The Long Complicated Story About Women in Chocolate

A Chocolate Taster's Devotion to Women of Cacao and Chocolate

If you are new or have landed on Tarantula: Authors and Art for the very first time, you are in for a treat. Our contributor, Sanja Vladovic, a chocolate taster and activist will take you on a journey through the story of chocolate and “her” most famous women. If a friend forwarded you this article welcome; if you like it, share it or why not subscribe?

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I am not sure of how is it referred to in other languages, but in Croatian, “chocolate” is a feminine noun, so when I talk about chocolate, I’m talking about her and when I read about chocolate history, I’m reading herstory.

Even in the age of ancient myths, cultures of Mesoamerica tell the stories of Ixcacao, the Mayan Goddess of the cacao tree whose name means "Cacao Woman.” Ixcacao was an earth goddess in a matriarchal society and was adored by the common people as a goddess of abundance, compassion and fertility. During her time, the Mayans consumed unsweetened liquor made of cacao beans known as ‘xocolatl’. They believed that chocolate was a gift from the gods and that everyone should drink it. Chocolate was drank by women before childbirth to give them strength and by soldiers before battles to make them brave. However, her story is “a long and complicated one.”

It is a story of women’s struggle in a patriarchal culture, a story of men exerting power and control over women, but it is also a story of feminine energy and strength. 

With the arrival of the Aztecs and their patriarchal culture, Ixcacao was forced to marry the God of Commerce who turned her cocoa beans into currency and declared chocolate as the 'food of the gods’ available only to the elite, leaving the common people to yearn for it. Women in particular were not allowed to drink chocolate in order to control their sexuality since it was believed that chocolate was an aphrodisiac. Nevertheless, the Aztec emperor Montezuma II, maybe the first confirmed chocoholic, allegedly drank 50 cups of chocolate a day in order to be able to satisfy his numerous mistresses (sex slaves). But Ixcacao could not accept her peoples’ suffering caused by the greed of the privileged,  so she joined with the Goddess of Love to fight the elite and bring back abundance and love to all.

Sandra Vitaljic, from her series Beloved

With the arrival of European colonizers, a new chapter in the story of the exploitation of both, women and chocolate, began. The Spanish conquistador - Hernán Cortés was allegedly the first European to taste chocolate. Moctezuma II himself offered it to him, but that did not stop Cortés from imprisoning the emperor and conquering his empire. Hernan Cortez, later brought the first cacao beans and chocolate to Europe, where it was introduced as medicine, mainly for those who needed sexual arousal.

But in this male-dominated story, the role of one woman stays permanently controversial. She is La Malinche, Hernan Cortes indigenous sex slave who served as a guide and a translator for the Spanish, and who is considered crucial for the success of the Spanish Conquest as well as a traitor to the Aztecan race.

Mexican history continues to be prejudiced against her by focusing on her sexuality, rather than her linguistic skills; ignoring that she was a young child, sold multiple times as a sex slave by her people but who still refused to be a victim and instead used her skills to survive.

Despite her personal dreadful circumstances, thanks to her translations and mediations, she saved countless lives of local people by facilitating negotiations with Spaniards, thus saving them from slaughter. But, even today, for Mexicans, Malinchista translates to 'a traitor with an affinity for other cultures and has colloquial connotations of a 'whore’ even if her and Cortés' son, Martin, is believed to have been the very first mestizo* "Mexican.".  At the same time Hernán Cortés is remembered as “the Conquistador “ and sometimes even described as the “Discoverer of cocoa”.

We are leaving that story for the time being and returning to the story of chocolate. Once it arrived to Europe, the Europeans mixed the bitter drink with sugar turning it into a decadent sweet drink and treat that become a significant part of European culture. To keep up with the growing demand for it, the industrious men of the European imperialism commoditized cacao, spread its cultivation across their colonies all over the world, and in that way took the control and the power from its homeland.

Spreading cacao trough the colonies of Imperialistic forces of Europe was mainly a male adventure, while women were believed to be weak and easily addicted consumers of chocolates.

Chocolate was even believed to be causing women’s hysteria.

There is a famous story about European women of Chiapas in Mexico who allegedly poisoned the Bishop who forbade them to drink the chocolate during religious services. The irony is that the bishop was most probably poisoned while drinking his own chocolate. That is where the popular Mexican saying “Beware of the chocolate of Chiapas” comes from.

Interestingly enough, the indigenous women of Chiapas have an important place in the history of the fight for women’s rights since it was exactly in Chiapas in the year 1993 that the Women’s Revolutionary Law became an important cornerstone for indigenous women’s rights in Mexico. What was the role of chocolate in this - it is still unknown.

With the rise of industrialization, European men developed a massive industry of chocolates that was fueled by crops of cacao from colonies, grown and harvested by millions of enslaved or underpaid indigenous people.  In the European society, chocolate was becoming more and more popular, it changed the form from drink to solid bar, cacao powder and limitless variation of industrial sweets. It became a favorite, but also just a cheap confectionery loosing the divine nature it had in her origin.

However, the word “chocolate” kept on living in all languages almost unchanged, it has never been translated… so even today, across the world, when asking for chocolate we are speaking the language of Indigenous people of Mesoamerica who worshiped the goddess Ixcacao.

So you see, it is “a long and complicated story” of struggle, exploitation and resistance.; for me, very much as a story of women’s fight for equality. Chocolate endured the dreadful history and kept her spirit, just as women all the round the world did. Neither chocolate, nor women allowed to be kept silent and oppressed, but kept fighting for their dignity and rights.

Sandra Vitaljic, from the series Beloved

Today we can witness the change and re-birth of the real chocolate. The craft chocolate revolution is giving back the dignity to the chocolate, treating her again as a gift from the gods worthy of Ixcacao.  Among many talented craft chocolate makers, chocolatiers and chocolate educators there is a strong and growing community of women who  are on their quest to save the world from deforestations, modern slavery and social injustice… one divinely delicious chocolate bar at the time.

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A FEW OF MY FAVORITE WOMEN CHOCOLATE MAKERS

Singling out just a few (or to list them all) - it is difficult task, so I’ll shine a spotlight on some of the inspirational women who made (and keep making) significant influence on my personal journey.

• Pam Williams of Ecole Chocolate and recently deceased Sara Jayne Stanes, the founder of Academy of Chocolate, who thought education and organizational work promote the understanding and appreciation of fine chocolate, establishing the high standards and help establish some of the most famous chocolate makers, chocolatiers, chocolate tasters and educators.

• Today there are numerous wonderful women chocolate makers who are raising the quality of chocolate all around the world through their own work, like Cecilia Tessieri, one of the pioneers of the single-origin chocolate, or Mackenzie Rivers of Map Chocolate, Jenny Samaniego of Conexión Chocolate from Ecuador, Kimberly & Priscilla Addison, two sisters pioneering bean to bar chocolate production in Ghana… just to mention few.

• There are more and more women in all phases of cacao production like fierce women from cacao sourcing company Silva Cacao or Uncommon Cacao. Last, but not least, we have to mention the thousands of women working on cacao plantations who represent more than half of the workers on the farms and earn only 30% of the men’s revenue for the same job.

There is still so much that has to be done to improve opportunities for women in all channels of the value chain in chocolate production. Just follow #womeninchocolate and get yourself inspired!

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