Mamá Osa in the Mountains: African Ascendientes' Embodiments of Fugitivity and Freedom in the Americas

Abstract

Abstract: Women who are multiply marginalized find innovative ways to conjure prestige and assert their dignity within oppressive societies. In this essay, I apply a Mami-informed de/colonial approach to analyze the life of one such woman: my grandmother Rosa. In 1936, Rosa (Mamá Osa) moved to the sierras of Sánchez, Samaná, Dominican Republic to resist the anti-Black patriarchy she experienced. By sharing my grandmother's story, I underscore the value of multiply marginalized women being in community with one another as a counterpoint to the liberal goal of integration. I draw parallels between the oral history of her decision to start a new life in the mountains and the written accounts of the sixteenth- and seventeenth-century maroon communities of the Americas. I also examine Dominican feminist writings during my grandmother's era to contextualize her life narrative. In making explicit how past Dominican feminist and pedagogical discourse were inaccessible and marginalizing to freedom-seeking women like my grandmother, I urge scholars who trace knowledge systems around the world to continue to examine the sources of feminist thought.