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- Title
Gender-Bending in El Teatro Campesino (1968-1980): A Mestiza Epistemology of Performance.
- Authors
Heller, Meredith
- Abstract
Initially formed in 1965 as a political theatre troupe, El Teatro Campesino has been hailed as one of the pre-eminent artistic outlets of the Chicano civil rights movement. Believing this dominant historiography on Teatro Campesino occluded women’s contributions, feminist academics shaped a counter-history of the troupe by applying gender critique to the oral testimony of female performers. While this method privileged women’s voices and experiences, my article problematises conclusions that Chicana identity was entirely constricted by misogynistic cultural beliefs. This article explores how Teatro Campesino teatristas actively mobilised their gender roles through gender-bending performance practices. Engaging with Gloria Anzaldúa’s theory of mestiza consciousness, this article examines how the performance of gender-bending calavera (skeleton) characters allowed teatristas to achieve personal and professional growth while still retaining allegiance to El Movimiento. The first part of this article interrogates the feminist methods and conclusions that crafted an alternate historiography on Teatro Campesino. Introducing previously restricted archival material, I then explore how gender-bending performances allowed teatristas to transcend singular and pejorative gender roles while simultaneously embodying their specifically sexed, gendered and racialised identities. I conclude that performance practices such as these were methods for achieving the agency of mestiza flexibility and pluralism.
- Subjects
EL Teatro Campesino (Company); MEXICAN American theater; MEXICAN American actors; GENDER bending (Gender expression); MESTIZOS; CIVIL rights movements; PERFORMING arts; FEMINISM &; theater; POLITICAL theater; THEATER &; society; TWENTIETH century; HISTORY
- Publication
Gender & History, 2012, Vol 24, Issue 3, p766
- ISSN
0953-5233
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/j.1468-0424.2012.01705.x