From 'Black-Eyed Girls' to the MMU (Mujeres Metodistas Unidas): Race, religion and gender in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands

This study places the stories of Mexican American Methodist women in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands within the context of the organizational history of the United Methodist Women of the Rio Grande Conference of the United Methodist Church: Mujeres Metodistas Unidas, or the MMU. It focuses on the experiences and memories of women who came into contact with the ideals imported by Anglo Methodist missionaries to the U.S. southwest immediately following the conquest of the northern half of Mexico in 1848.;In order to understand the experiences of Mexican American women in relation to the history of Methodism in the southwest, this study explores the most salient and relevant themes found in Methodist missionary activity beginning in 1869 and continuing through 2008. The origins of the Methodist missionary work with Mexican women lie in the Women's Foreign Mission Society founded in 1869 by a group of Anglo women in Boston, Mass.;By placing the missionary documents into conversation with Mexican women's voices, memories and experiences, this study shows the ways in which Mexican American women adapted to, resisted and reshaped Methodism to suit their educational, social and religious needs.