The importance of naming. The political imprint of feminist collectives at the Autonomous University of Chiapas

Abstract

This paper presents the results of an investigation into the process of forming university feminist collectives in a university in southeastern Mexico, the Autonomous University of Chiapas (UNACH), who publicly denounced their rage and indignation after the feminicide of the medical intern Mariana Sánchez Dávalos in January 2021 and carried out a strong mobilisation to denounce the expressions of violence they face at the university. The aim of the essay is to make university violence visible, from the voice of young university activists who are members of two collectives, and to analyse the institutional strategies of action in the face of the students' mobilisation. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with students organised in two collectives; the agreements published on the university website were also analysed in order to identify the scope and limitations of the institutional strategy. Initially, it is perceived that the university authorities acted in a reactive manner, i.e. they responded to an extreme situation of violence in a hasty manner, by creating the Coordination for Gender Equality, the Office for the Defence of Human and University Rights, as well as the implementation of a protocol of attention to violence, providing workshops and courses to the university population; However, the existence of these bodies within the organisational structure does not guarantee a comprehensive and systematic strategy for dealing with violence in order to carefully address a structural problem, and they are subject to the political will of the university authorities.