User:Megalibrarygirl/Gladys Tzul Tzul

Gladys Tzul Tzul is a Maya K'iche writer, academic, feminist and activist from Guatemala. Tzul Tzul's work focuses on the independence of indigenous people, their forms of government and their resistance to authority in Guatemala. She emphasizes that women are central to the struggle for land rights in the country.

Biography
Tzul Tzul was born in Paqui, Totonicapán. She is Maya K'iche and traces her lineage back to, leader of an 1820 Mayan rebellion. Tzul Tzul earned a master's degree in Latin American studies from Alberto Hurtado University. In 2014, she was a PhD student at the Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla. In 2018, she was awarded the Voltaire Prize from the University of Potsdam.

Tzul Tzul considers herself a popular feminist who believes in the creation of a cooperative society where people have control over their own lives and work. Her work focuses on indigenous ways of forming government, their relationships to power, and their struggles with various forms of authority in Guatemala. Tzul Tzul has fought for indigenous communities to keep control of their land when business interests try to force them out of their homes. She emphasizes that indigenous people should be allowed to create their own form of government and that women are central to the indigenous struggle for autonomy. She has received death threats for her work.