ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
For their encouragement and close readings of drafts of When A Woman Rises, I am deeply grateful to Jena Camp, Elaine Hampton, Bill Jungels, Sandy Marshall, LeeAnn Meadows, Beth O’Leary, Mike O’Malley, Gail Olive Onion, Susan Rivera, Diane Rus, Heather Sinclair, Joanne Townsend, and Carter Wilson. For listening to my earliest musings about this novel, I thank Christine Kovic and participants in a writing workshop in Las Cruces with Denise Chávez. To Lee Byrd, my editor, and to Bobby Byrd and the rest of the team at Cinco Puntos Press, I am forever grateful for the respect you showed me and the culture and people that I portray in this book. Paco Casas and Edgar Amaya took into consideration our ideas and created a book cover that is both beautiful and culturally symbolic.
Lastly, to my friends in San Pedro Chenalhó, Chiapas, Mexico my eternal gratitude for welcoming me into your homes in the 1980s and for teaching me ever since how to laugh and love even in the toughest of times.
CHARACTERS
Lucia: the one who disappeared (born in 1964)
Carmela: Lucia’s mother
Pedro: Lucia’s father (disappeared in 1969)
Hilario: Lucia’s grandfather
Magdalena: Lucia’s friend (born in 1964)
Verónica: Magdalena’s daughter
Manuel: Magdalena’s father
Francisca: Magdalena’s mother
Ricardo: Magdalena’s older brother
Ernestina: Magdalena’s younger sister
Victorio: Magdalena’s husband
Abolino and Sebastian: Magdalena’s sons
Ángel de Jesús: Lucia’s kexol (spiritual and cultural replacement)
Madre Ester: a nun from Mexico City
Doña Dolores: a retired teacher living in San Cristóbal de Las Casas Diana: director of Telling Our Stories, an oral history project
NOTES
A
agave: A native plant originally from Mexico, member of the Agavaceae family, also known as the century plant or American aloe. Agave has many uses, including using its fibers to make net bags.
antsetike: Plural for women. (tsotsil)
antsil vinik: A gay man. (tsotsil)
atole: A hot drink made with corn or rice. (Spanish)
B
bats’i k’op: “True language,” how native speakers of tsotsil refer to their mother tongue. (tsotsil)
Bees, The: A civil society Catholic organization that formed in Chenalhó in 1992 and calls itself Sociedad Civil Las Abejas (Civil Society The Bees) for a variety of reasons, one being that like bees they sting the government to make it listen rather than using more aggressive means, such as taking up arms. Bees also make honey, a sweet thing, that Las Abejas members compare to peace and justice, their ultimate goal.
Believers: Followers of La Palabra de Dios (The Word of God), the progressive branch of the Catholic Church in Chiapas. In the early 1990s Pueblo Creyente (Believing People) began as a broad non-partisan movement of Catholics motivated by the struggle for social justice. In other parts of the world similar expressions of Catholic faith are called Liberation Theology.
bik’it snuk’: A falsetto voice of respect used by juniors with seniors and also in certain ceremonies, such as the joyol, or bride petition. (tsotsil)
C
cafetal: Land on which coffee is grown. (Spanish)
Cancún: A city in Yucatán where men from Chiapas migrate in search of work in construction or service jobs.
cargo: A role of service that individuals perform for their communities without remuneration. Cargos may be in governance or in spiritual and health-related matters, such as people who pray for the whole community or for individuals. Members of independent cooperatives and of Zapatista support bases refer to their roles in leadership as cargos. In the past, cargos were usually revealed through dreams, called cargo dreams. (Spanish)
cargo dream: A dream in which a spiritual being comes to a person to give them work to perform for their community. This work was traditionally unremunerated and often still is.
Casa de La Cultura: The House of Culture in the municipal center of San Pedro Chenalhó. (Spanish)
Castellano: A term used by indigenous people to refer to the Spanish language, also called Castillian. (Spanish)
Chamula. An indigenous township of highland Chiapas, Mexico where tsotsil is the original language. Its full name is San Juan Chamula.
Chenalhó: An indigenous township of highland Chiapas, Mexico. It’s full name is San Pedro Chenalhó. As part of their colonization plan, the Spaniards created administrative centers in rural areas that they named after Catholic saints who became patron saints of these centers. In tsotsil Chenalhó translates roughly as, “water from a rocky hole in the earth.”
chayote: A light green, pear-shaped fruit belonging to the gourd family Cucurbitaceae, along with melons and squash.
chicha: A fermented drink made of sugar cane. (Spanish)
comadre, compadre: A term used to refer to the woman or man who is your son or daughter’s godmother or godfather. One can become a godparent at the baptism of a child or at other religious or secular rites-of-passage, such as school graduation. (Spanish)
comal: The clay griddle that tortillas are made on. They come in many sizes, some large enough to prepare tortillas for fiestas. Today most are made of cast iron. (Spanish)
compañeros: Companions in the struggle for a better life. (Spanish)
costal: A large bag made of burlap or other materials to store and carry coffee, corn, sugar, flour, and grains. (Spanish)
D
Doña: An honorific, a term of respect used by mestizos before the first names of women. (Spanish)
E
El Norte: Any place in the United States that migrants go to find work. (Spanish)
elote: Corn fresh from the harvest before it is dried and then cooked with lime to be ground into masa to make tortillas or matz. Elote is either boiled or roasted and is typically eaten by taking off one kernel at a time and putting it in the mouth, rather than bringing the cob to the mouth and biting off the kernels several at a time. (Spanish)
enganchador: A labor contractor, literally a man who “hooks” migrant workers into doing work at a distance from their homes. Enganchadores live either in the regions from where workers migrate or on the farm where workers are headed. (Spanish)
F
Father-Mother-Ancestor-Protectors: Traditional dieties which represent ancestral wisdom and guidance and are often lumped into the tsotsil term kajvaltik.
Feast of the Souls (Sk’in ch’ulelal in tsotsil): Also known as Day of the Dead (Día de Los Muertos in Spanish). A tradition in which people welcome back the souls of their deceased loved ones and the ancestors on November 1st and 2nd. The tradition involves visiting cemetaries with gifts of food and flowers and inviting relatives and neighbors to partake of the food on home altars.
flowery face: Words used in prayers to describe the face of God and other Maya and Catholic dieties.
J
j’ak’vomol: A person who uses herbs to heal. Some j’ak’vomol also use massage and steam baths. (tsotsil)
j’ilol: A traditional healer who heals with prayer; one who “sees.” Plural, j’iloletike. (tsotsil)
joyol: The traditional process through which young men petition to marry (tsotsil)
K
kaxlan: A descendent of colonists and people of European descent. The plural form is kaxlanetike. (tsotsil, “x” is pronounced like “sh”)
kexol: A person who bears a similarity to another person or is considered to be able to replace them. (tsotsil, “x” is pronounced like “sh”)
L
Lokan: The fictional name of one of the 100 or so small communities in the township of San Pedro Chenalhó. (tsotsil, means “Let’s go!”)
lum: The municipal center of a township, with stores, churches, schools, a clinic, and government offices. In the case of Chenalhó, the lum refers to the municipal center of the original administrative cen
ter in the township of San Pedro Chenalhó. In 1995 another administrative center was established in Polhó, the center of the Autonomous Zapatista township of San Pedro Polhó, which is located within the boundaries of San Pedro Chenalhó. There are 38 autonomous Zapatista townships across the state of Chiapas. (tsotsil)
M
madres: The Spanish term used by native people in Chenalhó to refer to Catholic nuns.
masa: Corn dough used to make tortillas, tamales, and matz (Spanish)
matz (mats): Coarsely ground corn mixed with water and drunk throughout the day, a staple of the diet in Maya communities. (tsotsil). Maya writers of tsotsil now replace “ts” instead of “tz” in an effort to decolonize their language. In When a Woman Rises, the old spelling for matz is used to help distinguish it from the English word, mats.
mayol: A young man who keeps the peace and cleans up after fiestas. This cargo fills some of the functions of a policeman, but is not a fulltime or paid position. A mayol doesn’t carry a gun, but instead a hard wood baton or night stick. (tsotsil)
me’ max: The wife of a man whose nickname is max, meaning “monkey”, a type of dancer who has a cargo in some religious festivals. Me’ is a female marker in tsotsil.
mestizo (mestiza, feminine): A non-indigenous person. (Spanish)
mol: An honorific, used before the first name of respected older men. (tsotsil)
moy: Wild tobacco, considered to be a powerful diety. (tsotsil)
N
nagual: An animal spirit companion, born at the same time as a person is born and which shares the person’s fate. The nagual has the power to leave the body and walk around, especially during states of sleep and drunkenness. (Nahuatl, a language of central Mexico)
níspero, loquat (Eriobotrya japonica): A tree that produces a small, round, or pear-shaped fruit. In Lokan, the fruit is white or yellow and the skin is yellow.
P
petate: A straw mat used for various purposes, including sleeping and sorting beans. (Spanish)
pinole: Parched corn, dried, ground, and mixed with water and sugar to make a drink.
pitch pine: A tree whose bark can be used as a torch or to light fires.
Polhó: The political and ceremonial center of the Autonomous Zapatista township of San Pedro Polhó. Founded in 1995.
pox: Alcohol distilled from sugar cane juice used as an offering in petitions for spiritual help and social support. Also the tsotsil word for medicine. (tsotsil)
Pueblo Creyente: See Believers.
R
resistance, the: A movement inspired by the formation of autonomous Zapatista townships in which those involved do not take any form of government assistance (e.g. cash, food, tin for roofs, cement for floors) based on the belief that the Mexican government has used this aid to buy the submission of the poor and the original people of Chiapas and Mexico.
rotoplas: A polyethelene container to collect rain water. (Spanish)
S
San Cristóbal de Las Casas: The urban center of the highlands of Chiapas where Spanish colonists based themselves after invading the region. It was originally called Cuidad Real and was founded in 1528. Today San Cristóbal is home to many migrants from rural areas who have established settlements on its periphery. The city is also a popular tourist destination.
Sinaloa: A Mexican state in the North of Mexico.
Subcommander Marcos: Subcommander of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation from the inception of the movement until 2014. Marcos is the nom-de-guerre of a mestizo philosophy professor from central Mexico who answered the call of Bishop Ruíz, the Bishop of Chiapas from 1959-1999, to come to Chiapas in the early 1980s and do community organizing among the most marginalized people.
support bases: Groups of men, women, and young adult supporters of the Zapatistas who work together to realize the social, political, and economic goals of the Zapatista movement.
T
tamales: Corn dough filled with beans, either ground or whole, wrapped in a leaf and steamed. Tamales eaten in Lokan rarely have meat in them, but sometimes they have greens.
traditional ones, traditionalists: Original people of Chenalhó who maintain an intimate relationship with Maya dieties and Catholic saints which they have worshipped side-by-side since the Spanish invasion.
tsotsil: One of several Mayan languages spoken in Chiapas. (native speakers refer to their language as bats’i k’op or “true language”)
V
vinikitike: Plural for men. (tsotsil)
W
Word of God (La Palabra de Dios in Spanish): The Catholic social justice movement in Chiapas which began in the 1960s under the guidance of Bishop Samuel Ruíz García. The word of God also refers to passages in the Bible.
Z
Zapatistas: Civilian supporters of the EZLN, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, which rose up on January 1, 1994 against neoliberal capitalism and the Mexican state’s failure to respect the rights of the original peoples of Mexico.
zocalo: The central park of a Mexican city, town, or village, traditionally a gathering place on Sunday evenings. (Spanish)
Photo by Mike O’Malley
In 1987, CHRISTINE EBER lived for a year with a family in San Pedro Chenalhó, doing fieldwork for her PhD in Anthropology. She shared daily life with women and their families, witnessing the difficulties they faced. It changed her life. Now, as a respected anthropologist, she continues to work with the indigenous women of Chiapas, visiting communities on a regular basis and supporting the woman-organized weaving collectives. Her most recent book is The Journey of a Tzotzil-Maya Woman: Pass Well Over the Earth, which she co-authored with Antonia. She lives in Las Cruces, New Mexico, with her husband, Mike, and dog Sami.
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