The Afro-descendant Women's Meeting opens at the MNCP

Alondra Flores Soto

La Jornada Newspaper, Saturday, July 26, 2025, p. 5

We, black, coastal women, but also historically marginalized and impoverished, when we begin to name the margins in which we have lived, it causes conflict , said Aleida Violeta Vázquez Cisneros, who represented the female voice at the inauguration of the Meeting of Afro-descendant Women, at the National Museum of Popular Cultures (MNCP).

Faced with a system that has made us uncomfortable all our lives simply by existing, today, as a political stance, I love to provoke discomfort in those who listen to us , she stated, while thanking a space that is the result of a collective struggle planted with a seed of at least 500 years, where Black women have resisted with words, work, and knowledge.

A poet, activist, and artisan from Cuajinicuilapa, Guerrero, a coastal town in the south where Blackness is prevalent , called for people not to search for them solely on July 25, International Day of Women of African Descent.

The word "inclusion" causes me a lot of trouble because it implies that we have never been part of public policy or society itself . At the same time, I express my gratitude for the spaces that represent constant recognition on the path to historical reparation for women and people of African descent.

Surrounded by dances of devils and runaway sirens, music from the leeward side of the southern Ariles, poetry and literature, the broad textile tradition, gastronomy, and a craft fair from the Costa Chica region of Guerrero and Oaxaca, the knowledge and resilience of the third Mexican root were evident.

At the start of activities within the Creators of Dreams and Realities program, Diego Prieto Hernández, head of the Strategic Unit for Living Cultures, Intangible Heritage, and Interculturality, announced that 42 women exhibitors, artisans, activists, composers, and dancers from the Costa Chica and Chacalapa regions of Veracruz will participate, starting yesterday and continuing tomorrow.

She stated that the meeting is an effort to vindicate women and Afro-Mexican communities, although much remains to be done in the fight against racism, discrimination, classism, and exclusion.

Activities continue today and tomorrow at the museum located at 289 Hidalgo Avenue in the Carmen neighborhood of Coyoacán.

This Saturday at noon, a lecture will be offered on Afro-descendants: The Role of Women in the Long Struggle for Recognition. This will be followed by a musical performance by Las Nietas de Nicolás. At 4:00 PM, a discussion panel will take place on Afrohistorias: Memory, Resistance, and Power. At 5:00 PM, a fandango jarocho will be performed.

Tomorrow, three of the most traditional dances of the Afro-descendant community will be presented: the Diablos de El Quizás at 11:00 a.m., the Sirenas Cimarronas at 1:00 p.m., and the San Juan Colorado masked dance at 4:00 p.m. All activities are free.