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The Rhetoric Of The Mothers Of Plaza De Mayo

Decent Essays

To continue with the private vis-à-vis public realm, we now turn to Valeria Farj’s “Motherhood as political voice: The rhetoric of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo”. Much like Taylor, Farj also focuses on the notion of a double identity that is used in the movement. Farj states, “This paper analyzes the rhetoric of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo. Specifically it looks at how these women have chosen to speak in the public realm by using voices of motherhood from the private realm” . Even with her title, Farj makes a strong statement of the use of identity of motherhood and the transformation this later has to act as political voice in the Plaza de Mayo. Similarly to Taylor, Farj echoes the struggles women faced back then and reinforces the struggles …show more content…

This myth of marianismo exercised by the mothers provided them with a stable identity; however similar to Taylor this identity also restricted them . This identity through marianismo restricts them to be women dedicated to the home and forces them to meet cultural expectations; further it creates the notion that “ a woman's role as mother becomes her central identification” ; hence, one cannot go without the other and a woman’s role is dependent on motherhood. Taylor describes the use of motherhood as a contradiction that questions the responsibility of a good mother and a problematic choice. Farj further shows the reasoning for such …show more content…

However, when this did not happen the military labeled these women as mad women because they did not stay where they belonged, because of their illegal demonstrations and lastly because of a disobedience to the cultural and patriarchal expectations . Once again, it is seen that the identity on the private realm hinders the capability and legitimacy of these women in the public realm. Nevertheless, this madness had a positive side, as for the first time women broke through the limitations of home and motherhood into the “public sphere of government” ; and subsequently this identity shaped the movement as these “women found a voice in their role as Mothers” . Besides using a strong identity from the private sphere, these mothers also turned private symbols used in the home sphere and turned them into public symbols. The mothers found symbols to voice their concern, without posing a threat to the military. These symbols were also chosen upon their motherhood identity that relate to the home

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