Indigenous genders



MUXES: Indigenous Genders
BBC - Travel - The third gender of southern Mexico

Juchitán, Mexico recognizes a third gender. Muxes are people who are biologically male but embody a third gender that is neither male nor female. Their gender and sexuality intersects with their native identification in a way that cannot be recreated outside of the Zapotec society, where there is more gender freedom than the rest of Mexico. In the past, muxes were seen as a gift from the gods. Contemporary muxes are an integral part of Zapotec, and they are fully active and accepted in the community. Because in Zapotec, “la-ave referred to people, la-ame to animals, and la-ani to inanimate beings,” the construction of ‘he’ and ‘she’ came from the Spanish and renders their unique identity untranslatable to other contexts. Sexuality became a powerful mechanism through which Europeans, Spaniards in this case specifically, could frame their existence as "perverse" and validate violence. Muxes are only one of the many pre-colonial examples of sexual and gender diversity, but their experiences are sometimes flattened for other audiences. Muxes are resisting the imposition of LGBT classification upon them. They are not gay men or men who dress as women and cannot be reduced to language surrounding a binary feminine and masculine gender. They are an identity, like all, that is specific to the fabric in which it was constructed. Additionally, muxes and other genders across Latin America continue to add to the conversation that, although gender is a separate identity from sexuality, gender is used to define sexuality, and are therefore must be discussed alongside it.

Sources:
Bosia, Michael J., Sandra M. McEvoy, Momin Rahman, and Manuela L. Picq. "Decolonizing Indigenous Sexualities: Between Erasure and Resurgence." In The Oxford Handbook of Global LGBT and Sexual Diversity Politics. : Oxford University Press, 2020-05. DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190673741.013.23

Indian Woman in Legal Battle to Give Zapotec Women Basic Rights. 2008. Associated Press. https://video-ebscohost-com.ccl.idm.oclc.org/details/1_nga8pq8c?q=Zapotec&deviceId=164b5f9c-8898-4f75-ae0e-67c04a30bd65&lang=en&minDate=&maxDate=


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I'm Emily Ortiz, a freshman at Claremont McKenna College, and one of the co-founders. I'm a first-generation Mexican-American, so I have always been invested in the history of Latin America. I began to notice, however, that Latin America was often treated as a monolith, instead of the incredibly diverse and beautifully complicated countries they are. As I discovered more about myself too, I became invested in the LGBTQ+ movements, not only in the U.S., but in the various Latin American countries, as well. In the very little research I conducted, I could never find much information on pre-colonial views on sex and sexuality. Because access to information brings power, and silence on issues contributes to oppression, I believe this blog should serve as a space to learn and connect with people who are just as invested in learning more about their history.

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