"Citizenship and Rights in the New Republics"

  There were three documents that stood out the most for me in this weeks reading. Those documents are 3.1 "The Fetishist Animism of the Bahian Blacks" by Raimundo Nina Rodrigues, 3.4 "Brushstrokes" by Maria Eugenia Echenique, and 3.5 "Women: Dedicated to Miss Maria Eugenia Echenique" by Judith [Josefina Pelliza de Sagasta].  Document 3.1, to my understanding,  is a discussion of the evolution of fetishism and the evidence of its prevalence in Bahia, despite the claim of Christianity of the Black population. Nina Rodrigues states a position of "upmost neutrality and impartiality" however also describes the Bahian Blacks and mulattos as "inferior races". I wonder if Nina Rodrigues recognized his own hypocrisy which today seems so foolish. Such hypocrisy is evident later in his ideas that the violence placed on slaves to rid them of fetishism was due to slave owners' fears that the salves might have a will of their own. To me, this is exactly what this document is trying to do. Although it acknowledges a prevalence of fetishism, I think that it uses this finding as a tool to other and reinforce a primitive, non-human ( or at least non-christian) understanding of the Bahian Blacks in order to disempower them and give reason for any denial of citizen rights. 

  Document 3.4 by Maria Eugenia Echenique and document 3.5, which is a response to 3.4,  were in regards to women's rights in society. 3.4 surprised me, in a good way, because this is the earliest document i have read that calls for the equality of women and men. The issues Echenique discusses are still issues women fight for today around the world. However, i was surprised (mostly) that the response to Echenique's piece was written by a woman. My first reaction was that -if i read such a response to a call for the equality of women in today's Canadian context, i would think of it as 'unwomanly' however i realize that our society is quite different (but not opposite), thanks to the feminist movements which have taken place since the early 20th century up until now. My reaction was probably the reaction of Judith, in her context, which led her to such a disheartening response. Having said all of that, i would like to share something i came across in a magazine about 20 minutes after reading these two documents. It was an add for a kitchen knife -one of the big ones you need to cut the big veggies with. All the add was, was a close up of a woman's profile and the knife, sort of 'swung' over her shoulder as if it were a rifle or some other gun ( i don't know guns), and the look on the woman's face (as though looking far into the distance) expressed, bravery, empowerment, and ambition. When i saw this i laughed because to me is was saying exactly what Judith was saying -Women are free to be educated and empowered, but her power is to remain confined to the home. This is what made me rethink my first reaction to the response. Perhaps no one is saying it out loud but women are still being shown their 'place' in society, and there are still other women that would defend this position.

  I think that the all of these articles must have influenced society as much as they were  a result of it. I see an underlying theme of Christianity in all three articles which explains their reasoning and where they drew their 'facts' of what society should look like. It is evident that Christianity still held a lot of power. The first and last document are written from an essentialist point of view, that there is something about the essence of Blacks and women which make them different from whites and males. The whole discussion is still influenced by colonialism and that first question posed by Father Montesinos: "Are these not men?".