The Power of Words

Part of becoming an adult is learning how to use language skillfully. Verbal ability is greatly admired, whether in ritual speeches, jokes and metaphors, quick retorts, or good counsel.

From a young age children are taught to be respectful, but also to defend them­selves. The expectation is that rude or aggressive behavior should not be tolerated, and the appropriate response is a vigorous verbal display. As Chinas observed along the coast of Oaxaca, that Zapotec women regularly move about in public areas as market vendors or messengers, where they are vulnerable to assault, so “it becomes imperative that women behave in ways designed to leave no doubt in anyone's mind as to their virtue. Thus Isthmus Zapotec girls are socialized to rebuff improper and undesirable attention. Members of both sexes greatly admire ‘a woman who defends herself' by devastatingly insulting remarks directed toward would-be lotharios” (Chinas 1973: 110).

Women use language in self-defense, but they can also use strong language to make a peremptory strike and take over a situation. For example, one day in the late afternoon I was traveling by bus between two villages, accompanied by a young Zapotec woman. I was going as far as the last stop, but she was getting off before that. As the bus was quite full, we were standing at the back, among a number of men from other villages. She had previously warned me that men from one of the villages were notorious for being aggressive and violent.

In Zapotec communities defending oneself should be done with words first and foremost. Violence does occur, but this is a sign that words have failed. It means that someone has lost control of themselves or others. Sometimes children are punished physically, a handful of men are known to beat their wives, and a few women beat their inebriated husbands. On rare occasions women fight with each other, but what is most frequent is for drunken men to quarrel. But the man who resorts to violence is admitting verbal defeat. A man who uses violence against women or children is viewed as out of control, or a coward who takes out his frustrations on others. All acts of physical aggression, whether by men or women, were criticized by others. They openly criticized people in two other villages as notorious for their violent be­havior, places that should be avoided or only entered cautiously when accompanied by others. By contrast, they spoke well of other villages where the people were well mannered. The Zapotec ideal is to use words to resolve disputes. When people resort to violence they lose some of their humanity and sink in the estimation of others.

The Zapotec emphasis on using words to resolve conflict flows out of what Nader calls a “harmony ideology” (Nader 1990). In Talea, the Zapotec town she studied in the Sierra of Oaxaca, people respond to conflict by seeking mediation in the village court. Nader points out that violence per se is not the problem, for Taleans view violence as a sign of disruption in social relationships, and it is the broken relationships that must be addressed. They do not focus on the violence itself (which is a Western category), for violence is only a symptom of a deeper problem (1990: 243). The Taleans are more interested in discovering the motive for violence in order to resolve the situation and maintain community values of balance and unity. The legal model of traditional Mexican society emphasizes communalism, compro­mise, and conciliation; in contrast, individualism leads to adversarial relations and group fragmentation (1990: 304-305). The Zapotec do not think in terms of indi­viduals as points on a map, they think in terms of relationships between people, and whenever relationships are disrupted this can ripple out to affect many others.

Many scholars have described conflict escalation and resolution in relation to court systems or examined the historical context for violence in Mexico, but Beverly Chi­nas is one of the few who discusses women's roles in this area. In the Isthmus of Te­huantepec on the southern coast of Oaxaca, Chinas found that Zapotec women per­form crucial roles in supervising, mediating, and policing their community. There is a high level of aggression and violence related to land disputes and outsiders, but women work together to bound and control aggression so that the violence can be prevented or subdued (Chinas 1973: 86). Women’s roles include monitoring local conditions, maintaining order at fiestas, protecting women from assault, and defend­ing the community against outsiders.

Because men are often away working in their fields, during the day women pre­dominate in the markets and streets as well as other public areas and homes.

Chinas notes that Zapotec men have formalized policing roles at fiestas that in­clude guarding the entrances to keep out uninvited men and maintain order, but women have informal policing roles as well: “whenever a male guest, encouraged by too much mezcal [agave liquor] begins to behave improperly, an elderly kinswoman intervenes” (Chinas 1973: 104). Either his aunt, grandmother, or godmother will try persuasion or the stronger measure of verbal shaming, but if he resists then she will physically push him toward the male guards and let them take over.

I observed similar behavior among Zapotec men and women at fiestas, the women cajoling or scolding the men to keep them in line. People expect women to be able to drink and maintain their composure, rather than becoming quarrelsome, aggressive, or emotional. Even though the women drank as much mezcal liquor as the men, it was the women who maintained a vigilant eye over all the fiesta proceed­ings. The women carefully monitored who was present, how much they drank, and their emotional states.

Age ranking differentiated women’s roles, for girls and young women would carry information to the older women who then gave the orders on what to do next or stepped in to break up any argument or fight that erupted. People are expected to so­cialize and may discuss issues at fiestas, but loud arguments are definitely discour­aged as inappropriate and offensive. Quarrelsome people are closely watched and forced to leave if they become difficult. In one case Chinas observed women kin dancing a drunk man into a bedroom, getting him into a hammock, and locking him in to sleep it off until the next morning to avoid potential conflict (1973: 107).

When I asked about women breaking up fights, one man explained that people call in a man's mother or godmother to break up a fight because no man would ever think of hitting such an important woman, no matter how drunk he was. The only reason a man would strike these women, he explained, would be if the man had be­come marijuanado because some outside evildoer put marijuana in his mezcal.

The women themselves get angry, but they are less likely to become violent and threaten community solidarity since they express their anger more privately, within the family, according to Chinas (1973: 101). What I found is that women are more likely to stick to using words, and less likely to express their anger physically. In the village I studied there was one old couple who fought fiercely, engaging in heated verbal exchanges, during which the husband would take out his old rifle and bran­dish it about. At that point the wife would get out her old rifle and wave it around as well. But people did not seem worried about this exceptional behavior. In their youth the old couple had both fought in the Mexican Revolution and long ago developed this rancorous interactional style.

The more typical way that conflict between women is expressed is through fear of the evil eye or witchcraft, both of which may be attributed by young women to old women: “evil eye beliefs differentiate women in the community, revealing points of conflict as well as support networks across generational lines” (Sault 1990: 70). In this Zapotec village “older women have the authority to tell others how to behave, to give orders, and to scold. They also have the right to ask for things, including chil­dren When a young mother says she fears the evil eye of an old woman, she is

also verbalizing her discomfort about the power asymmetry in that relationship” (1990:80). Here words express women's fear, but they also become a weapon that can be used against others. According to Selby, “symbolic exchange is the major ac­tivity that creates community,” by reinforcing relationships among villagers, and when people are engaged in these exchanges then neither will label the other a witch, for witchcraft is by nature an anti-social activity (Selby 1974: 128). Whether the ac­cusation is of giving the evil eye or practicing witchcraft, in each situation the victim accuses the suspect of antisocial acts that threaten her family and the community.

From the adult women Zapotec girls learn to protect each other from men. This “esprit de corps... which goes beyond kinship and beyond ethnicity, allows women to cooperate in many situations” not open to men (Chinas 1973: 111-112). In Te­huantepec Chinas found that “women cooperate in overt nonformalized roles to pro­tect one another from sexual aggression” (1973: 104). A woman alone is much more vulnerable, but if there is any other woman around, she can be appealed to for aid. In fact, it is not even necessary to ask for help. Zapotec women will defend others whenever the need arises.

Zapotec women will also rise to defend male as well as female members of their community against outsiders. Since the men are often away during the day, women may actually be more active in defending the community during daylight. Again, this has been observed by both Chinas and Velez Ibanez. Chinas argues that Zapotec “women can act aggressively toward the dominant mestizo power structure with less fear of reprisals than can men” (1973: 111). For a mestizo man to respond with force publicly might be viewed as a sign of powerlessness or cowardice. He is better off simply retreating, rather than risking a crowd of women forming to attack him.

Velez Ibanez describes how women's support networks for defense coalesced in Netzahualcoytl, where he observed several incidents in which women attacked out­siders who threatened the community: “The use of violence and confrontation was not specific to men.... Many daytime confrontations... involved women” (Velez Ibanez 1983: 119-120). He describes one incident he observed that involved “a local municipal judge, a land developer's representative, and two policemen from the mu­nicipality, who came to serve eviction papers on a lot owner” (1983: 120). The women's network notified local residents, and within minutes thirty-two women with their children gathered, accompanied by three men. The women surrounded the house lot and prevented the eviction notice from being served. When the judge, the developer's representative, or the police tried to cross the street they were blocked by about a dozen women who insulted them. Women continued to gather until forty to fifty stood together, calling the outsiders cowards and sissies. When one of the po­licemen advanced against the women, they picked up rocks and taunted him until “the women eventually chased the males from the street, pelting them with rocks, tearing the coat off the representative, and jabbing a stick into the anus of the judge” (1983: 120-121). Velez Ibanez goes on to describe other incidents in which women burned down the huts of mortgage payment collectors, after first looting the huts, throwing out the workers, or stripping a man and throwing him into a sewage ditch (1983: 121).

Other more recent examples of women defending their communities can be found all over Chiapas, in towns like La Realidad and Bachajon, where Mayan women have driven out soldiers of the Mexican government or armed paramilitary groups. In the 1997 Saul Landau film The Sixth Sun, the final scene shows Mayan women shouting at the government soldiers atop enormous tanks, using the tradi­tional tactics of publicly shaming men for their wrongdoing in assaulting the town.