n underwent some drastic changes as a result of the Sandinista Revolution. I would say that the female gender role was shaken up more than for men. Women used to almost be afraid of men; not necessarily afraid, but it was customary that men socialized with men and women associate with women. The traditional man was powerful, commanding, and sometimes physically abusive. Some women used to have close relationships with other women as a defense mechanism against machismo as an outlet, sometimes for moral, emotional comfort or companionism. This defense mechanism helps the women manage the home better by dividing work, taking care of the children, taking care of a drunk husband, or for resource sharing, of which resources were scarce. From one angle, this community forms a line against machismo- a refuge for women and their children a means of mobilizing women and their resources apart from and even against men. From another angle, it is a product of machismo- an allocation of expectations in which physical intimacy is heterosexual, emotional intimacy homosocial. From yet another angle, this female world is a necessary prerequisite for the ongoing reproduction of the male world of machismo- for the package of assumptions it carries, the efforts and resources it allots, even the spheres of relative autonomy it grants for women, are part and parcel of a deeply gendered division of the world, where gender remains defined in terms of male dominion over women and children (Lancaster, 1992; pg. 125). Yet as I mentioned, as the war continued, all this soon changed; women were voicing opinions, they were becoming more independent and even had their own International Womens Day to celebrate to revolutionary New Man and Woman, especially the women. Women are also crossing into the male breadwinner boundary of gender roles, and in some cases ended up being the mother as well as the father in a home without a male father figure. Dona Flora seemed to b...
