Emotions and gender-based violence in Mexico

This article analyses the intersection between emotions and gender-based violence through the conjugal struggles Mexican women faced after marriage and cohabitation in their efforts to continue their education and have a paid job. We aim to explore the social function of emotions in gender-based violence. The results suggest they play a vital role in the reproduction of gender mandates, gender inequality and the larger social structures that together conform to an emotional regime. Likewise, the results shed light on the fact that despite abuse seeks to subjugate women, it also triggers their agency and helps them to reconfigure and/or end the relationship. The analysis is based on a mixed-methods approach. The semi-structured interviews show the interplay between personal, situational, sociocultural and structural factors that fostered the abuse. The representative survey shows that gender-based violence is one of the causes of the breakup of the relationship. Both sets of empirical data come from research focused on intimacy and partner relationships carried out in two regions of western Mexico among three cohorts of the heterosexual adult population. The analysis seeks to relate the role of emotions to the basis of social action and claims they are a powerful theoretical lens for studying the dynamics of gender-based violence.