Surviving Beyond Fear (Human Rights Series, Vol 2)

This anthology represents a unique contribution to the field of human rights in Latin America by focusing on two very fundamental and neglected areas: women and children. Human rights abuses against women are systematically overlooked by international organizations, although women are very often arrested, abused, and raped as punishment for their political activities or those of their husbands or children. In the Catholic courtiers of Latin America, where the ideal of womanhood is the Madonna, the use of torture and rape to strip a woman of her virtue and threats against her children to make it clear that she has lost the ability to protect them have been common practices in military states. This wide-ranging collection of essays and interviews documents a legacy of human rights abuse throughout Latin America and explores the physical and psychological abuse of women and children, the loss of childhood, and the high cost of state terrorism. Included are interviews with leading figures in the struggle for human rights such as Leonor Alonso and leaders fo the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, and articles which discuss how women have come together in the struggle to discover the whereabouts of children and grandchildren who were abducted by the authorities and "disappeared." They show how ordinary women became extraordinary human beings through social and political mobilization and helped to restore democracy in their countries by continuing to speak on behalf of an entire missing generation so that their struggle will not be forgotten.

Marjorie Agosin is a poet, writer and human rights activist. She is also a professor of Spanish at Wellesley College and editor of our Secret Weavers Series.