Joyce Nicole Bennett

Our Clothing, Our Designs: Maya Women and Intellectual Property Rights is a project centered on Indigenous Maya women’s collective activism in Guatemala to support the retention of intellectual property rights over their traditional weaving designs. Indigenous Maya women have passed down knowledge and techniques of back-strap weaving for millennia; recently, fashion designers from the developed world have attempted to claim intellectual property rights that include Maya women’s traditional designs and weaving patterns. Furthermore, foreign-owned companies have begun mass-producing replicas of women’s traditional weaving using newly available printing technologies. Indigenous women in Guatemala have come together to protect their ancestral knowledge through the legal system, basing their claims in intellectual property rights. During the grant period for this project, Bennett and Cuma Chávez worked with Maya women across Guatemala, gathering interviews and attending meetings and rallies. Our findings suggest Maya women’s collective action could open new spaces for the enfranchisement of Indigenous women in how they resist dispossession under capitalist, settler colonial frameworks. We also found significant miscommunications and different understandings of cultural appropriation across identities, which impacts the ethical fashion industry. The research importantly reveals the interconnected nature of women’s rights and their activism for a dignified life.