The discourse of romantic love on the Miskito Coast

Abstract

abstract This Article examines the sentiment of love among the indigenous Miskitu people along along the Honduran and Nicaraguan Caribbean Coast. Miskitu women historically have held high positions of power in their matrilocal society. Since the lobster-diving industry began in the 1970s, however, gender and power relations have shifted, rendering women more dependent on men who earn wages. Women's loss of power is not only due to the economic changes, but it is also caused by the ideology and discourse of romantic love in Miskitu society. The main body of the Article explores the ideology of Miskitu love through three discourse genres – involuntary love, commodified love, and violent love. It is argued that whilst Miskitu women are victims of romantic love within the changing economic and social conditions, Miskitu women still have the capacity to negotiate their positionality and use strategies of resistance to navigate the highly gendered domain of romantic love. Miskitu women can claim both agency and constraint (Cole and Thomas, 2009; Padilla et al, 2007; Wardlow and Hirsch, 2006). The literature similarly shows that gender inequality may constrain women's options but it does not determine them as women – women are able to manoevre within its constraints. Miskitu women are seen as strategisers who create sexual meanings and use sexual resources to achieve their goals. This Article is important because of what it reveals of romantic love within a specific context and for what it reveals about gender oppression, yet it is important to understand Miskitu women's resistance to romantic love.