Impact of the Spanish Invasion on Andean Women

This week in class we discussed how important gender parallelism was in the culture of the Andeans. Everything was divided into distinct, completely separate male and female spheres. Men and women were seen as completely opposite as represented by the separate spheres that each sex represented such as sun and moon, lightning and rain, morning and evening, and sky and earth. These views worked for these people and constituted a nice flow for the workings of everyday life.

Lines of descent were according to sex. Daughters were linked primarily to their mothers and sons to their fathers, forming matrilines and patrilines. Likewise, surnames were passed on from one gender parent to the same gender child. There were also parallel lines of inheritance where the mother passed down her lands to her daughter upon marriage and death. These lands received by women, remained the woman’s own property upon marriage. Effective labor units involved both the male and female working together on different tasks within the home and community. There were distinct line of these male and female tasks that were essential for the maintenance and reproduction of the household, society, and the empire itself.

However, everything changed when the Spanish invaded the Andes. The Spaniards strove to immediately uproot everything of the Andean society for the sole purpose of their own wealth and prestige. According to Spanish law, women were legally minors. In order for women to obtain goods or property, they had to obtain permission from their male “tutors”, or husbands, and could not dispose of it on their own. On the other hand, land received by women from their mothers or anyone could be sold by their husbands without their permission. If that wasn’t demeaning enough, women were sometimes locked up by colonial administrators and forced to weave and spin for their own profit. They were essentially used as slaves not only for economic gain but for sexual use also. While women were seen essentially as equals sexually in the pre-Spanish invasion and permitted to engage in sexually activity, as long as both parties were willing, they were now seen as sex-slaves and concubines to the Spanish conquistadors. Many of the men that did not abandon their families because of the harsh conditions of the militia service took advantage of this new society of male dominance. They now had a sense of ownership of their female relatives, essentially pawning them to the intrusive, destructive Spaniards.

It is really sad to see the decent that women underwent during the invasion of the Spaniards. Everything was working cohesively for them and their families until the Spanish turned everything upside-down. Women equality is supposed to constantly move forward and it is disheartening to see it take a huge step back for the furtherance of Spain and its greedy conquistadors.