Latin American Studies Resources

This article addresses the impacts of domestic violence in Latin America. Is is estimated that between 30 and 45 percent of women in the region suffer from some form of physical, sexual of psychological abuse. Latin American women want domestic violence to become more visible to the public to show that everyone pays for it. Due to the efforts of women organizations, domestic abuse victims can now receive free psychological and legal assistance, along with have access to help-lines and shelters.

This article states how the costs of migration in Latin America outweigh the rewards concerning the lives of children. Many children in the region endure negative impacts from their parents' migration to generate remittances. UNICEF claims that migration laves children with feelings of abandonment and vulnerability; the children's role models (their parents) are absent from their lives.

This article focus's on war and nation states in Latin America. Some of the main concepts are on making war, the state, the nation, and on making the citizens. This article fully outlines the types of war Latin America is involved with, who precisely is involved, and what those people think about themselves and their actions. It also portrays the effects war has on Latin American countries-its advantages and disadvantages.

This article is from 2006, when Maria Teresa Fernandez was allowed to become a judge, which Spanish Law had previously banned. I think it relates to the course because, even though it is in Spain, the machismo culture still exists, and this demonstrates how women's rights are threatening the strength of the machismo culture.

This article discusses how the Machismo culture in Latin America is causing health problems and cutting life expectancies. Being macho means to attract lots of women and to never show any weakness. This need to be tough is causing problems for men.

This article discusses the use of birth control in Mexico and how it plays a role in the population. Different programs, such as on for family planning, are trying to help in controlling population by encouraging different forms of contraceptives.

After a weapons-buying splurge, is South America gearing up for conflict? Robert Munks, Americas analyst for IHS Jane's, investigates.

Gay rights protesters plan to hold a Gay Pride parade in a Mexican border town that recently outlawed cross-dressing.

This article interviews a woman named Lidia Cacho who runs a crisis center and discusses the domestic violence issue in Mexico. Many women's rights activist say that domestic violence is one of the ugliest consequences of Mexico's machismo culture. Many domestic violence victims are silent, because of fear and the lack of support from the police. Victims are often followed by their husbands or sent death threats. Lidia Cacho tries to work with domestic violence victims by protecting them and offering them as much support as possible.

In 2005, Mexico declared that a sexual attack by a husband is still defined as rape. In 1994, the country ruled that it was simply "an undue exercise of conjugal rights". Under this ruling, women could not report rape by their husband. The article states that 47 percent of women report being the victims of violence, and 84 percent of domestic violence victims are silent.

Written in 2002, this article talks about improved changes made to children in Latin America in the way of health and education. However, these slight advancements have been met with many new challenges such as the spread of HIV/AIDS and domestic violence. The UN has become very involved in this problem and working on its solution as in many of these developing countries, children make up a great part of the population.

Homosexuality in Mexico is the main subject of this article. They go on to talk about masculinity and how that relates to being gay and whether it is accepted within society. The article also discusses HIV/AIDS and how it is connected to homosexuality and the various acts of men in Mexico.

This article discusses the views and reality of abortions happening in the hospitals and behind the scenes in Latin America. Many different issues are brought up on abortion, such as that of religious and health, showing various opinions. The article also talks about possible solutions through sex education and birth control and also the cultural reality of these solutions.

This article is from 2008, one year after Mexico City legalized abortions. It talks about the continuing difficulties for poor women to receive safe abortions, even though they had been legalized. Women complained about long lines at understaffed public clinics, hostile treatment from hospital workers who opposed abortion, and unfair bureaucratic hurdles which made it difficult or impossible for them to get the procedure done. At the time this article was written, the abortion law was being challenged in the Supreme Court by the conservative government.

In many Latino cultures masculinity is defined by the heroics of sport. Mexico is no exception; their most sacred and national masculine symbol could very well be their national soccer team. I chose this web page for its vivid imagery documenting the "idols of the Tricolor."

This sight documents the abuses done to homosexual couples in Mexico. I think this page gives good insight into how ashamed Mexican culture is of its gay community. The purpose of this organization is to seek social change through peaceful means but unfortunately it seems that simple letter writing campaigns will not stop discrimination on such a massive scale.

This page demonstrates a World Bank policy to keep the fertility rate down in developing countries. Surprisingly, there is little attention given to specific countries, rather the policy prescribed here is uniform and enforced equally.

This is a music video from Shakira that demonstrates the sexualized status of women. In the video, Shakira, who is from Colombia, belly dances in a very sexual style. She also, at one point, is crawling in the mud. Finally, the lyrics are about how she will always be there for the presumed man. In the chorus, the line "estoy a tus pies" is repeated, which means "I am at your feet".

This news story is about a "declaration of sexual rights" given by the International Planned Parenthood Federation in Argentina, in which the group asked governments to commit to protecting their citizen's sexual rights, which translates into sexual education and ease of access to contraceptive methods.