ProQuest Dissertations - The University of Arizona Campus Repository

meanings and discourses on health as they emerge from women's practices and
narratives.
PART IV (WOMEN IN MENNONITE SOCIETY) concludes this dissertation by
summarizing some of the ways in which social structures and processes impact upon
Mennonite women's lives. Chapter 7 {Daut haben wie emma soo jedoonen: Life
Transitions and the Socialization of Women) summarizes how women are socialized into
their adult roles throughout childhood and adulthood via Mennonite institutions and by
habitus, i.e. everyday processes of socialization. Mennonite religious teachings,
institutions and habitus thus combine at the household and community levels in shaping
major aspects of Mennonite women's everyday lives; their economic, socio-religious and
health productions. Each of these aspects of women's lives is influenced by the type of
income-generating work pursued by the male household head, which in turn is subject to
a long history of religious and economic traditions, as well as to the contemporary
location in rural, northern Mexico.
In Chapter 8 (Social Challenges and Coping with Adversity), I briefly look at the
ways in which men and women cope with social challenges that arise from Mennonite
socio-cultural and economic structures, as well as contemporary socio-cultural and
economic changes. In general, while Mennonite men respond to conflict by splitting into
separate groups and by largely isolating these groups from surrounding influences,
Mennonite women's coping strategies are characterized by cooperation and mutual aid
that is anchored in women's everyday female support networks within extended families.