ReShunda's World

Its a Man World

2010-04-26T12:17:00.000-07:00

This week during discussion we talked about women in the nunnery during and how they had to live by certain rules if not the Inquisition could bring them up on charges. Women especially women in the church were closely watched. They had to uphold their beliefs and never questioned it or do any thing that would bring any attention to them that would also questioned their faith as well. A person we been talking about concerning this topic is Sor Juana. She was a scholar and also a nun in New Spain. We currently watching a movie entitled I, the Worst of All. This movie was somewhat a depiction of Sor Juana life. This movie showed how a nun in Mexico during the seventeenth century was looked down upon because of being vocal in her beliefs, when the only way for a woman to be was to be submissive towards a man. This movie showed that Sor Juana was a woman before her time. She was very intelligence and introduced new ideas that were very foreign. Her ideas were not favor because she was a woman and much thought that her ideas went against the church. Many people in the church wanted to bring Sor Juana in front of the Inquisition but Vicereine was protecting her. The Vicereine took a certain interest in Sor Juana because of her charm and intelligence. She also loved Sor Juana’s poetry as well.
I feel that Sor Juana was a very intelligent woman and that she was misunderstood by many especially the men around her. These men in my opinion were somewhat threaten by her intelligence and were jealous of how she was favored by so many. I think they also viewed her as a threat against their faith but should had just gotten to know her and understand her views. Sor Juanan was just exploring the world around her but also stay true to her faith. She wanted to somewhat uplift women in her country and enlighten the world of things they never knew about that might could make people understand themselves better.

Examining Witchcraft

2010-04-09T15:38:00.000-07:00

When I first thought of witchcraft,I mainly just thought of people casting spells. However, witchcraft in colonial Mexico was more then just casting spells. Someone that practiced witchcraft was known to be having sex with the devil. This is one of the main reason that witchcraft was viewed as a serious sin and if found using witchcraft you would be punish severely or even be put to death. Also witchcraft was use to make someone doing something, however during those times many people, mainly women , use witchcraft to stop someone from doing something. For instance, some women would use witchcraft to stop their husbands from committing adulterous acts or from being abusive towards them. If a woman was having problems with her spouse, she would seek another midwife or a folk healer that would probably be formally with a remedy that could help them in in their situation.

There was many methods that women use to executed these witchcraft method on their husbands. One of the frequent method use was to put the remedy inside the food they cook for their husbands. This was the most efficient was because the remedy could run through the man's body and work effectively. Also, Men were not the only one subject to falling a victim to witchcraft. A woman could used it against the woman her husband might was committing adultery with , or a slave could use it as well against her owner due to the fact that he was abusive towards her

World of Spanish Marriage :Week 10

2010-02-22T13:34:00.000-08:00

This week we talked about the institute of marriage and how the views of marriage today greatly differs from the views of marriage from the Spanish between the 15th to the 17th Centuries. During those times, marriage was viewed very seriously and sacred because it was something that God created so that man would not be alone. Therefore, Divorce was considered a sin since Spain was under the Catholic Church. This is why Divorce was rarely heard of and if so had to be proven through certain laws. One of these laws to prove that the marriage partner was impudent or that the two were related in a close matter. This would nullify the marriage because the marriage would be deemed not a holy marriage to begin with in the first place. However, for instance if the woman could not prove that the marriage was not a holy marriage, she could decide to enter the nunnery and vice versa for the man to enter the monastery. Also these laws were also there to protect women from being taken of from men that only wanted to marry them for just sexual reason. If a man married a woman just for just sexual reason and left the woman , would have to face a judge for this act. For this act would compare to how in today's culture if a man fathered a child would have to go to court to face having to pay child support to the woman.

Overall, marriage was viewed as a sacred bond between two people that honor this bond and understood the importance of such an act. However, if one or both of the partners wanted to leave the marriage, there were laws placed that could help one or both of partners escape an unholy marriage. Also there were laws for people that took advantage of marriage and if found out would have to face charges and be seen as committing a sin within their community .

World of Slavery

2010-02-13T15:05:00.000-08:00

This week discussion was rather interesting. We discussed the different slave trades and how they were different. In today's society, the views on slave is manly focus on the new settlers of the new world in America who came to African to get slaves to help maintain the Settlers farms in which helped the Settlers flourish financial. Also we discussed how the process of getting slaves from Africa to America was violent and deemed immoral. To explain this process, we were seen a clip of the movie Amistad. In this clip, the slaves were forced to leave there homeland and were treated horrific matters. They were beat and some died due to the harsh conditions that they had to endure on the boat. They were beat to put fear into them so that they would not think about going against their master or the people that had capture them. They were also made to travel in cramp and damp quarters and were literally on top of one another. Due to these harsh conditions, disease ran rapidly and killed off many Africa slaves during the trip to America. Also in the clip, the slaves were given new American names so to speak in which this process was to strip away their identity from being from Africa.

Another thing that was discuss was the fact that Africans were selling their own people to the American people to earn money and for own selfish reasons and also had slaves as well. However, Africans treated their slaves slightly better because to in their eyes, the slaves were precious cargo but the Americas just felt that if they lost a slave that they could just buy another one. In addition, in Latin American slaves had rights and could sued their masters for mistreatment. These different elements show that there were different structures , rules, and regulations depending on who was doing the selling of slaves and who were being the owner of slaves as well .

Also within the slave system, different slaves had different roles depending on your gender. African male slaves usually did the hard labor while the African females slaves did field work as well but could also be use to do house work .