The Woman Who Fell in Love with the Man Who Thought the World Was Flat Public Policy, Identity, and the Challenge of Reconceptualizing Domestic Violence in the Latino Community

Abstract

Almost as Often as the Earth Turns The story I am about to tell should have taken place during medieval times, but instead, it takes place in the twenty-first century. Perhaps it could best be described as a Latino version of a tale about a knight-errant and his damsel, a tragic fairy-tale-in-the-making that has as its protagonists an undocumented Mexican couple - a man and a woman who ventured to an unknown land, like so many others, looking for work and the promise of a better future. I was a witness to this story before I became its narrator, and as such, I was struck by the ties that reach out across history, repeating the same tales again and again. The lovers and travelers, then and now, searching for hope and facing great obstacles, and even violence, along the way. This much is enough to tie us to the past, to tie fiction to reality. But there is more. For one of the most remarkable and surprising things that I discovered was that the modern caballero I knew, like the medieval cavalier I could only imagine, was utterly sure that the world is flat. I discovered this fact while walking along Main Street in a small town somewhere in the American Midwest. I was making my way back to my office with our "hero" and his doncella (from now on, "Pedro" and "Isabel"), talking to them about their hometown. (1) It was a time during which that city found itself at the center of international news due to a high intensity earthquake that had just hit, causing major damage and loss of life. "It's amazing how quickly we learn of events happening in places so far away these days," I commented, "but I suppose that's the nature of technology: news travels around the globe in no time." To my surprise, Pedro reacted with confusion and disbelief - not to the claim that news travels quickly, but to the claim that it travels "around a globe." Isabel proceeded to explain to an incredulous Pedro that the world was, indeed, round. She enunciated the word "round," or redondo in Spanish, in such a beautiful and musical way that there was no doubt what she meant to convey, how she meant to insist on the idea of the roundness of the world. I also felt compelled to add that the Earth turned on its axis and, further, revolved around the sun. The cosmos is about curves and ellipses, never about flat surfaces and straight lines. Pedro listened for a while, looking at us condescendingly, apparently feeling sorry for us. After all, we were women, and by definition we were not capable of knowing more than he did. The conversation continued for a while, with stories of Columbus and Copernicus, explorers and scientists, discoveries and celebrations; but Pedro remained silent, unconvinced, and always smiling as if to indicate his disdain. I changed the topic and kept walking, sensing that we were not going to change Pedro's mind in the first round. We made our way through the summer air, and I thought of the seasons. I thought of the beauty of the way it all unfolds, spinning and turning. And I thought of Isabel and myself trying to argue for what we knew was right in the face of overwhelming and powerful disbelief, the two of us like modern female Latin American versions of Galileo. When Pedro looked away I whispered in Isabel's ear "E pure torna." She turned to me and smiled. I doubt now that Isabel understood the presumptuous reference to Galileo's final rebuttal, as I later found out that although she is quite intelligent, Isabel never had the opportunity to finish elementary school while in Mexico. Despite her lack of formal training, though, there were many things that Isabel knew with complete certainty that happened to be true. She knew, for instance, that the world was round, that Pedro was wrong, and that he was no Prince Charming. As it turned out, Pedro beat Isabel on a regular basis - almost as often as the Earth turns. And in spite of all of this, she walked along through the trees and the flowers of a foreign land, her eyes full of care and compassion, deeply and completely in love with her unmoved abuser. …