My name is Martha Gonzalez and I am a Chicana artivista, singer and songwriter for East LA based Quetzal. I want to invite you all to support a very important project that I have been working on.
Entre Mujeres is a translocal music composition project between Chicanas/Latinas in the U.S. and Jarochas/Mexican female musicians in Mexico. This project seeks to make the voices, ideas and translocal dialogues between Chicanas and Jarochas visible through the medium of song.
A song as a sonic and literary manifestation is life’s sound-scape, a unique cathartic memento, as well as a powerful political tool. Without question a song is also an important historical text. A person’s testimonio (testimony), life views, triumphs, and struggles can be expressed into song lyrics. In the end a song, like a testimonio is what stands as moment lived. Multiplied by community this can be an active exercise in consensus and knowledge production. As a collaborator in various songwriting moments I have witnessed time and again how this method and process creates space, builds community, challenges multiple patriarchal systems, and can potentially produce knowledge that is accessible.
Throughout this project there has been convivencia, trust, testimonios that have generated important moments of healing, and knowledge production. In these ways Entre Mujeres Project is a testament to the kind of collective knowledge generated across U.S. Mexican borders.