Transnational Feminista Praxis: Justice For The 56 Girls
From July to September 2019 I had the honor to travel to Guatemala City for summer fieldwork. As a Guatemalan native and Geographer, the story of the 41 girls from Hogar Seguro Virgen de la Asuncion interest me because of the regional location the tragedy took place at and to connect the issue to the high levels of feminicide and migration. I was able to identify two organizations working in Guatemala that are entrenched in the work against gender-based violence. One of the organizations is 8 Tijax- a small volunteer ran collective who began providing support to the families of the 41 girls after the tragedy on March 8, 2017. They became the families’ guardian angels taking upon themselves different roles such as hospital accompaniment, social workers, journalists, and advocates of justice for the 41 girls. I was able to interview all of the collectives’ participants plus one of the mothers of one of the girls.
The people of Guatemala has undergone traumatic events from an armed conflict that lasted more than forty-years inflicting terror in different indigenous territories to ongoing neoliberal policies creating devastating forms of inequalities. To conduct each of the interviews I had to keep that in mind. However, 8 Tijax participants resonated and appreciated the interviews, they shared how their collective formed and how their work has been to humanize and empower each of the girls’ stories. As one of the participants’ shared, “Within deep pain, love is born.” She mentioned how they do this labor of love to amplify the truth and to valorize each of the stories. 8 Tijax has created altars and even an international campaign known as #NosDuelen56 which is a tribute to all the girls who were inside Hogar Seguro, where 41 of them died after the fire and 15 face serious injuries. 8 Tijax continues to help the families through court cases and making the families stories go viral on social media to reach more people and global support.
MuJER is the second organization I had the pleasure to work with and interview some of the staff members. A community-based organization composed of five staff members. The organization’s main campaign is to provide a safe space to sexual workers and provide them with skillsets for them to learn and have different sources of income. MuJER is one of the organizations in Guatemala helping to advance gender equity and is part of a feminist network but it’s not as involved in the case of the 41 girls. Through the interviews I made the connection that MuJER could potentially provide emotional support to the mothers of the 41 girls. Many women reach out to this organization for psychological support and gain self-confidence in a society where patriarchal norms are valorized undermining women’s inclinations for self-determination. One of the best moments during my field work was when they invited me to provide a natural deodorant-making workshop for the women in the organization. I provided the materials and shared with them a step-by-step natural deodorant recipe. Some of them would make it at home and others were really excited to sell it to their friends to make extra cash. We were building community with one another and it made it feel more reciprocal.
These ethnographic encounters made me learn a lot, especially how women in Guatemala are organizing for better social and political conditions. Organizing culture appeared to be more relational and emotionally supportive. There were forms of cariño (tenderness) within the organizers through an embrace, or even applying essential oils on their bodies. It was really refreshing to see this because the issues these women are organizing against and for can bring you down, but their care and commitment are contagious to a feminist transnational movement.
~Ova Love~ Pomada/Salve
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