Abstract:
This study focuses on processes of identity formation of indigenous Mapuche women, especially those who are not involved in the land vindication struggle with the Chilean state. Recent research on these processes argues that the political domination of the land vindication struggle has reinforced patriarchal features of Mapuche social structures, limiting Mapuche women's ability to determine their feminist subjectivities. Grounded in a post-structural feminist perspective, this thesis analyses how aspects of gender, class, ethnicity, and age intersect to shape Mapuche women's identities as women and as Mapuche by determining role-performing linked to their everyday activities. The aim of the study is to illustrate that female identity might be constructed in various ways, even through structures that can appear as patriarchal to western feminist understandings. Mapuche women's identities are shaped on a daily basis based on their underprivileged social position within Chilean society and strict behavioural codes of Mapuche collectives. Nevertheless, Mapuche women have found ways to overcome the difficulties they are faced with, in order to define themselves as women and as Mapuche, evidencing the need to work with inclusive notions of feminism.