Latina Empowerment and Border Realities 403
against artificial birth control, Latinas admit undergoing sterilization procedures and
using artificial birth control, sometimes without the knowledge of their husbands. In
several focus group discussions I conducted, women admitted coaxing their husbands
to get vasectomies. One woman stated:
[I]magine, eleven pregnancies with the rhythm method, I surmise that it doesn’t
work too well, does it? My sisters, I don’t know if all of them, but some of them have
told me that they went for the “operation,” and I know that some of them have not
told their husbands. (ibid. 627)These findings are consistent with American Catholics’ attitudes toward birth control
and sexuality where there is little support for church teaching (Greeley 1989). Surveys
show that even among Hispanic Catholics who both attend Mass and take communion
at least once a month – a group that might be considered among the most likely to
follow the teaching on contraception – 38 percent of all women of reproductive age were
practicing a method not approved by the Vatican (Goldscheider and Mosher 1991).
If we extend to the Latina experience what Patricia Hill Collins (1991) argues about
African-American women’s empowerment process, understanding women’s culture of
resistance helps to dispel common myths of Latina passivity/submissiveness. In taking
this approach, we are better able to come to a more complex understanding of how
Latinas stand against the dominant ideology promulgated in patriarchal societal in-
stitutions – those rooted in the Latino community as well as those of the dominant
society. We see this particularly clearly when we look at Latinas’ resistance to their sub-
ordination in marriage. Women question religious leaders who advise them to return
to abusive marriages for the sake of preserving the marriage (Pena and Frehill 1998: ̃
13–15). My research also shows that Latinas draw from the strengths of the Latina/o
community by participating in local faith-based community groups and organizations.
In fact, Latinas often turn to their own culture, and not the dominant one, to find the
empowerment they need to confront personal, family, and community crises.
Other scholars offer additional insights on efforts to challenge the passiv-
ity/submissiveness paradigm. For example, Oliva M. Esp ́ın emphasizes the empowered
place middle-aged and elderly Latina women have within the family. She observes that:
Middle-aged and elderly Hispanic women retain important roles in their families
even after their sons and daughters are married. Grandmothers are ever present
and highly vocal in family affairs. Older women have much more status and power
than their white American counterparts, who at this age may be suffering from de-
pression due to what has been called the “empty-nest syndrome.” Many Hispanic
women are providers of mental health services in an unofficial way as “curanderas,”
“espiritistas,” or “santeras,” for those people who believe in these alternative
approaches to health care. (1995: 423)Thus, research on Latinas points to the importance of considering specific status mark-
ers (i.e., age, class, gender, and race), in the cultural context of the Latina, particularly if
one dimension of community work bridges popular religious practice and community
health practice. That elderly women are held in high esteem in the life of the Latino/a
community can be gleaned from the migration narratives of Latinas who, regardless
of Latin American country of origin, share a common Spanish colonial cultural her-
itage. This makes their narratives more similar than distinct when it comes to the social