Chuquichinchay or the Traces of Andean "Androgyny"

Notes

1. An apu is a living mountain. According to pre-Hispanic Andean traditions, the apus have influence over the vital cycles of the regions they dominate. After colonization, the Spaniards placed Christian elements on the summits of the apus to eliminate “pagan” or “idolatrous” beliefs.

2. The word “androgyny” is not part of the historical development of the Andean peoples. Its use in this work responds to the fact that it can bring us closer, through the epistemes we currently use, to a cultural reality whose traces have been recorded in chronicles such as the one written by Santa Cruz Pachacuti.

3. The hypothesis that qariwarmi subjects were considered an important part of the reproduction of the Andean social order during pre-Hispanic times is developed by Michael Horswell in Decolonizing the Sodomite: Queer Tropes of Sexuality in Colonial Andean Culture (2007).

4. In June 1993, Onda magazine references the story of Francisco Pro investigated by historian Tito Bracamonte in an article titled “La tapada gay,”. It is possible to find this article in Museo Travesti del Perú by Giuseppe Campuzano (2003).

5. Tapada is a term used during the colonial period and the early years of the Peruvian republic to refer to women who covered their heads and faces with blankets, leaving only one eye uncovered.

6. A more detailed study of the process of criminalization of sodomy in Peru is made by Adolfo Tantaleán in “Vivo según mi naturaleza. La experiencia de la sodomía en la sociedad colonial limeña, 1770-1810.” In: De amores y luchas. Diversidad sexual, derechos humanos y ciudadanía (2001).

7. Oiga’s report, together with a note and a photograph published by the newspaper Expreso, are also in the Museo Travesti del Perú.

8. The killing of people from the LGBTQIA+ community.

9. Center for Interdisciplinary Studies in Sexuality, AIDS and Society-Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, Informe Anual del Observatorio de Derechos LGBT 2019. Lima, Peru, 2020. http://cvcdiversidadsexual.org/publicaciones/informe-anual-del-observatorio-de-derechos-lgbt-2019.

10. “Pico y género” (“peak and gender”) was the name of a governmental measure implemented during the presidency of Martín Vizcarra to face the health crisis. The goal of this measure was to reduce the movement of people during transit times for essential activities, for which it divided the movement of the population according to gender. Although LGBTQIA+ organizations in the country warned the executive branch about the possible consequences of implementing this measure, the president assured them that the police were already trained and that discrimination was prohibited. In a matter of days, the first arbitrary arrests against transgender people began to occur and on the eighth day of being initiated, “Pico y género” was eliminated.