Who sets out to do it, asks María Sánchez, “to free our mothers and grandmothers from their exile, from the tiny, quiet space that reduces them to the role of companion, exemplary wife and good mother?” It is a shadowy existence from which the author wants to dare to break out in her almost two hundred page book essay.
In the first part of the book, Sánchez examines the role of women in the countryside, the urban view of the countryside and the lack of real voices from the countryside. The second part is even more dedicated to the family history of the author, who remembers the life of her great-great-grandmother, grandmother and mother in one chapter each. For Sánchez, her life as women in rural areas is the starting point for numerous personal anecdotes and socio-political considerations, which are one of the book’s great strengths.
Beyond this dichotomy of the book, three major themes run like a red thread through the essay: feminism, urban-rural relationships, and remembering and forgetting. Sánchez counters the urban feminism discourses that are also prevalent in Spain with a rural understanding of feminism. People would forget “that there is a different time frame, a different rhythm in the country. That urban feminism cannot expect a specific form and a specific tempo from rural areas. “
The author, herself trained as a rural veterinarian in Andalusia, not only exposes the invisible voices of women, but also the marginalization of the entire rural area. Although this has recently been a popular topic in urban media, there is a kind of idealization of rural life, “but it also humiliates us. Because they do not allow us to speak for ourselves. “
Many city dwellers also experience a cultural loss that is common in the country: “My grandmother cannot write, but she runs the garden all by herself.” But it is not just cultural practices that are remembered by some and forgotten by others. Sánchez is primarily concerned with the lives of all those women in rural areas who have remained invisible and unheard: “This essay should finally do them justice by recognizing them, by making them part of the memory . ”She succeeds in doing this in a sometimes poetic tone in the German edition of the book, but in some places it does not come close to the linguistic clarity and elegance of the Spanish original due to inaccuracies in the translation.
The German readership is likely to find themselves in many descriptions, because in Germany, too, the work of women in rural areas is hardly appreciated, the socio-cultural urban-rural divide and the dying of small farms are part of serious changes in society. Sánchez’s essay can serve as an inspiration for dealing with the problems of rural areas in solidarity. This includes an inclusive rural feminism, “which everyone feels accompanied by, supports everyone and does not make anyone feel less worthy”. It’s not just about long-established farmers, but also about migrant workers in the strawberry fields and in the slaughterhouses.
Land of women Maria Sanchez Petra Strien (translation) Blessing 2021 192 pages, 20 €
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