In Spain, women are challenging the traditionally gendered norms of rural life.
Since time immemorial, life in the countryside has depended on sharply defined gender roles. The gruelling labour of farm life has typically been seen as a masculine domain. For women, it has been more about the pressure to conform to the gendered roles of wife, mother, and homemaker. Historically, rural areas have often had more limited opportunities for women to seek education and employment. It is the city which has represented freedom and possibility. But ageing populations and mass urban migration are threatening traditional ways of rural life. Things are changing.
A recent case in point, explored in an article by journalist Cristina García Casado for infoLibre, has been the example of women in Spain revitalising remote villages by taking on the masculine roles associated with farm life. One important source for her is the work of Ángel Poveda Polo, a writer living in rural Spain who has chronicled these women’s experiences in a blog called Pobladoras, in order to provide “a window to discover the difficulties rural women entrepreneurs have endured to carry out their projects”. The infoLibre article looks at the example of three very different women, who through very different circumstances have all settled in the Spanish countryside.
The first is Hiromi Sato, who immigrated from Japan with her husband to the remote village of La Alberca. This charming historical village in the province of Salamanca is home to just under a thousand inhabitants. Her husband died 13 years ago, but rather than return to her country she decided to stay. She tells infoLibre: “when he died, I had doubts about whether to continue living in Spain or not, and about where to do so. It would have been easier for me to return to Japan, but then I thought about my children. They were already settled in school, and couldn’t speak Japanese that well. I thought it was better not to subject them to such a drastic change.” Her son was the only non-Albercan child in his school. Classed as outsiders, things were difficult for her children – until they entered secondary school, where they were joined by more children from all over the region.
These days, Sato is very much integrated into rural life, helping her local area to flourish in the face of depopulation. She’s part of a local textile crafts association, sings in the local choir, and grows her own garden. She hosts workshops which have helped revitalise local wool crafts. Her story is certainly not typical, but provides a great example of the varied ways women are taking on traditional masculine roles, and providing a lifeline to struggling rural areas.
Another independent woman taking on masculine roles is Luz Bella González Gómez. She had to relearn how to live a rural life when her husband died almost three decades ago. She now runs her livestock farm alone near the town of Zamora. Many tasks that were once her husband’s domain, are now her own. She never thought of leaving: “I have the village in my soul”, she tells infoLibre. Aged 69, she wakes up at the crack of dawn to go to the mountains to gather fodder for her cows who graze nearby her home, then goes to do the housework. “This is very hard. Working and living here is hard. You have to like it; it’s not for everyone”, she notes.
Unlike the other women in the article, Violeta Serrano is much younger. She grew up in a small village in the area of La Maragatería, in the province of Castilla y León, home to less than a hundred people. At 17 she moved to the city in search of opportunities not available in her hometown. An ambitious writer, she has since become very accomplished, authoring books and earning multiple degrees and public recognition. After living in the urban centres of Madrid, Barcelona, and even abroad in Buenos Aires, at 36 Serrano decided to return to her village. She has built her own house there, a distant dream for those living in the city. She explains to infoLibre: “I never thought I’d come back here for anything more than visiting my parents from time to time. But things have changed a lot since I left. When I moved back to Spain, I thought it was absurd to go to a city where all the income I could generate would be absorbed by rent . So I made a virtue out of necessity.”
Though she understands her story is inspiring, like the others, she is hesitant to over-idealise country life. “There’s no work here”, she tells infoLibre, young professionals would have to either start their own business or establish remote working arrangements with their employer. Serrano’s own venture has been creating the Escuela Savia, a space that fosters creativity through connecting with nature and writing. With Mount Teleno as a backdrop, she shares with others how to sync their life to the cycles of nature, enjoying the peaceful routine of rising with the sun, seasonal gardening, and spending as much time as possible outdoors.
“The peace we have here cannot be bought with money”, she tells infoLibre.
Translator is packing its bags.
TMH
The original article by Cristina García Casado was published in Spanish on this year’s International Women’s Day (8 March) under the title ‘Mujeres que eligen el campo: un entorno masculinizado acoge ahora nuevos proyectos de vida’.
It is available here.
infolibre is a Spanish general news website created in March 2013, with a team of former journalists from El Pais and Público, including its former director Jesús Maraña, who is now director of infolibre. According to his editorial vision, the website aims to practise “journalism the old-fashioned way: rigorous, analytical, accurate and independent.”
