Jessica's History 465 Blog 2010-02-02 18:54:00

Although it seems that the parallelism of the Incan culture is vastly different from our own, there are many similarities. In the modern deconstruction of gender conventions, writers like Derrida have focused on the binary system of gender that is prevalent in western culture, their primary criticism being that, as we discussed, neither gender can be defined without reference to its differences from the other. Their proposed solution was a redefining of gender that would include broader definitions of the term. Unfortunately, our society has not, in general, moved very far beyond traditional conceptions.
The Incans, on the other hand, crafted a society that embraced the perceived differences between men and women and crafted a society based on the binary nature of gender. Their parallel belief system was nearly equal in its treatment of men and women, giving them each a hierarchical system according to class, with a male and female ruler at the top of society. Both genders had assigned tasks to further the success of their ayllu, and it could be argued that neither set of jobs was more difficult than the other. They embraced the fact that women were made for childbirth and men were made for protection and provision, but they did not see either role as more or less necessary than the other.
However, the system of convents described in the article by Garcilaso de la Vega does not seem to fit in this parallel scheme, since it involved only women. The virgins that were chosen for seclusion lived their lives without contact with the outside world, other than visits from the Coya and her servants. They were not given a choice in this fate, but they were revered as special servants of the huacas and the society in general, and the goods they produced were seen as more prestigious than normal ones.
When the Spanish arrived, the class distinctions that already existed within Incan society were exaggerated because of the way they fit into the social structures of the colonizers. The Spanish adventurers aligned themselves with the Incan nobles because they felt that their similarities in class standing outweighed their ethnic differences. For this reason, noble Incan women were often respected by the Spanish as potential partners, and their marriages were used as political alliances. This fit into the parallel structure of the Incans in a sense, but the male domination of the Spanish slowly began to affect this mixed culture.
Even though the Incan culture was still a binary definition of gender, it was in many ways more advanced than our own. The Incans celebrated the differences between men and women, and created a system of harmony. They also allocated specific jobs for women that allowed them to have a structured hierarchy within their own gender and a method of sustaining themselves and their families. This was a great help to the women as they began to interact with the Spanish, because they could hold their own and garner respect from men who were used to women being placed in roles of submissiveness and subjection.