CHAPTER 12 WOMEN AND GENDER IN MESOAMERICA 471Box 12.6 How CONAVIGUA Came to Life.“Since I was fourteen I joined groups of young Catholics, cooperative groups and literacy groups.
We taught women using their own experiences, employing the milpa, a hoe, a broom, to teach
them to read and write in connection with their reality.
“Our lives changed after the earthquake of 1976. We devoted our energies to reconstruct
our town and villages. Our communal organization was increasingly stronger because everybody
participated in the work of reconstruction.
“Then the violence came, in 1979. We were disbanded. Our work became extremely diffi-
cult, many women disappeared, others were murdered. The whole population was terrorized. The
groups disintegrated. Everybody felt persecuted....
“In 1984, while I was living in the city with my family, my husband was kidnapped and I was
left alone with two children.... I had to sell vegetables in the city every day with my children. It
is thus that I had the opportunity to meet other sisters that were also widows. We supported
each other, we began to weave together and our work grew.
“We were here in Guatemala City, all of us widows, when we learned about similar groups
in Chimaltenango. There were groups all over the country and we began to communicate. That
is how CONAVIGUAcame to life; it was not the work of one or two women, but of many, seeking
help, seeking corn. In the first Assembly of Widows there were one hundred representatives of
the different groups. I was chosen as a member of the board because I was one of the three
women, among those 100, who knew how to read, write and speak Spanish. This Assembly
opened the eyes of many women. Sharing our problems strengthened us.” From “Rosalina Tuyuc:
Our Lives Changed Since the Earthquake,” interview published in Siglo Veintiuno,April 20, 1993.
Translated by Brenda Rosenbaum.their countries and now seek to transform their societies so that their children may
have a better future. A similar process of awareness and development of activism
took place in the refugee camps in Mexico, where thousands of Guatemalan Maya
widows fled in terror with their children.
In contrast to the movements in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua, from its
inception women found a place in the Zapatista rebellion in Chiapas as combatants
and in positions of leadership in support bases in their local communities (see
Chapter 10). Mayan women constitute about one-third of the combat forces and 55
percent of the popular support of the Zapatista National Liberation Army that came
onto the world’s stage in January 1994. During the peace talks between rebel lead-
ers and representatives of the Mexican government, female commanders Ana María,
Ramona, and Maribel shared the negotiating table with Subcomandante Marcos;
and journalists witnessed the internationally renowned Marcos taking orders from Ra-
mona, a slight woman wearing a multicolored, handwoven huipil.
Local Zapatista support bases and regional councils are structured to have equal
numbers of male and female representatives. In reality it is often difficult to find
women willing to fill leadership positions, since most women are married and have
children and cannot afford to take on unpaid service outside the home (Eber 1999).
Men have yet to assist their wives sufficiently with household work and child care to
enable women to serve in leadership positions.In many communities only unmar-
ried, divorced, or widowed women serve in leadership positions.