In Colonial Latin America, women resignedly occupied inferior roles in the political, economic, and social spheres that dictated the happenings of their daily lives. Society did not view women as equivalent to their male counterparts and thus aimed to restrict and diminish their intellect and political agency. Their most effective manner of perpetuating this oppression was to discourage women from seeking an education. From a colonial mindset, the duty of the woman was to meekly obey the desires of the paternal figures in her life and aspire to become a wife and mother; the only acceptable alternative was to devote her life to Catholicism by entering into a convent with the intent of becoming a nun. Although both options deprived women of their right to self-autonomy, the latter offered lesser societal confinements. Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz was a woman who challenged the social norm that women were not worthy of entering the realm of academia. Her inquisitive nature and desire for knowledge prompted her to …show more content…
From the early age of three years La Cruz consumed herself with learning and in the face of adversity, she pursued her passion. The actions she took to advance her learning ranged from refusing to eat cheese, because she believed it would make her dull-witted, to haranguing her mother to let her dress in men’s clothing, in order to receive and education in Mexico City. However, the only officially mandated education she and her female peers received was learning how to “sew and do other women’s tasks.” La Cruz recognized that social constraints would attempt to quell her adventurous and extroverted nature, and despite the collective pressures of her environment, La Cruz refused to become complacent to her predetermined