‘Aren’t we mothers all the same?’: Personhood and patria in Eva Canel’s La mulata

Abstract

Eva Canel’s play La mulata (Barcelona 1891, premiered in Havana in 1893) places its protagonist, Patria, at the intersection of feminist, anti-racist and anti-colonial agendas. In particular, I argue that it is through an original adaptation of the sentimental ideal of motherhood that the play grounds Patria’s rights as a mother and as an Afro-descendant woman, as well as the standing of a soon to be independent Cuba. In this way, the play invites reflection on the problematic relationship between discourses of disembodied personhood and bodily discrimination.