
3. Social Feminism organized by NGO’s. This group focuses on women of the popular sectors. They institutionalized their movement.
Feminism and Participation
Main goal: To participate in design of public policies related to violence, reproductive health and associated issues.
This participation has helped the women because they have:
• Feminism has expanded the concept of politics to include everyday struggles for survival and a change in power relationships in all spheres of social life.
• Women’s demands for citizenship expanded informal means and modes of social action.
• Influence in policy making, centering women’s problems within the public agenda and developing alternative policies.
• Women are establishing relationships of power with public authorities, demand and negotiate resources, counteract public decisions, resist, and negotiate and exert influence.
• Mexican Women’s NGO’s define their political participation through their involvement in advocacy and policymaking.



NGO’s means Non-governmental Organization.

NGO’s is defined as social and political actors who resolve their specific needs through alternative models of social relationships and for representing their interests in political life.
Goals
The social movement of women’s NGO’s has had a strong presence in Baja California since the 1990’s.
The goals for NGO’s are to
• Define women’s rights
• Increase women’s political participation
• Influence in public

Differences
• Ngo’s have differences in their specializations, some have overlapping aims that create disagreements and they also compete for political resources and networks.
• Not all NGO’s have the same political resources they consider themselves as advocates with some influence in public policies and laws.
Challenges
• NGO’s face the challenge of providing continuity to programs and policies that they promoted.
• They have to target groups such as judges and physicians to show more resistance to gender perspective.
• They need more efficient use of strategic planning tools that will continue to build an agenda that focuses on local problems such as:
o Women’s opportunities to access education
o Labor rights of maquiladora workers, Indigenous women, agricultural women workers, domestic workers, and working children
• They face ongoing challenges of promoting a new gender culture based on equity.


Achievements
• Contribute to civil society by promoting a gender dimension to public policies, institutions, and local governments.
• Because of demands and actions of NGO’s, local governments have assumed the defense and protection of women and other vulnerable groups in their discourses.

Dissident Women (Chapter 2)

Indigenous communities today are facing many hardships. In many of the indigenous communities there are high rates of malnutrition, poverty deaths, and cultural segregation. Oaxaca and Chiapas is one of the most marginalized from the benefits of development and has the largest indigenous population in Mexico. Life expectancy in indigenous communities is forty years compared to the national average is seventy years. Women are the most seriously affected by this living condition. They are very vulnerable and the main cause of deaths is related to reproductive health.
The Zapatista armed movement is a community movement. The majority of women who join the armed movement are young girls. By taking part in the Zapatista movement it requires that communities assign new activities to women which require that they remain single for a longer period of time.
Some women who have participated in the movement have pointed out the jealousy of their husbands. Their absence is interpreted as deceit and infidelity by their husbands. Alcohol is usually a factor in these situations as well as violence.
What is happening in these indigenous communities is causing many challenges to the Mexican nation.

Women and Change (Chapter 8)

Women leaders are the heart of Colonia communities. Colonia’s exist on both sides on the border. They are a space in which what it means to be a Mexican in the United States is constructed. Colonia’s are usually filled with substandard housing stock. Immigration to the United States was at its highest in the 1980’s when the Mexican economy was at worst. Women’s traditional gender roles in Mexico are caretaking and for men are to be providers. It is important in the production of political subjects in the Colonia’s. Most Colonia households have one car sometimes it may not be working so it requires carpooling. Some of the people who live in the Colonia’s were interviewed about gender roles and what they expect from men and women. Some responses about the about the fathers role was the most authority, kids obey him more; give security to their families, and the provider. Some responses about the mothers roles was intelligence and wisdom, educator, iron clothes, bathe the kids, take them to school, and feed them food. These roles are traditional patriarchal roles but women on a daily bases are also active in leadership roles. The Colonia homes would not a functioning home without the women. Men who work from eight to five or nine to five come home after work and their work is done for the day. Any other activities are recreational. Women leaders find it easier to be active in public areas if their husbands are not present. Many of the leaders are women who are the heads of their households.

Don’t Let the Sun (Chapter 7&8)

Chedisake was a small community, there were only six families including Eva’s who lived there. All of the families helped each other out though. They shared hunting supplies and if one person shot a deer they shared the meat. Eva’s family hunted a lot. They shot with .22’s and .44’s. Eva shot her first deer with a .22. Her mother spent much of her time making jerky. Not many people had money in their community so when they did have money they used it to buy things. Eva’s mother traded goods most of the time. Eva rode horses often. Her family had many animals that her mother looked after. Charley talked to the horses in Apache, they would just stand there and listen. Eva started taming horses when she was 16, she learned from her brothers. I think Eva really enjoys being around horses, once she learned to ride and tame horses she never stopped.

Don’t Let the Sun (Chapter 5&6)

Eva’s sister died but before she did they attended school together at St. John’s Indian School. Everyone spoke English so if you didn’t know it you had to learn it. The boys and girls were always separated from each other and they rarely played together or participated in activities together. Music was taught at school and Eva’s brother Joe played the piano and the organ. The second year Eva was at St. Johns she got chicken pox really bad and was in the hospital for a week. Eva did not want to go home for the summer break, she wanted to stay because back at home was only her mother and her mother worked all the time. She didn’t want to go home just to be alone all the time. Eva’s mom also remarried to a man named Charley Marley. She had never met him but already was not fond of him. The next summer she decided to go home for the summer and she discovered Charley was a very kind man and he made her laugh. Eva went back to St Johns after summer break but came back right away to take care of her mother who became blind from trachoma. Eva had to stay with her mother but eventually she got better and Eva went back to school. Eva’s mother and Charley Marley moved form Cibecue to Chedisake and lived on land that belonged to Charley. He built a log home on that land and Eva’s brothers helped. They all lived there, Eva, her brothers, her mother and Charley. It wasn’t big but it stayed warm.

No Parole Today (pg 1-27)

In this book, Laura Tohe memorably records her experiences with boarding school life alongside those of her mother and grandmother. She also writes of the joys and tragedies of growing up on and off the Reservation. She describes attending a government school for Indian children and the challenge it presented to her socially, culturally, and expressively. She shares many of her experiences in poems. In grade school she describes her teacher, Miss Rolands as an alien to them. She was a black woman from Texas and the children thought she had a hard time adjusting to living in a Dine community. Laura loved to dance, she and her friends practiced often and she enjoyed wearing her dancing boots that her brother often made fun of. In high school her first dance was with Pierce in the Indian School gym. She remembers his cologne and the way it smelled, she will never forget the smell of Pierce. When she went off to college she starts to remember home and how much she misses it. She remembers the calves nuzzling their mothers; she remembers the mountains, the smells and her mother. She misses her mother’s warm, round tortillas.

Strong Women Stories (Chapter 3)

The Métis Women’s Circle was founded 1995 by Métis women as a response to a need expressed by women of mixed blood and Métis heritage. There is healing work to be done in the Métis communities and a lot of that has to do with people having the notion that they are only alive in history books. Many Métis women fear being told that they don’t belong. Other Métis women have chosen to identify with mainstream culture. To be considered in the Métis Women’s Circle they are three conditions that are required and that is mixed Aboriginal ancestry, self-declaration as Métis, and community acceptance. Many of the Métis women are attempting to expand and displace histories but have failed because too much reliance has been placed on what has been written about Métis. Métis women’s voices are not documented in historical texts. Because of this the Métis Midwife’s Medicine Planting project was created. The projects purpose is to reconstruct Métis women’s histories specific to the southern Great Lakes region. This project has helped to better understand Métis values and Aboriginal worldviews. Their work brings the Circle together in hopeful anticipation each time a tiny scrap of history is uncovered.

Women and Change (Chapter 3)

Mobility is made up of daily routines and complicated and precisely timed arrangements. The journey to work is an important type of daily movement for women in the United States and Mexico. Women who have to travel across the border to go to work or go home affect their daily mobility and time constraints are a major consideration. The main concern for women and mobility is the need to coordinate between work and household responsibilities as well as their children. Some women are fully responsible for their child’s care and some have to work part-time to attend to their children. Child care is often a major time conflict or restraint in everyday working women’s lives. The border location adds complications to families who work on both sides of the border and have to find child care. Surprisingly, after a study was done it was found that the most common motive for crossing the border from either direction was to shop. That was surprising to me because I would think if the people crossed the border to shop in a certain place then it would be on only one side of the border. Shopping however classified as grocery shopping, specialty foods only available on one side, and prescription drugs. Some other reasons people cross the border are to see family and friends and receiving health care from doctors and dentists.
After 9/11 many things have changed at the border. Sometime the wait at the border can be long, now residents or visitors can now check the Internet to see updated times for how long the wait is at the border. Because problems at the border have created much delays in crossing of the border. That has affected many aspects of the border community. Because of increased waiting time there has been a decrease in shopping which has affected businesses. There has been an increase in security at the border which has created a decline in cross-border traffic.

Women and Change (Chapters 1 & 2)

The women at the U.S. Mexican border are facing many issues; employment, long-term mobility, and political activism are all concerns. This chapter talked about changing lives of indigenous immigrant women from Mexico’s poorer southern states. There is an ongoing problem with women who live and work on different sides of the U.S. Mexican border. Immigration is growing massively and migration from Mexico to the United States has become more dangerous.
Indigenous women who work in Baja California often have double and triple work days and are still expected to perform housework, child care, physically demanding salaried work and craft production and its commercialization. Added work in the tradition of immigrants is another extension for indigenous women. They also perform hostess functions such as washing, shopping, cooking and cleaning. The standard of living conditions for immigrants are related to immigration.
Many younger women differ from the older generations. They contract their own jobs, work without male supervision, negotiate, and collect their own salaries. Many of these young indigenous women work in the maquiladoras of Tijuana, Ensenada, Maneadero, or Mexicali. Today, many of the younger women who have finished primary and or secondary school control their own salaries, study technical or professional careers, and defend their right to choose their partners.

Dissident Women (Chapter 8)

Women who participate within the EZLN are very active at all levels. The women organize communities and regions; they also take part in the women’s militia who form irregular troops who are called to action. The women also are a part of the support bases who take part in all of the EZLN initiatives. In 1995 the people of San Francisco were forced to flee from their home to protect themselves against the Mexican Army. After three months they finally returned home to find devastation. Their homes, belongings, and animals were all destroyed. Everyday life for them involves violence and the way they go about everyday life has changed. The women’s tasks have been made more difficult because of the army, they have to walk much further everyday to fetch water and fire wood. The Mexican army settled in San Francisco because it had pronounced itself a community in resistance after the EZLN. Since the EZLN uprising in the community changes have been made and they have been made for the good. Maria Angelica talks about some of the changes she has noticed. The Women’s Revolutionary Law issued by the EZLN is a symbol of women’s dignity for the Zapatista women. Women were given the right to choose their spouses and were not forced or sold into marriage. Women also had the right to take part in community politics and hold leadership posts. Physical violence against women is also prohibited and it has decreased in the community. It has become more normal to find young women of twenty-one who are still single considering ten years ago women were married at the age of fourteen. The use of birth control pills have been used more by married women in the community. With the Zapatista uprising men are helping women with tasks that were previously considered exclusively women’s domain. Women are continuing to fight for their rights and a change but they still face obstacles and resistance inside the EZLN.

Strong Women Stories (Chapter 2)

Laura Schwager describes native traditions and values as a feeling of coming home. Her father was native but he did not speak of it. Her mother believed in native ways though and so did Laura as a child. Her story begins with searching her ancestral tree and the search to finding out who she really is. She comes from the Hotinonshon:ni, meaning the People of the Longhouse. Her great-grandmother was a hard working native woman. She spoke Mohawk and made baskets from black ash and sweet grass and mittens from deer hide to sell in Kingston. She was a native woman raising three children and went against the norm of married couples. She worked very hard when they moved to Belleville to support her three kids. Her great-grandmother is remembered for sticking up for Native people. Her father grew up with no Indian status in his life but remembers his cousin coming by the house when he was young to tell his father that he should have Indian status. It wasn’t until his twenties when he realized there was Indian blood in his family. His father finally acquired Indian status and became the first of his mother’s children to do so. Laura does not have Indian status but her family tree begins with Native roots. Laura is on a journey to find and explore her Native heritage and her Native self.

Every Day is a Good Day (Chapter 3)

Living according to a certain set of values is one of the most important attributes of culture. The lack of knowledge about indigenous people has created a lot of stereotypes. Because the indigenous people have had contact with the Euro-Americans in the past their culture and traditions are automatically paired with Euro-Americans. To the indigenous people Euro-Americans are considered more analytical; they rely on formal logic and avoid contradictions where native Americans view things in a more interrelated way.
Wilma Mankiller in her early child hood lived in a house with no plumbing, no electricity, no well, and no paved roads. Clothes and shoes for the winter were bought with money her father earned butting broomcorn. They signed up for the Bureau of Indian Affairs Relocation Program which was supposed to provide a better life for them but San Francisco turned out to be a culture shock to their family. They were able to connect with other Native people who had also been relocated by the Bureau. They met at a center called the old San Francisco Indian Center however it burned down before the occupation of Alcatraz. When Wilma married they had two kids. Her husband was controlling and wanted her to be a certain way, she always tried to be perfect for him and he made the decisions for everything they did. She had no say in where they traveled and how much money they spent. She ended up taking money out of their account and went to buy herself a car. She took her daughters about 100 miles out of San Francisco to an indigenous world that loved and embraced them. It was called the Pomo Kashia Ranchero. She seemed much happier there. After her and her children enjoyed traveling around California for a while she traveled to the Colville Reservation to attend a spiritual gathering following the Wounded Knee occupation. Her marriage ended and she would be heading back to Oklahoma soon. She began working for the Cherokee Nation. The Cherokee traditional identity is tied to both an individual and a collective determination. Be responsible, and loving, and help one another.

Every Day is a Good day(Chapt 1,2)

Audrey Shenandoah is described as a clan mother; she is responsible for the welfare and social harmony of the clan. She has important roles and is responsible for the removal of male chiefs who are considered caretakers of peace. Mary and Carrie Dann represent personification of Indigenous womanhood-beautiful, strong, loving, and free woman. The struggle with the U.S. government taking the Shoshone land seems unfair in my opinion. The Indigenous people have been putting up a fight but the government does not seem like they are respecting their rights. The land and history of the Native Americans affects the lives of native people today. History is who they are and reflects the decisions made today. Chapter one talked about how indigenous and native women are little known about and that has created stereotypes about native women. However these native and indigenous women play a critical role in many indigenous committees as leaders in tribal societies and the larger culture around them. The indigenous people embrace many spiritual practices such as Christianity and Buddhism. Being forced out of their land is a problem because the native people know it will be impossible to keep their culture intact. Their land is sacred and an important key to their culture.

American Indian Women's Activism in the 1960s and 1970s (H.O)

The purpose of the 1953 Termination Act offered one-way bus fare and the promise of assistance in finding jobs and housing in urban areas for reservation Indians, usually younger tribal members with more employable skills. The BIA estimated that 200,000 Indians were relocated under this program while the Indian Removal Act of 1830 had forced less than half this number, 89,000, to relocate. The high point of termination policy occurred during the period from 1952 to 1962. The Alcatraz Occupation was a landmark occupation that began in November 1969 and ended nineteen months later, in June 1971.The Indian population in California was 82 percent urban in contrast to states such as Arizona, New Mexico, Alaska, and North Carolina, where Indians were more than 70 percent rural. Urban residents at this time had more education and lower rates of unemployment. The 1969 occupation of Alcatraz, which gained national and international media coverage, was led by students from California campuses and supported by community members of the San Francisco Indian Center. The important thing that happened from the Alcatraz movement was they raised so much political consciousness and because of the Education act they gained land back.
Fish-in protests began as a response to Washington state policy that tried to use state laws to restrict Indian fishing rights guaranteed by federal treaties. Women Led the Fish-In Movement. The fish-ins started out as nonviolent civil disobedience, but after violence from state and city law enforcement, game wardens and white vigilantes, including the use of tear gas, clubs, beatings, and shootings, Indians responded in self-defense. In most cases, it was women who carried the arms during the fish-ins. Women comprised the majority of protesters and half of those arrested. One of the first protests occurred in 1961: of twenty-seven protesters, only eight were men. When men were arrested, women ran the fishing boats. The Fish-in movement was to fight for reservations and wanted their treaty rights back. They constantly battled fishing laws with the government. Native American women very important during the Indian Rights Movements because the struggles were mostly lack of health care, no schooling, and no reliable resources so it was the women who stepped up and opened community health clinics, they opened schools and ran them so their kids can get schooling. They brang urbanization to the community.

Strong Women Stories (Intro & Ch 1)

This reading tells a story about Gertie Mai Muise of the Mi’kmaq women who travels back home to Newfoundland for a visit. Home for Gertie Mai is a non-status Mi’kmaq community. She had been forced to live away because of the precarious economic situation. This trip home will give her the opportunity to network with the women and help them to deal with the problems they face. Coming home means having a sense of status of your Native heritage; it is something that native people need to do to re-embrace the traditions that return them to their Native community. Coming home can be reconnecting to their communities both physically and emotionally to make them feel at home. Some major problems the Mi’kmaq people are faced with are assimilation and intermarriage are problems the Mi’kmaq people face because the genocide experienced for years has forced those people to attempt to blend in with the dominant culture. Outsiders and academics have established their authority over the Mi’kmaq existence and history. The federal government has encouraged for the Mi’kmaq chiefs to call themselves “Mi’kmaq Descendants”. The Mi’kmaq people are disappearing as a race and women and children are being abused and sexually assaulted. Suicides are taking place because of people wanting to pass on to the spirit world. When Gertie Mai arrived in her hometown she wanted to bring a sense of hope to the community. The gathering took place at a female relative’s home and women and children were in and out throughout the day. She talked about her understanding of traditional concepts of self-determination, attitudes, elders, and about traditional forms of governance and techniques for listening, talking, and justice. By night time the men have rejoined the women and children and there is a new energy that filled every person. A safe environment has been created and much healing work is being done.

Don't Let the Sun (Chap 3,4)

Eva and her family began their journey to Roosevelt and camped along the way at night. Moving to Roosevelt was best for the family because there were jobs available. Eugene which was Eva’s brother ran away to Roosevelt to attend a boarding school and work. The family called Roosevelt their new home. The everyday tasks Eva’s father did was carry rocks down to where the new road was being built and her three brothers Joe, Jack, and Albert carried water to the workers. That was their job and they received pay for it. Grandma Rose and Eva’s mother traveled across the lake and collected wood. Grandma Rose stayed with the family for a little while until the family was able to get back on the Apache Trail and then she moved back to San Carlos. Gambling was a very entertaining part of the Roosevelt community and lots of money was won and lost on a daily basis. Many new things were introduced to Eva in Roosevelt such as gambling games for men and women and she saw a car for the first time ever. As the road (Apache trail) was getting built the family moved mile to mile as it was being built. Eva cooked all the time as well as carried water and gathered wood. They currently lived at the Mormon Flat when Eva’s father became really sick with pneumonia and unfortunately passed away. The children were not allowed to attend the funeral and they stayed at the Mormon Flat while the rest of the family went back home to San Carlos to attend the funeral. The family then moved to Solomon because work became available. Eva’s sister Donna also died that year. There was nothing the doctor could to do to save her. I think Eva’s mom has done a really good job of holding it together. She lost her husband and now her daughter but she is continuing to take care of Eva and her brother while they go through grade school at St. John’s. I think it was unfortunate that she was put in jail but I think she is doing a good job as a mom and as a primary provider for her family.