The University of Arizona Press
Chicana Spiritual Activism
Making Change, Making Soul
This book explores the profound impact of spiritual activism within the Chicana feminist movement in Texas. It illuminates how a cohort of Texas Chicanas embraced spiritual activism in pursuit of social change during the movement and into the present day.
The book draws on an array of qualitative methodologies—including interviews, autoethnography, testimonio, pláticas, and archival analysis—to develop what the author formulates as “methodologies of the spirit.” Focusing on the lived experiences, histories, and spiritual activism of sixteen Chicanas/Tejanas, Sendejo shows how these trailblazing women confronted the enduring impacts and repercussions of colonial legacies in Texas through their involvement in movement initiatives such as electoral politics through Mujeres Por La Raza, the cultural arts movement, developing Chicana feminist thought, and the establishment of bilingual education and Chicana/o studies programs.
The activists highlighted in the book include well-known figures such as Santa Barraza, Norma E. Cantú, Rosie Castro, Martha P. Cotera, Inés Hernández-Ávila, and others. Through their work, these activists emerged as architects of their own healing and transformation. Simultaneously, they opened avenues for others to embark on similar journeys reshaping religious practices and unearthing and disseminating spiritual, feminist, and ancestral knowledges.
“Developing her earlier work on ‘methodologies of the spirit’ and building on Anzaldúan thought, Brenda Sendejo draws on her more than fifteen years of building relationships with incredible Chicana/Tejana spiritual activists doing their healing soul work alongside their social justice work to offer her readers the first single-authored book to focus on spiritual activism as a liberatory praxis. Uniquely blending Chicana feminist autohistoria, ethnography, and plática methodologies with cultural analysis, Sendejo writes from her bodymindspirit to uplift hope-filled conocimientos as critical lessons for navigating ongoing political arrebatos. Reading this book will fuel us with ‘spirit stories’ as creative strategies of remembrance, transformation, and persistence, inspiring us to continue our work with radical love.”—Irene Lara, co-editor of Fleshing the Spirit: Spirituality and Activism in Chicana, Latina, and Indigenous Women’s Lives
“Brenda Sendejo’s book is foundational scholarship for anyone seeking deep conocimiento and understanding of the political, cultural, and spiritual influence of Texas Chicanas of and beyond the movement era. Through almost two decades worth of testimonios, ethnographic research, and convivencias with these spiritual activists, Sendejo documents the decolonizing, spiritualized activism of Chicana movement–era activists who have continued to do healing and spirit work as educators, community advocates, artists, organizers, writers, intellectuals, and agents of change. The author draws from the rich intellectual, praxis-oriented, and spiritual genealogy of Chicana feminist activists to examine their life journeys of ‘making soul’ and how they’ve forever shaped our worlds through new liberatory subjectivities and ways of being in the world.”—Lilliana P. Saldaña, co-editor of Latinas and the Politics of Urban Spaces
