Healing the Curse of the grosero Husband: Women’s Health Seeking and Pentecostal Conversion in Oaxaca, Mexico

Abstract

Drawing on anthropological research in Oaxaca, Mexico, this article describes the role of health seeking in women’s experiences with Pentecostal conversion. The present study confirms that Pentecostalism’s promise of reforming problematic male behavior is a significant draw for women. Women’s stories of conversion are strikingly consistent in their accounts of male drinking, womanizing, and domestic violence. However, the findings also demonstrate that when efforts to domesticate men fail—and they often do—women still find significant ways in which Pentecostalism addresses suffering. The study provides a unique contribution to the literature by exploring that paradox in detail.

Acknowledgment

This work was supported by a grant from the Ruth Landes Memorial Research Fund, the Reed Foundation.

Notes

1. The study was reviewed and approved by the Institutional Review Boards of both collaborators. Pseudonyms are used to protect the identity of study participants.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Margaret Everett

Margaret Everett is a medical anthropologist and Professor of Sociology at Portland State University, Portland, USA. Her research interests include the health transition and chronic disease prevention in Mexico and among US Latinos/Latinas. Michelle Ramirez is a medical anthropologist and Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, USA. Her research interests include healing, gender, and sexuality in Mexico and among US Latino/Latinas. She is currently working on a project examining the parallel claims of both religion and science about appropriate marital sexuality among Mexican Pentecostals. CORRESPONDENCE: Prof. Margaret Everett, Portland State University, Office of Graduate Studies, 1633 SW Park Ave, Portland, OR 97201, USA.