Chisme Saves Lives: Chisme, and #MeToo as Storytelling Interventions in Sexual Violence

Abstract

My work aims to contribute to the ongoing conversations in the field of sexual abuse by demonstrating the ways chisme (or gossiping), and the #MeToo movement serve as active forms of storytelling, the action of telling any story whether fiction or nonfiction, that can be used as a form of healing. This work builds upon the work of scholars like Gloria González-López who utilizes los relatos de vida, rich oral practices of traditional stories and anecdotes in Mexican families as a methodology to emphasize incestual sexual abuse.2 Likewise, I will utilize Gloria Anzaldúa’s autoteoria-historia, or a “personal essay that theorizes,” as a tool to tell my story to amplify my own voice.3 The conceptual framework provided by González-López and Anzaldúa assists me in showcasing how chisme, and the #MeToo movement are relatos de vida and can be used as an important innovation of storytelling.