La Chicana and the Intersection of Race, Class, and Gender

This is a description of the social situation in America of La Chicana, a Hispanic minority female whose life is influenced by racism and sexism. It analyzes contemporary scholarship on race, class and gender, scrutinizing the use of language and labels to examine how La Chicana is affected by these factors. The author explores the history of Chicanas and the meaning of the term Chicana , and considers her socialization process, the consequences of deviating from gender roles, and the evolution of Hispanic women onto the national scene in politics, health, economics, education, religion and criminal justice. The shared lives of Mexican-American women and men at home and inside and inside and outside of the barrio are also investigated, and the book highlights the variables that effectively discriminate against coloured women. Following a chapter that reviews the literature on Chicanas and focuses on their participation in three major social movements, the text discusses the conquest of Mexico and the blending of Aztec and Spanish cultures. Next, the life of colonial Hispanic women in Mexico and the United States and role of the Mexican War in shaping the Mexican-American experience are investigated. The book then explores how Americanization disempowered La Chicana, discusses women’s contemporary cultural roles and their impact on men’s roles. Current social issues are compared with those of those of the 1960s, and the final chapters develop a theory of discrimination based on the academic work of racial and ethnic minority scholars and feminist scholars.