Soldaderas

Soldaderas, women warriors, camp followers, also known as "Juanas," "Adelitas," viejas (old ladies), galletas (cookies), cucarachas (cockroaches), soldadas, capitanas, and coronelas. Soldaderas are Mexican women who served in armies as camp followers and soldiers during wars. The custom of women fighting in wars, defending their tribes, or accompanying warriors also goes back to Mesoamerican practices. The Spanish origin of the word is soldada, which means "the pay of the soldier." A soldadera is a female servant who takes the soldada of the soldier and buys him food and other essentials.

Soldaderas functioned as foragers, cooks, nurses, laundresses, baggage carriers, sentinels, spies, gunrunners, prostitutes, and front-line soldiers. Because of the variety of roles and their semiofficial acceptance in the military until 1925, the soldaderas have an ambivalent position in Mexican society and popular culture. They are considered variously as silent bystanders, self-abnegating patriots, loose women, or valiant fighters for justice.

See alsoWomen .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

A comprehensive study is Elizabeth Salas, Soldaderas in the Mexican Military: Myth and History (1990). See also María De Los Ángeles Mendieta Alatorre, La mujer en la revolución mexicana (1961).

Additional Bibliography

Lau J., Ana, and Carmen Ramos-Escandón. Mujeres y revolución, 1900–1917. México, D.F.: Instituto Nacional de Estudios Históricos de la Revolución Mexicana, 1993.

Mitchell, S. E., and Patience A. Schell. The Women's Revolution in Mexico, 1910–1953. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007.

                                            Elizabeth Salas