EL ARTE FEMENINO: INTERPRETANDO LOS CÓDIGOS DE LA SOCIEDAD ABAKUÁ

Abstract

The Spanish colonization of the Americas involved fierce confrontations in the real and symbolic realms. The Spaniards persistently tried to impose dominance over the indigenous populations as well as the enslaved Africans, promoting their Catholic faith as central to the assimilation of the communities they attempted to dominate. In urban centers, enslaved Africans resisted assimilation, when possible, by reorganizing their homeland institutions, including brotherhoods and nation-groups. In Havana, Cuba, the enslaved carabalí Africans from the Old Calabar region (Nigeria and Cameroon) established the Abakuá Society, described by many as “African masonry”, through a series of lodges devoted to mutual aid. My dissertation, El arte femenino: Interpretando los códigos de la Sociedad Abakuá, explores cultural artifacts made by female artists as well as art that visualizes female figures through interpreting imaginary of the Abakuá Society. Many scholars wrongly judge the Abakuá Society based on racial, gender, religious, ideological, and even moral grounds, namely, phallocentric, misogynistic, with presumed primitive religious and ethical practices. The core of my dissertation is to analyze the Abakuá imaginary impact on Cuban culture through the artistic lens. The Abakuá imaginary is a sort of anlagen—the potential at the center: “that which will become”—, an incubator, and escape valve for Cuban economic and political tensions. Despite being forbidden for females, leading artists like Sara Gómez, Belkis Ayón, and Ana Mendieta used the Society’s symbols, ethos, and myths for their artistic production. Moreover, male writers and artists who did not belong to the Society such as Guillermo Cabrera Infante, also recreated the Abakuá imaginary. I contend that the myths, rites, symbols, ethos, gender, and race notions of the Abakuá percolated into Cuban culture and society and served as a counter-hegemonic platform for Cuban artists that challenged discourses of male and political dominance. I also argue that the perceived misogyny of the Society was mainly bound to certain interpretations of the foundational myth and due to the homosocial composition of the juegos (Abakuá groups). In their practices and contrary to popular belief, the organization does not reject females. I demonstrate, through archival research, testimonies, and personal interviews—collated from members—, that the Society is not secret; as with all the Afro-Cuban initiation systems, they have sacred and private practices, but the Abakuá is an “open” organization with a strong political influence that can operate freely in the barrios (neighborhoods) as mediators, to which females have access.