La Malinche - Heroine or Temptress

A small army of Spaniards left Cuba in February 1519 on eleven ships headed for the Mainland. The expedition was led by Hernán Cortés who had been Secretary for the Spanish invasion of Cuba led by Diego Velasquez Cuellar. Velazquez had massacred the native warriors, burned their leader, Chief Hatuey, alive, and secured the island and its people as a Spanish colony. 

The point of the expedition led by Cortés, therefore, was to accumulate as much gold as possible, by trade or otherwise, and to capture slaves. After a resounding Spanish victory over the native warriors of Tobasco, the local High Chief told Cortés of the golden city called "Culua." There, he said, a river of gold ran into Montezuma's beautiful City In A Lake Near the Sky. 

To speed Cortés and his soldiers on their way, the huey tlatolani also handed over a number of slave girls to the Spaniards. One of these, baptized as "Marina", had her own reasons for invading the capital of the Aztecs. This woman, now known as "La Malinche", used her great intelligence, her quick mastery of Spanish, and Cortés and his soldiers to conquer Mexico.

Non-Fictional Accounts of La Malinche:

Feminism, Nation & Myth: La Malinche edited by Amanda Nolacea Harris
La Malinche: The Mistress of Hernan Cortes, From Slave to Goddess by Rodrigue Levesque
La Malinche in Mexican Literature: From History to Myth by Sandra Messing Cypress


Fictional Accounts of La Malinche:

The Treasure of La Malinche (Vols 1 & 2) by Jeffry S Hepple

Feathered Serpent: A Novel of the Mexican Conquest by Colin Falconer
Malinche: A Novel by Laura Esquivel

For more on La Malinche see:

La Malinche - Unrecognised Heroine from Mexconnect

La Malinche - Translator & Companion To Cortes from Mexonline

La Malinche from Wikipedia

From Sex Trade To Second Chance

From the Daily Beast:

“There was no way to go back and erase a criminal conviction in New York,” says Sienna Baskin, co-director of the organization the Sex Workers Project of the Urban Justice Center. SWP is a legal advocacy organization that helps sex workers of all kinds, from trafficked individuals to those who freely engage in commercial sex. In 2007, SWP helped create the New York Anti-Trafficking law, which made human trafficking a statewide offense.

“We wanted to have as part of that law a remedy for people who’ve been convicted of prostitution,” said Baskin, but it wasn’t included in the final bill. So in 2010, they drafted and were instrumental in passing Criminal Procedure Law §440.10(1)(i), which allows judges to vacate convictions directly related to an individual’s history as a trafficked person. This law, the first of its kind in the nation, gave Maria and other survivors the chance to truly leave their pasts behind. It also sparked a wave of similar organizing around the country.

The Woman Who Started The US Civil War

From Salon:

When Harriet Beecher Stowe published "Uncle Tom's Cabin" in 1852, the American slave trade was a thriving institution. The courts condoned it and, as Southerners were quick to claim, so did the Constitution and the Bible. Twelve American presidents had been slave owners, and the abolitionist movement was fragmented and marginal.

But Stowe, a seminal figure in American liberalism, had a knack for making radical concepts palatable to the general public, and her novel became one of the first genuine pop culture phenomena in American history. Within 10 years of its publication, the United States devolved into civil war. And as historian David S. Reynolds argues in "Mightier Than the Sword," a new book that explores Stowe's life and the global impact of her work, it was "Uncle Tom's Cabin" that catalyzed the conflict.

Mysterious Life of Lydia Bryant

From The Daily News Online:

About two years ago Susan Sherwin was indulging in a favorite pastime — looking at headstones at Longview Memorial Park where she works — when a pair of dates made her do a double-take: Lydia Bryant 1845-1972.

To help piece together this mystery, Sherwin turned to Sandy Rountree, whose prodigious volunteer research created the annual Memorial Day page in The Daily News. Rountree began looking into Bryant's background to hopefully learn her true age.

"I didn't think it would be hard," Rountree said. "Little did I know it would take two years."

Book: Women & Slavery In America

From News Wise:

Women and Slavery in America: A Documentary History, edited by Catherine M. Lewis and J. Richard Lewis has been published by the University of Arkansas Press.

The edited collection offers readers an opportunity to examine the establishment, growth and evolution of slavery in the United States as it impacted women — enslaved and free, African American and white, wealthy and poor, northern and southern. The primary documents — including newspaper articles, broadsides, cartoons, pamphlets, speeches, photographs, memoirs, and editorials — are organized thematically and represent cultural, political, religious, economic and social perspectives on this dark and complex period in American history.

UK Museum Drama - Mary Prince

From Bernews:

The Museum of London is launching a one-hour dramatic reenactment of the life of Bermuda slave Mary Prince for visiting school children.

An actor will be portraying the Bermudian woman whose 1831 memoir helped to galvanise the abolitionist movement and end the institution of chattel slavery in in British territories two years later in a production intended to bring history to life for youngsters.

“Meet Mary in 1831 London, when the anti-slavery movement published her life story,” says a Museum of London promotional release . “Born into slavery, as a child she was the ‘pet’ of a rich white girl and as an adult she suffered hard labour working as a field slave. Although in England she was free she could not return to her husband in the Caribbean because she would become enslaved again.”

Bermudian Mary Prince is also featured in a permanent display at the museum called “London, Sugar & Slavery” which commemorates the roaring trade in humans and sugar, slave resistance and the abolition campaign and the enduring relationship between the British capital and the Caribbean.

Heroic Women of Dundee

From the Courier News:

As the old saying goes, “Behind every successful man lies a woman.”

Dundee Township Historical Society members wholeheartedly agree and said it was high time that the women of Dundee’s past be rightfully recognized.

On Sunday, the group presented, “Women in History: The Story of Heroic Women in Dundee Township,” one of many public programs it has offered to help keep the area’s rich history alive.

It’s often been the men in Dundee’s past that have received all the acclaim for their roles in purchasing land, starting up companies, and furthering societal efforts such as the Underground Railroad.

However, none of those advances would have been realized without the help and support of their wives, according to DTHS president Marge Edwards.

Nepal: Human Trafficking

From Sindh Today:

Four Nepali women, three of whom were being trafficked to Muscat, have been arrested from Uttar Pradesh’s Gorakhpur district, officials said here Sunday.

One of the four women was part of a human trafficking gang and she was taking the other three to Muscat. They were nabbed by the anti-human trafficking cell of the police from the railway station Saturday evening while they were headed to New Delhi, from where they were to take a flight to Muscat, an official said.

They were caught with the help of NGO Manav Seva Sansthan, which aids the police in curbing human trafficking.

A couple of months ago, police in Gorakhpur had arrested five Nepali women along with a pimp who was trying to send them to the Middle East.

Govt. Guilty of Slavery

In Niger, a young woman who has spent the past 12 years as a slave, has been successful in her action to take the country of Niger to court for failing to protect her.

From The Independent:
"A West African regional court of justice convicted the state of Niger today for failing to protect a 12-year-old girl from being sold into slavery in a case anti-slavery campaigners hope will set a precedent.

The regional ECOWAS Court of Justice ruled that Niger had failed in its obligations to protect Hadijatou Mani, who says she was sold into slavery in 1996 for around $500 and regularly beaten and sexually abused.

The Community Court of Justice of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), based in neighbouring Nigeria, upheld Mani's claim that the state had failed to protect her from slavery.

But the court, which has been sitting in Niger's capital Niamey to hear the case, dismissed a second plank of the case, which accused the government of legitimising slavery through customary laws that campaigners say discriminate against women.

London-based Anti-Slavery International says 43,000 people are enslaved in Niger despite the practice being officially outlawed in 2003. Activists say slavery is also common in other countries in the region, including Mauritania and Sudan. "

From the Times Online:
"Hadijatou Mani was sold into slavery at the age of 12. She was beaten, raped and even imprisoned for bigamy after she married a man other than her “master”.

Astonishingly her story is not that rare in Niger, but now it has a happy ending. In an historic ruling that will resonate across West Africa, where slavery is still rife, Ms Mani won a landmark case yesterday against the Niger Government for failing to protect her.

Ms Mani was sold to a man called Souleymane Naroua when she was 12 for about £300. For the next ten years she was forced to carry out domestic and agricultural work. She was raped at the age of 13 and forced to bear the children of her “master”.

In 2005 Ms Mani's “master” freed her and gave her a “liberation certificate”, but when she left him and tried to marry another man he claimed that they were already married. A local court found in her favour and she went ahead with the wedding.

For generations the children of a slave automatically became the property of their parents' “master”. Ms Mani said that one of the reasons she turned to the international court was to secure the freedom of her two children and ensure that they did not have to suffer the same fate."

From the International Herald Tribune:
"Slavery has long been tolerated in Niger. The Niamey government outlawed the practice in 2003, but it continues in the remote reaches of the vast, arid and impoverished nation that straddles the Sahara.

Antislavery organizations hailed the decision as an important victory against deeply entrenched social customs.

The Community Court of Justice, the entity that found Niger guilty, is a judicial arm of Ecowas, a political and trade group of West African nations. The court, which can sit in any of the member nations, was created in 2000 and has made a number of important rulings."

From BBC News:
"Now the former slave from Niger has won a landmark case against her government, which a regional West African court found had failed to protect her.

The court has ordered the government to pay her 10m CFA francs (£12,430; $19,750) in compensation.

The ruling could have broad implications for countries nearby where slavery is still practised, including Mauritania, Burkina Faso and Mali, according to observers.

Human rights organisations say more than 40,000 people are still in slavery in Niger, though the government says this figure is exaggerated.

Most live in conditions little changed over centuries, forced to look after animals or domestic work such as cooking and cleaning without pay.

Born into an established slave caste, they inherit a status from their mothers that it is almost impossible to shake off.

Romana Cacchioli, Africa Programme Coordinator for Anti-Slavery International, says this form of slavery began centuries ago when North African Berbers and Arabs raided the settlements of black Africans to the south and enslaved them.

Ilguilas Weila, head of the local human rights group Timidria, said the situation in Niger had barely changed since the country announced that it was banning slavery.

Slaves are kept in humiliating and degrading conditions, he said. They can be beaten, sold, or given away as wedding presents."


Let us all hope that this court ruling does have far-reaching consequences.