Restoring Miranda: gender and the limits of European patriarchy in the early modern Atlantic world

Abstract

Atlantic history has become fashionable as a way of linking the histories of Europe and the Americas. However, much work in Atlantic history does little to challenge the national biases of traditional colonial and imperial history. This article argues that gender provides an important conceptual tool for a trans-imperial and comparative exploration, just as it provided important conceptual structures for all the peoples of the Atlantic world. An examination of the research on two gendered issues – work, and family and sexuality – demonstrates that while Europeans attempted to impose their ideas on the various societies that they encountered in Africa and the Americas, such attempts were rarely successful. Gender not only provides the basis for a trans-imperial analysis of the Atlantic world but also enables us to reorient our scholarly perspective in the Atlantic, highlighting the agency of non-European peoples and exposing the limits of European patriarchy.

Las mujeres portuguesas en Canarias durante la agregación de la corona portuguesa a la monarquía hispánica: identidad, género y emigración

“…En este sentido, prosigue Almorza Hidalgo enfatizando que la Historia Atlántica ha demostrado su validez en el análisis de género (ALMORZA, 2018). Aunque es una línea de trabajo poco desarrollada, la referida historiadora destaca los trabajos de Verena Stolke (2004), Bianca Premo (2010, Karen Graubart (2011) y Susan D. Amussen y Allyson M. Poska (2012) por el empleo de la categoría de género para realizar un análisis transimperial y la reivindicación de éstos de la centralidad del género en la organización y la articulación de los imperios atlánticos: "Gender not only provides the basis for a trans-imperial analysis of the Atlantic world but also enables us to reorient our scholarly perspective in the Atlantic" (AMUSSEN;POSKA, 2012, p. 342). Además, para entender estas dinámicas atlánticas desde la categoría de género, como apunta Judith P. Zinsser, es necesario repensar términos clásicos como "economía" o "redes de parentesco" (ZINSSER, 2000, p. 203).…”

Latin America and the construction of a hegemonic periodization.

“…But the Caribbean was more than an idyllic archipelago, it represented a vast heritage of new opportunities that was not only difficult for Europeans to fully exploit in the first years of contact, but also for Asians. Even so, the conquerors tried to impose their ideas and redesign a new geography whose limits or borders have been characterized over time by their porosity 27 , as was the case with other spaces, such as Africa 28 .…”

Temporary Service?

“…Most indigenous women's main responsibility was working the fields alongside their husbands, and they were thus not confined to work in the home as many of their counterparts in Europe were. 39 Although at first European missionaries' attempts to change this were rather fruitless, in the long run, encounters and settlement patterns changed the features of indigenous everyday life considerably, as is discussed below.…”