Witchcraft, Intersectionality, and Agency: A Gendered Approach to the Study of Colonial Mexico and Surrounding Regions, early 1500s to late 1600s
Abstract:
The main focus of this project is a historical examination of the power dynamics of the practice and accusation of witchcraft. My primary research question is: how did the concept of witchcraft affect Mexican women in regards to agency and intersectionality between the 16th and 17th centuries? To extend this historical analysis, I explore how the ramifications of this history may have influenced modern-day feminist Latinx movements, specifically the Brujería Movement. By challenging traditional frameworks of chronology and disciplinarity, I argue two points: (1) that the Spanish colonization of Mexico and the Aztec empire was the catalyst for the craze in witchcraft trials throughout this region of Latin America and its direct impact being the implementation of a new social order that perpetuated racist, sexist, and pro-Catholic legislation; (2) that witchcraft ironically existed as a dualistic colonial instrument – an application of oppression induced by the Spanish colonizers upon Indigenous and enslaved African peoples, as well as a way in which oppressed individuals could gain a level of power and control within a predominantly racist, patriarchal society. Sources that have influenced my project include a multitude of Spanish Inquisition cases as well as secondary works produced by historians such as Ruth Behar, Martha Few, Karen Vieira Powers, María Elena Martínez, and Louise M. Burkhart – all of which explore themes of gender, sexuality, race, religion, genealogy, and socioeconomic class in regards to colonial Mexican witchcraft.