The memory of Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz is alive and well in the U.S. Her writing and ideas about the need to educate women are central to a play, The Tenth Muse, which recently had its world premiere at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon. Set in a convent in Mexico City in 1715, twenty years after the death of Sor Juana, the central plot of the play is the discovery of the writings and musical scores of the iconic champion of women’s rights which had been hidden by her niece, also a nun, to prevent burning by the Inquisition. Continue reading The Tenth Muse→
We all know that Oaxaca’s capital city is renowned for its art scene, with a passel of museums and galleries; a little dawdling over a travel book will tell you it also has museums of philately, historic interest, archaeology, religion, textiles, and the Ferrocarril Mexicano. When we go to museums, we mostly just gawk and “gosh-golly,” but museums are the shining stars of informal education, that kind of life-long learning we engage in every time we do something that interests us and adds to our knowledge, skills, or abilities. Continue reading Community Museums—Very “Special Ed” for Indigenous Peoples→
It’s very early in the Huatulco morning, still dark, the dawn just beginning to silhouette the umbels of the guarumbo tree in back of the newly renovated Hotel Binniguenda. From my next-door balcony, I savor the serenity . . . Oops! The leaves flutter, the branches droop, and an unexpected guest rustles up early to start his daily foraging. Continue reading The Unnatural History of the Tejón→
In 1979, we took a train from the port of Vera Cruz to Jalapa, the capital of the state of Veracruz, to visit a friend. A beautiful trip; a train with old-fashioned charm, chugging slowly up the sides of the Sierra Madre Oriental. We saw coffee beans ripening among glossy green leaves, crossed deep gorges on spidery bridges, and ate gorditas we bought from women who boarded the train whenever it stopped. There might even have been a chicken crate or two overhead. Continue reading Buses Vs. Trains→
The illegitimate daughter of a Creole mother, Juana Inés de Asbaje y Ramírez was born in 1648 on a farm in central Mexico. By the age of three she had taught herself to read and frequently hid in the hacienda chapel engaging in an activity forbidden to girls, reading her grandfather’s books. She had an insatiable appetite for learning and devoured most of the available books before she was sent to live with relatives in Mexico City. Continue reading The First Feminist of the Americas→
Shifting perceptions of women and their roles in society have occurred more rapidly in Mexico City than in the rest of the country, not unusual given that large cities generally seem to adapt to change more readily than rural environments. The advancement of women in the workplace, at home, and in social standing has brought a new respect for women in general. We’re seeing more women playing active roles in government and gaining positions of power in politics, even in rural areas of the country. Continue reading Women, Respect and Mexico City→
Mexican women attained the right to vote much later than their counterparts in the US and Canada. Women in Mexico were granted both the right to vote in national elections and the right to run for national office in 1953. For most readers from the US, the 19th.amendment to the constitution (ratified in 1920), which prohibited discrimination by sex in the right to vote in federal and state elections, must seem like ancient history. But many of our Mexican friends clearly remember the first time the women in their families could vote in national elections. Continue reading Suffrage in Mexico→
Whenever a Mexican asks me when my birthday is and I tell them the date, they inevitably say “Día de la Bandera”. Young, old, it doesn’t matter, every Mexican knows what day they celebrate their National Flag. It always amazes me that they know this little bit of trivia; because in my home country, that is exactly what it seems to be – trivia or trivial. I would guess that less than 20% of my countrymen could tell you when Flag Day is in the USA. Continue reading Flag Day→
Oaxaca, Cuna y destino de la Civilización Americana is an impassioned plea for recognition of ancient Zapotec culture in the state of Oaxaca as the cradle of Mesoamerican society. As such, the treatise contends, Oaxaca constitutes one of the world’s six great founding civilizations. Author Juan Arturo López Ramos cites key evidence that Oaxacan settlement should be credited with developing the continent’s earliest known system of writing, calendar, cultivation, and first great city-state, Monte Albán. He bases his thesis on archaeological investigation by national and international researchers. Continue reading For the Love of Oaxaca, Cradle of Mesoamerica: A Book Review→
In the year 0 A.D. when Jesus of Nazareth was born, the Jewish Law of Moses dictated that a baby and its mother must present themselves at the Temple of worship forty days after it’s birth. Followers of Jesus Christ celebrate Jesus and Mary’s presentation every February 2nd. In Mexico it is called “el Dia de la Candelaria”, and in other parts of the world it is known as “Candelmas”, the “Feast of Purification”, or the “Presentation of Christ at the Temple”, among other names. Continue reading A Christian Holiday Celebrates a Jewish Tradition→
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