Paper short abstract:

This paper explores from a gender perspective the role of indigenous labour in the global economy by focusing on the experiences of Mexican Mayan women who produce embroidery and handcrafts for tourist consumption in the Yucatán Peninsula.

Paper long abstract:

Embroidery is a fundamental activity among Mexican Mayan women; it sustains the definition of Mayan womanhood in the same manner the cornfield defines the Mayan man. But stitching huipiles (the traditional Mayan women's dress) is also a source of income, part of a Mayan family spectrum of economic activities.

In the Yucatán Peninsula the production and selling of embroidery increased since the 1970s, when the initiation of a major tourist development project in Cancún generated a growing market for handcrafts. While Mayan men left the agricultural work and migrated to the Mexican Caribbean coast in search of job, a number of women started to trade their embroideries for tourist consumption.

Although the expansion of tourism has pushed many Mayan women into the commercial production of embroidery and handcrafts, this occupation is submerged in a series of assumptions that set a limiting framework for their professional and personal development. In fact, women engaged in embroidery are portrayed as "non-workers" when many of them are, in reality, the main breadwinners. This shift in economic power has challenged gender norms and relations by altering the structure and function of the traditional Mayan family.

In this paper I will explore how Mayan women use embroidery to redefine their gender identity and negotiate their power both in their "local" communities and the "global" market. These examples will be used to question the nature of indigenous labour in the global economy, as well as the impact of tourism and its potential to empower impoverished communities.