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Caribbean Women Analysis

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The Caribbean woman’s search for identity has been a long and arduous journey, not only is she disadvantaged by a community that faces the same struggle and unanswered questions, but also by her gender in respect to her male counterparts and her being given a ‘lesser’ role within society . Caribbean Feminist Scholars such as Hilary Beckles, Varene Shepard and Dr. Lucille Mathurin Mair have strived to give a face to this invisible group through their substantial research in the fields of Gender and History. Mair was an Author, Diplomat and Pioneer in the fields of History and Women and Gender Studies. Mair’s ground breaking research A Historical Study of Women In Jamaica 1655-1844 has been recognized as the “most sought after unpublished work …show more content…

She wrote of the white woman’s privileged existence, of the black woman’s struggles and position as the laborer and lastly, of the mulatto woman who was placed between both worlds; the concubine and mistress of the white man, viewed as better than the black slave females but never attaining the status that was reserved for whiteness. Mair shattered the ‘maleness’ of history, brining from the darkness the women who were hidden behind their male counterparts, showing the world that they too played an active part in the emancipation and justification. The History of the Caribbean (more specifically Jamaica) has never been the same since the emergence of Mair’s work, as the work used was crucial in refuting of generalizations as it pertains to the invisibility of women in the historical …show more content…

Her decision to delve into the lives and experiences of these Jamaican women have shown that there was indeed a lot left to be desired within the historical texts throughout the years. These women who were lumped into one invisible group and filed away by previous historians as submissive and passive, were proven by Mair to be as crucial to the revolution and the emancipation of Jamaica as their better known male counterparts. In looking at these women based on their class and race and the experiences afforded to each created by their varying differences, Mair’s gendered research not only opened a whole new world pertaining to the study of the Caribbean slave societies, but also gave a voice to the voiceless and a face to the faceless. Who better to tell the story of oppression, labor and struggle than the women who experienced it

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