Gender, State, and Medicine in Highland Ecuador: Modernizing Women, Modernizing the State, 1895-1950

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Gender,State,andMedicine inHighlandEcuador A.Kim Clark Modernizing Women, Modernizing the State, 1895–1950 latin american history / women’s studies “By examining policies and institutions that focused on reproduction, sexuality, and medicine, Clark exposes the gendered relations at the nodes where political and social reforms reframed private behaviors as public concerns. Writing with sympathy for and insight into the lives of the historical actors peopling the book’s rich social landscape, Clark makes a valuable contribution to Andean gender history.” —Ann S. Blum, University of Massachusetts, Boston “Kim Clark offers a deeply grounded, nuanced study of state modernization in postcolonial Ecuador. By addressing how women have been both objects and agents of Ecuador’s modernization project, and by revealing the emancipatory appeal as well as the contradictions of state programs that target women, Clark presents us with one of the richest historical analyses of state formation and its gendered articulations in Ecuadorian and Latin American studies to date.” —Amy Lind, University of Cincinnati In 1921 Matilde Hidalgo became the first woman physician to graduate from the Universidad Central in Quito, Ecuador. Hidalgo was also the first woman to vote in a national election and the first to hold public office. Author Kim Clark relates the stories of Matilde Hidalgo and other women who successfully challenged newly instituted Ecuadorian state programs in the wake of the Liberal Revolution of 1895. New laws, while they did not specifically outline women’s rights, left loopholes wherein women could contest entry into education systems and certain professions and vote in elections. As Clark demonstrates, many of those who seized these opportunities were unattached women who were socially and economically disenfranchised. Political and social changes during the liberal period drew new groups into the workforce. Women found novel opportunities to pursue professions where they did not compete directly with men. Training women for work meant expanding secular education systems and normal schools. Healthcare initiatives were also introduced that employed and targeted women to reduce infant mortality, eradicate venereal diseases, and regulate prostitution. Many of these state programs attempted to control women’s behavior under the guise of morality and honor. Yet highland Ecuadorian women used them to better their lives and to gain professional training, health care, employment, and political rights. As they engaged state programs and used them for their own purposes, these women became modernizers and agents of change, winning freedoms for themselves and future generations. A. Kim Clark is associate professor of anthropology at the University of Western Ontario. She is the author of The Redemptive Work: Railway and Nation in Ecuador, 1895–1930, and coeditor of Highland Indians and the State in Modern Ecuador. pitt latin american series University of Pittsburgh Press www.upress.pitt.edu Cover design: Ann Walston ISBN 13: 978-0-8229-6209-0 ISBN 10: 0-8229-6209-8 9 7 8 0 8 2 2 9 6 2 0 9 0 Clark Gender, State, and Medicine in Highland Ecuador pittsburgh GENDER,STATE,AND MEDICINE IN HIGHLAND ECUADOR Pitt Latin American Series John Charles Chasteen and Catherine M. Conaghan, Editors Gender,State,andMedicine inHighlandEcuador MODERNIZING WOMEN,MODERNIZING THE STATE, 1895–1950 A. KIM CLARK University of Pittsburgh Press Published by the University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, Pa., 15260 Copyright © 2012, University of Pittsburgh Press All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America Printed on acid-free paper 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Clark, A. Kim, 1964– Gender, state, and medicine in Highland Ecuador : modernizing women, modernizing the state, 1895–1950 / A. Kim Clark. p. cm. — (Pitt Latin American series) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8229-6209-0 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Women—Ecuador—Social conditions—20th century. 2. Women—Government policy— Ecuador—History—20th century. 3. Women’s rights—Ecuador—History—20th century. 4. Women—Medical care—Ecuador—History—20th century. 5. Medical education— Ecuador—History—20th century. 6. Public welfare—Ecuador—History—20th century. 7. Ecuador—Social policy—20th century. I. Title. HQ1557.C53 2012 305.409866—dc23 2012006940 To my father-in-law, Eduardo Larrea Stacey ...