Um prisma das personalidades femininas históricas em El Eterno Femenino (1996), de Rosario Castellanos: ressignificações

Abstract

This dissertation aims to research about the Mexican historical narrative resignifications written by Rosario Castellanos in El eterno femenino ([1975] 1996) from women’s perspective in the narrative: Malinche, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz and the empress Carlota, women that were put aside or silenced by the traditional history. In Castellanos’ play (1996), they have the opportunity to narrate their own story, in this way the hegemonic narrative is portrayed and resignified in the light of female protagonism. Thus, aspiring the decolonization of the crystalized vision about the traditional historic narrative and the female personalities of Malinche, Sor Juana and Carlota, in addition to explaining the decolonial sociocultural struggle to emancipation regarding the coloniality of power, of being and of knowledge, the proposed goal is to answer the following question: how, through the voices of Castellanos’ (1996) characters, are portrayed and resignified the female personalities aforementioned and the traditional Mexican historic narrative? The analysis falls on the Castellanos’ narrative approach about the historical events in contrast with the traditional perspective (patriarchal, Caucasian, Christian and colonial), also addressing the effects of the different measures of subalternity, oppression and misogyny surrounding the personalities studied. To do this, we dialogue with the following theoretical framework: Joan Scott (1995), Bourdieu (1995) and Judith Butler (2018) studies about the connection between gender and history, plus the Castellanos’ writings which show her vision about the position occupied by women in society and the dichotomy men/women; Santos (2003) (2009) (2016), Mignolo (2003), Quijano (2005) post-colonial studies about the coloniality of power/being/knowledge and border thinking, and also María Lugones (2020) with the intersectionality of race, social class, gender and sexuality to coloniality of power; the writing about the Latin American literary boom by Rama (2005), Bragança (2008) and Trouche (2010); Linda Hutcheon (1985) (1991) about the corpus structure, parody and historiographical metafiction; about time and narrative by Ricœur (1994); Márcia Hoppe Navarro (2010) and Naira de Almeida Nascimento (2011) with studies about the critical reinterpretation of History by fiction; and the border thinking as a response to the coloniality of power, by Leoné Astride Barzotto (2019) (2022). As final results, finally, the research leads us to conclude that Latin American literature produced by women, even at different times in the 20th and 21st centuries, shows us the potential for representation of women themselves within the societies in which they they inhabit and forge their existence in the face of continuous and increasingly offensive patriarchal devices. This time, we also conclude that 'being a woman' follows the path of 'living in challenges' and 'surviving to tell the story' and, therefore, literature allows us a whole process of maturation in the face of gender issues and, above all, of women's constant struggle for dignity and respect when living in society, giving new meaning to narratives around a common and collective good for all women, readers or not, as the knowledge acquired is propagated.