Erstellt am: 14. 12. 2012 - 16:01 Uhr

Ciudad Juárez: Feminicide

The killing of women by men because they are women.

In 1976, sociologist Diana Russell was testifying at the International Tribunal on Crimes Against Women in Brussels. And here she defined femicide as "the killing of females by males because they are females". The word femicide in Spanish is feminicidio and it has become synonymous, in particular, with the high number of female victims in the northern Mexico City of Ciudad Juárez.

Earlier this month, Enrique Peña Nieto officially took over the Presidency in Mexico but according to activists his record is not glowing when dealing with this issue of feminicidio. As governor of Mexico State, more than a thousand women were violently murdered in recent years there. Some 89 percent of cases remain unsolved.

Elisabeth Katzensteiner was studying Social and Cultural Anthropology at the University of Vienna. And to help her knowledge of her chosen topic, feminicidio, she decided to spend some time in Ciudad Juárez. It's not the kind of trip you can really prepare for, apart from knowing at the back your mind that you have to be careful. Here are some excerpts from a diary she kept during her time in Ciudad Juárez:

Day 6

I still don’t get what is happening here. This place is so quiet, it seems too tranquil. It reminds me a little bit of Winter in Austria, when no-one dares to go outside because of the low temperatures.

But although in Juárez there are still no leaves on the trees, we do have around 15 degrees plus and Spring is about to start. There are no people in the streets, no street vendors, no kids in the parks. But hey - we are in Mexico and a public space without food stalls at every single corner and without people selling you newspapers, sweets or toys for your kids on every crossing, and no permanent exposure to sounds as music, vendors pushing their products and drivers blowing their horns is just spooky.

I was in a car with a famous Juárez-born photo-journalist. The sun has already gone down and he offered me a ride home. He started explaining to me that the street we were on is known for frequent executions. He mentioned that we could get assaulted at the intersection at any moment, get into a shooting or get stopped by police who would have us disappeared…

Day 10

Today I met with an activist who runs Casa Amiga an organization offering help to victims of violence who are female and minors. We were having coffee at one of these famous US-based coffee shops next to a big supermarket.

The women started to mention right away, that they, as well as their organization were exposed to permanent threats. While she was talking, her eyes constantly followed the cars who left the parking lot and slowly passed by the glass window we were sitting next to. She made me nervous….

Day 11

Yesterday at night having bed-gossip-talks with my roommate Paulina. She had spent her whole life in Juárez and she told me nothing really bad had ever happened to her. This would usually calm me down. But that night, out of nowhere, she started talking about having witnessed already six shootouts. Four of them she only heard in the close-by neighbourhood, where she lived at that time. In the other two cases she also saw the dead bodies. Like in a crime novel she told me, that her family had moved to another house a few years ago. Two months after, one night they were having dinner in the living room and they heard gunfire coming from a machine gun in front of their house. At first they thought that it was directed at them and they threw themselves on the ground. After some time they came to the windows and saw the dead body of their neighbour lying in the gateway of his house. Two weeks before my arrival at Juárez, Paulina, after coming home from classes at night, witnessed a man entering a house near our place with a rifle.

Day 13

This week I took part in a three-day-conference which was held in order to celebrate International Women’s Day. A student of the local public university was giving a lecture about how her life changed after she was taught about the systematic sexual killings of women (feminicide) for the first time. It was in 2000 when a schoolmate of hers had been killed in that specific cruel way. By the time the girls were about 16 years old, all female pupils had to attend a separate lecture, where they were given instructions on what kind of security measures to take in public space. Meanwhile the male pupils were playing football outside. It was at that time, when she realized, that the condition of being female made her especially vulnerable. I am tired. And for the first time during my fieldwork I wish to be back in Austria.

Click on the player below and hear again Elisabeth Katzensteiner's journey to Ciudad Juárez in a My Reality Special, broadcast Saturday (15.12.12) at 12 midday on FM4.