Een wraakzuchtige Maria. Boliviaanse vrouwen over lijden en woede door huiselijk geweld.
Auteurs
Sanne Derks
Meike Heessels
Samenvatting
Scholarly research on domestic violence in
Latin America often relates to dominant notions
of masculinity and femininity: machismo
and marianismo. Within this gender paradigm
women are said to embrace the values of the
Virgin Mary as a passive submissive role model.
Up to this moment, these studies ignored
the question whether women indeed refer to
Mary as a symbol that encourages them to
endure gender-related suffering. Therefore,
this article analyses Bolivian women’s experiences
of domestic violence in relation to
their interpretations of the Virgin of Urkupiña
in Quillacollo, Bolivia. Although the stories
of these female pilgrims are full of suffering,
we argue that they do not merely accept their
suffering in marianistic terms. Rather, rage, or
rabia, seems to be a central concept in their
religious experiences. Women approach the
Virgin of Urkupiña to transfer their rage and
to ask for intervention in situations of domestic
violence. The Virgin of Urkupiña is thus
not only venerated for her capacity to endure
suffering, but is also perceived as a powerful
and vicious goddess of vengeance.