Cholas and Pishtacos
Stories of Race and Sex in the Andes
334 pages
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12 halftones, 2 maps, 1 table
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6 x 9
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© 2001
Winner of the 2003 Senior Book Prize from the American Ethnological Society.
Cholas and Pishtacos are two provocative characters from South American popular culture—a sensual mixed-race woman and a horrifying white killerwho show up in everything from horror stories and dirty jokes to romantic novels and travel posters. In this elegantly written book, these two figures become vehicles for an exploration of race, sex, and violence that pulls the reader into the vivid landscapes and lively cities of the Andes. Weismantel's theory of race and sex begins not with individual identity but with three forms of social and economic interaction: estrangement, exchange, and accumulation. She maps the barriers that separate white and Indian, male and female-barriers that exist not in order to prevent exchange, but rather to exacerbate its inequality.
Weismantel weaves together sources ranging from her own fieldwork and the words of potato sellers, hotel maids, and tourists to classic works by photographer Martin Chambi and novelist José María Arguedas. Cholas and Pishtacos is also an enjoyable and informative introduction to a relatively unknown region of the Americas.
Cholas and Pishtacos are two provocative characters from South American popular culture—a sensual mixed-race woman and a horrifying white killerwho show up in everything from horror stories and dirty jokes to romantic novels and travel posters. In this elegantly written book, these two figures become vehicles for an exploration of race, sex, and violence that pulls the reader into the vivid landscapes and lively cities of the Andes. Weismantel's theory of race and sex begins not with individual identity but with three forms of social and economic interaction: estrangement, exchange, and accumulation. She maps the barriers that separate white and Indian, male and female-barriers that exist not in order to prevent exchange, but rather to exacerbate its inequality.
Weismantel weaves together sources ranging from her own fieldwork and the words of potato sellers, hotel maids, and tourists to classic works by photographer Martin Chambi and novelist José María Arguedas. Cholas and Pishtacos is also an enjoyable and informative introduction to a relatively unknown region of the Americas.
American Ethnological Society: AES Senior Book Prize
Won
Society for Humanistic Anthropology: Victor Turner Prize for Ethnographic Writing
Honorable Mention
“In a highly original work, Mary Weismantel explores the sense of racial estrangement that is endemic to the Andean condition, embodied in the social figures of cholas and pishtacos. Weaving peripatetic ethnographic observations, archival information, folklore, literary representation, and festivals, Weismantel renders her theoretical points as vividly as the costumes of the cholas.”—Patricia Zavella, author of Women’s Work and Chicano Families: Cannery Workers of the Santa Clara Valley
“With rivetingly beautiful prose, Mary Weismantel weaves together a great deal of disparate material (novels, scholarly works, field observations) from several different Andean societies to a compelling and coherent whole. Cholas and Pishtacos is a triumph, and it shows the extraordinary power of insight that can be achieved through long-term fieldwork and deep familiarity with a particular geographic region. It will become a touchstone for all future work on race and gender in the Andes.”—Don Kulick, author of Travesti: Sex, Gender, and Culture Among Brazilian Transgendered Prostitutes
“The socio-racially ambiguous <I>cholas<I> and the phantasmagoric <I>pishtacos<I> . . . represent two related gendered facets of Andean sociopolitical structure which, moreover, highlight the operation of a whole range of other cultural dichotomies—private and public, traditional and modern. Weismantel’s instructive and persuasive book attests to the dynamic centrality of sex/gender for the understanding of sociopolitical processes.”—Verena Stolcke, <I>Current Anthropology<I>
"Weismantel's book is not just insightful but bold, thought-provoking, and imaginative. . . . Even if readers may not agree with all of Weismantel's conclusions, it would be hard not to admire her gutsy originality. . . . Weismantel's creative explorations have given us all something to think about. And since anthropology is reoutinely defined as making 'the strange familiar and the familiar strange,' her theorizing on the relation between the two is a particularly welcome contribnution. . . . Instead of the stultifying prose that characterizes so much academic writing, what you find here is elegance, economy, and lucidity."
Contents
List of Illustrations
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Indian and White
Part One: Estrangement
1. City of Indians
2. City of Women
Part Two: Exchange
3. Sharp Trading
4. Deadly Intercourse
Part Three: Accumulation
5. White Men
6. The Black Mother
Afterword: Strong Smells
Notes
Works Cited
Index
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Indian and White
Part One: Estrangement
1. City of Indians
2. City of Women
Part Two: Exchange
3. Sharp Trading
4. Deadly Intercourse
Part Three: Accumulation
5. White Men
6. The Black Mother
Afterword: Strong Smells
Notes
Works Cited
Index
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