{"id":6865,"date":"2016-10-26T11:20:08","date_gmt":"2016-10-26T11:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/?p=6865"},"modified":"2016-10-26T14:56:27","modified_gmt":"2016-10-26T14:56:27","slug":"magdalena-gomez-a-story-that-inspires-minority-feminists-and-all-alike","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/2016\/10\/26\/magdalena-gomez-a-story-that-inspires-minority-feminists-and-all-alike\/","title":{"rendered":"Magdalena Gomez: A Story that Inspires Minority Feminists and All Alike"},"content":{"rendered":"

The following post is\u00a0by undergraduate and\u00a0UConn History Department\u00a0intern\u00a0Diana Alvarado about her current project\u00a0working with materials in\u00a0the Archives & Special Collections.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The Women’s Times, 2004<\/p><\/div>\n

My name is Diana Alvarado, and I am a first-year student at the University of Connecticut. Lots of people seem to think that being a history major is just about learning the facts of the past, but it really is so much more than that. It\u2019s also about making a connections with stories and getting into the minds of the people in those stories.<\/p>\n

At the Archives & Special Collections in the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center, I have been doing research about second wave feminism, and I found an article in \u201cThe Women\u2019s Times\u201d about Magdalena Gomez, a Puerto-Rican poet, playwright, and feminist. While reading the article by Allison Tracy, I was able to get a good look at her life as a minority and a woman. I can understand that also being a Puerto-Rican and female would make it easier for me to relate to Gomez than someone who wasn\u2019t, but her story gives us a look inside the mind the of the feminists who weren\u2019t the center of attention in the movement. Why is this important? It\u2019s important because we can learn so much more about how the movement continues to impact our lives today; we can understand who we are a little more, and we can be more inspired to continue the work that feminists devoted their lives to.<\/p>\n

In the article, \u201cLobster Face: A Poet, Playwright and Performer Claims Her Identity\u201d Gomez expresses the point of her autobiographical play of the same name (Lobster Face). The title is supposed to represent \u201cthe blush that shame suffuses\u201d and later what Gomez explains it as \u201cthe red mark of failure\u2026 like a teacher\u2019s red X across a poem for not meeting some standard set forth by the dead white male literary police\u201d (Tracy). Gomez took all the oppression and criticisms of being Puerto-Rican and being female into an art form, an art form that anyone can see and understand, no matter who they are. Gomez\u2019s play\u2014in addition to her poetry\u2014show what it\u2019s like to be in the mind of the marginalized.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_20161021_145813<\/a>Gomez did not have an easy childhood. She explained that her mother was abusive both physically and emotionally towards her. She explains that her mother had a battered past due to being sold for sex at a very young age (Tracy). However, Gomez was able to see to her mother\u2019s capacities for empathy: \u201cI was able to see her gifts\u201d, Gomez told, \u201cbeauty and power, as well as the monster that tried to destroy me. They lived in the same woman\u201d (Tracy). What Gomez is doing by describing her mother this way is showing that women are complex. This statement would not be widely accepted in our patriarchal society. Women are often portrayed in media and expected to be simple, easy, and not dynamic in any way. Through her personal history, Gomez is able to connect to broader issues that anyone can connect to.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_20161021_145813<\/a> Gomez further taps into her past experiences of oppression that inspire her work by recalling her frustrations with trying to get a college education: \u201cas an artist, I simply wasn\u2019t engaged by the conformist curriculum; none of the white male teachers could understand me, or me, them\u201d (Tracy). This wall did not stop Gomez, she stayed true to herself\u2014no matter how hard it got.<\/p>\n

The importance of identity to Gomez brought her to success. Her play \u201cLobster Face\u201d has been featured on Broadway and has won awards for her productions (Tracy). Magdalena Gomez is not just a poet, a playwright, a Puerto-Rican, or a woman. She is an example of fighting for the right to dignity and identity. I wouldn\u2019t think what my life would be like if I didn\u2019t have people like Gomez to show me that finding out who we are is one of the most important things to do in life. I am indebted to women like Gomez who have come before me. To be on the cover of a women\u2019s newsletter, in such a way that shows power, poise, and prominence shows how important it is for people to be inspired to continue the work and devotion to the feminist movement.<\/p>\n

Source: Magdalena Gomez Papers<\/a>, Box no. 8; The Women\u2019s Times<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The following post is\u00a0by undergraduate and\u00a0UConn History Department\u00a0intern\u00a0Diana Alvarado about her current project\u00a0working with materials in\u00a0the Archives & Special Collections.\u00a0 My name is Diana Alvarado, and I am a first-year student at the University of Connecticut. Lots of people seem … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[329,328,186,80],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6865"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6865"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6865\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6877,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6865\/revisions\/6877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs-dev.lib.uconn.edu\/archives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}