2025 Summer Research Symposium • Silvia Benavides • July 9, 2025

Silvia Benavides

she/her/hers

Class of 2027

Major: Political Science

Mentor: Erika Grimm, PhD (she/her/hers), St. Mary’s University

The Coloniality of Gender and Class: Analyzing Maria Lugones Decolonial

Feminism

This paper examines Maria Lugones' theory of the colonial/modern gender system as a

foundation for her framework of decolonial feminism. Lugones argues that because of

colonialism, our society has gendered hierarchies. These hierarchies dehumanize Indigenous

women and enforce European heterosexual norms. Drawing from Anibal Quijano’s concept of

coloniality of power, Lugones expands the idea with the coloniality of gender. She emphasizes

how race, gender, and sexuality are constructed by colonial violence. Lugones offers a powerful

critique of traditional feminism’s Eurocentric bias. This paper aims to investigate the overlooked

concept of class oppression to achieve a decolonial feminism. Applying the work of Iris Marion

Young’s theory of structural injustice and the concept of the “Five Faces of Oppression,

"specifically exploitation and powerlessness, this work shows how economic hierarchies

intersect with colonial and gendered structures. A case study on women garment workers in

Bangladesh is used to illustrate how global capitalism reinforces the gendered labor hierarchies

that are rooted in colonialism and patriarchy. This expanded framework accounts for the lived

experiences of marginalized women and offers a more inclusive approach to feminist resistance.

Keywords: Oppression, Colonization, Exploitation, Modernity, Latin American

Philosophy