Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-42gr6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-20T01:35:19.627Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Epistemic Injustice and Resistance in the Chiapas Highlands: The Zapatista Case

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2020

Sergio Gallegos  and
Carol Quinn
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Though Indigenous women in Mexico have traditionally exhibited some of the highest levels of maternal mortality in the country—a fact that some authors have argued was an important reason to explain the EZLN uprising in 1994—there is some evidence that the rate of maternal mortality has fallen in Zapatista communities in the Chiapas Highlands in the last two decades, and that other health indicators have improved. In this article, we offer an account of the modest success that Zapatista communities have achieved in improving their health levels. In particular, we argue that Zapatista women have implicitly used a form of feminist standpoint theory to diagnose the epistemic (and economic) injustice to which they have been traditionally subjected and to develop an epistemology of resistance that is manifested in actions such as becoming health promoters in their communities. We also argue that this epistemology of resistance is partially responsible for the improvement of health levels in their communities. Finally, on the basis of our discussion of the Zapatista case, we suggest that standpoint theory could play an important role in other healthcare settings involving oppressed minorities.

Type
Articles
Information
Hypatia , Volume 32 , Issue 2 , Spring 2017 , pp. 247 - 262
Copyright
Copyright © 2017 by Hypatia, Inc.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Ariana, Proochista. 2012. Challenging our understanding of health: Indigenous perspectives from the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. Oxford Development Studies 40 (3): 405–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benjamin, Thomas. 1996. A rich land, a poor people: Politics and society in modern Chiapas, rev ed. Santa Fe: University of New Mexico Press.Google Scholar
Blas, Erik, Gilson, Lucy, Kelly, Michael P., Labonté, Ronald, Lapitan, Jostacio, Muntaner, Carles, Östlin, Piroska, Popay, Jennie, Sadana, Ritu, Sen, Gita, Schrecker, Ted, and Vaghri, Ziba. 2008. Addressing social determinants of health inequalities: What can the state and civil society do? The Lancet 372 (9650): 1684–89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brentlinger, Paula E., Sánchez‐Pérez, Héctor Javier, Arana‐Cedeño, Marcos, Vargas‐Morales, Guadalupe, Hernán, Miguel A., Micek, Mark A., and Ford, Douglas. 2005. Pregnancy outcomes, site of delivery and community schisms in regions affected by the armed conflict in Chiapas, Mexico. Social Science & Medicine 61 (5): 1001–14.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Collins, Patricia Hill. 2000. Black feminist thought: Knowledge, consciousness, and the politics of empowerment, 2nd ed.New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Crenshaw, Kimberlé. 1989. Demarginalizing the intersection of race and sex: A black feminist critique of antidiscrimination doctrine, feminist theory and antiracist politics. The University of Chicago Legal Forum 140: 139–67.Google Scholar
Cypess, Sandra Messinger. 1991. La Malinche in Mexican literature: From history to myth. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Eber, Christine. 2003. Buscando una nueva vida: Liberation through autonomy in San Pedro Chenalhó, 1970–1998. In Mayan lives, Mayan utopias: The Indigenous peoples of Chiapas and the Zapatista rebellion, ed. Rus, Jan, Hernández‐Castillo, Rosalva Aída, and Mattice, Shannan. Lanham, Md.: Rowman and Littlefield.Google Scholar
Forbis, Melissa. 2006. Autonomy and a handful of herbs: Contesting gender and ethnic identities through healing. In Dissident women: Gender and cultural politics in Chiapas, ed. Speed, Shannon, Hernández‐Castillo, Rosalva Aída, and Stephen, Lynn. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Freyermuth‐Enciso, Graciela. 2003. Las mujeres de humo: Morir en Chenalhó Género, etnia y generación, factores constitutivos del riego durante la maternidad. México, DF: CIESAS‐Porrúa.Google Scholar
Freyermuth‐Enciso, Graciela, and Argüello‐Avendaño, Hilda. 2011. La muerte prematura de mujeres en los Altos de Chiapas: Un análisis desde la violencia. Revista Pueblos y Fronteras Digital 6 (10): 181–216.Google Scholar
Fricker, Miranda. 2007. Epistemic injustice. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harding, Sandra. 2004. Rethinking standpoint epistemology: What is “strong objectivity”? In The feminist standpoint theory reader, ed. Harding, Sandra. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Heredia Cuevas, Joel. 2007. Health and autonomy: the case of Chiapas. A case study commissioned by the Health Systems Knowledge Network. http://www.who.int/social_determinants/resources/csdh_media/autonomy_mexico_2007_en.pdf (accessed July 17, 2015).Google Scholar
Hernández‐Tezoquipa, Isabel, Arenas‐Monreal, Luz, and Treviño‐Siller, Sandra. 2005. “Without money you're nothing”: Poverty and health in Mexico from women's perspective. Revista Latino‐Americana de Enfermagem 13 (5): 626–33.Google Scholar
Higgins, Nicholas. 2004. Understanding the Chiapas Rebellion: Modernist visions and the invisible Indian. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
INEGI (Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografia). 2010. Panorama sociodemográfico de Chiapas. http://www.inegi.org.mx/prod_serv/contenidos/espanol/bvinegi/productos/censos/poblacion/2010/panora_socio/chis/Panorama_Chis.pdf (accessed July 17, 2015).Google Scholar
Jaggar, Alison. 2004. Feminist politics and epistemology: The standpoint of women. In The Feminist standpoint theory reader, ed. Harding, Sandra. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Jung, Courtney. 2008. The moral force of Indigenous politics: Critical liberalism and the Zapatistas. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kincheloe, Joe L., and Steinberg, Shirley. 2008. Indigenous knowledges in education: Complexities, dangers, and profound benefits. In Handbook of critical and Indigenous methodologies, ed. Denzin, Norman, Lincoln, Yvonna, and Tuhiwai Smith, Linda. Los Angeles: Sage Publishing Inc.Google Scholar
Klein, Hilary. 2015. Compañeras: Zapatista women's stories. New York: Seven Stories Press.Google Scholar
Lumsden, R. D., García‐E, R., Lewis, J. A., and Frías‐T, G. A. 1987. Suppression of damping‐off caused by pythium SPP in soil from the Indigenous Mexican Chinampa agricultural system. Soil Biology and Biochemistry 19 (5): 501–508.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maurial, Mahia. 1999. Indigenous knowledge and schooling: A continuum between conflict and dialogue. In What is Indigenous knowledge? Voices from the academy, ed. Semali, Ladislaus and Kincheloe, Joe. New York: Falmer Press.Google Scholar
Medina, José. 2013. The epistemology of resistance: Gender and racial oppressions, epistemic injustice, and resistant imaginations. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mesri, Parastoo Anita. 2002. The violation of the human right to health as a factor in the Zapatista revolution of Chiapas, Mexico. Tulsa Journal of Comparative and International Law 10 (2): 473–511.Google Scholar
Mohanty, Chandra Talpade. 1988. Under western eyes: Feminist scholarship and colonial discourses. Feminist Review 30 (1): 61–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nájera‐Ortiz, J. C., Sánchez‐Pérez, A. J., Ochoa‐Díaz, H., Arana‐Cendeño, M., Salazar‐Lezama, M. A., and Martín‐Mateo, M. 2008. Demographic, health services and socio‐economic factors associated with pulmonary tuberculosis mortality in Los Altos region of Chiapas, Mexico. International Journal of Epidemiology 37 (4): 786–95.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Reyes‐González, , Patricia, Martha, and Gordillo, Guadalupe Álvarez. 2014. Formación de promotores para la prevención y control de la tuberculosis en la región fronteriza de Chiapas, México. Población y Salud en Mesoamérica 11 (2): 1–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, Linda Tuhiwai. 1999. Decolonizing methodologies: Research and Indigenous peoples. London: Zed Books.Google Scholar
Speed, Shannon, Hernández‐Castillo, Rosalva Aída, and Stephen, Lynn, eds. 2006. Dissident women: Gender and cultural politics in Chiapas. Austin: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Tucker, Kathryn, Ochoa, Héctor, Garcia, Rosario, Sievwright, Kirsty, Chambliss, Amy, and Baker, Margaret C. 2013. The acceptability and feasibility of an intercultural birth center in the highlands of Chiapas, Mexico. BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth 13 (94).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Young, Iris Marion. 1990. Justice and the politics of difference. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Zylberberg‐Panebianco, Violeta. 2008. ¿Queriendo se puede cambiar todo? Un acercamiento al proceso de discusión y cambio que se vive en el interior de una comunidad zapatista. In Etnografías e Historias de Resistencia: mujeres indígenas, procesos organizativos e identidades políticas, ed. Hernández Castillo, Rosalva Aída. Mexico, DF: CIESAS‐UNAM.Google Scholar