G. Sofía Villa de Buentello

Gerónima Sofía Villa de Buentello (1892 in Teocaltiche, Mexico — February 7, 1958 in Mexico City, Mexico) was a Mexican feminist who worked in the first wave of the suffrage movement in Mexico and was one of the first women to analyze the legal equality of men and women before the law. She founded the Women of the [Hispanic] race and led the faction of more moderate feminists in the 1920s in Mexico.

Biography G. Sofía Villa de Buentello was a Mexican feminist. She was probably a teacher, as most of the attendees at the 1916 First Feminist Congress of Yucatán were teachers and it was a requirement of attendance that women be educated. Her publications list her as a "professor" though she indicated in a 1925 interview with The New York Times that she had only a secondary education. Married and a mother — her books are dedicated to her husband, Edmundo E. Buentello, and her children Miguel Edmundo and Sofía —

Soon after the Congresses, in 1917 President Carranza’s “Law on Family Affairs (Domestic Relations)” was passed. In her analysis of the legislation, Villa pointed out that prior to its passage, the Civil Code was discriminatory. In the event that a child was born out of wedlock, if a woman who gave up her child to prevent stigma and shaming, she alone could be identified. The previous law had allowed maternity investigations so that orphans could find their birth mothers, but forbade paternity investigations.

In 1921 she published a book, La Mujer y la Ley (The Woman and the Law), which asked whether men and women were equal before the law in Mexico. Though the analysis was moderate in tone, Villa de Buentello stated that regardless of social or economic status, everyone must be viewed equally before the law. Considering that women did not have suffrage, it was considered revolutionary. She may have been influenced by Genaro García, a lawyer who had made a similar statement 30 years earlier, according to Carmen Ramos Escandón.

While Villa de Buentello was known for her less radical ideas, she was not truly a moderate. She established a cooperative union "Mujeres de la raza" (Women of the [Hispanic] Race) in 1923 with aims of uniting The meeting occurred in July, 1925 in Mexico City with Villa as President of the conference. Arizmendi served as Secretary General, but did not attend due to a difference of opinion with Villa. In attendance were Rosa Maria Anders, a Cuban lawyer; Carmen Burgos of Spain; Natalia Costa de Gori, of Guatemala; Eva Maria V. de Gytina, of Panama; and María de Jesús Montenegro of Nicaragua, among others. From within Mexico were delegates from Oaxaca, San Luis Potosí, Magdalena Salazar Venegas with the National University, Rosaura Sansores with the Liga de Maestros (Teachers League) from Morelos, and Rosa Torre González from the government of Yucatán.

Selected works La Mujer y la Ley. Pequeña parte tomada de la obra en preparación titulada "¡La Esclava se Levanta!. Estudio importantisimo para la mujer que desee su emancipación y para el hombre amante del bien y de la justicia, Mexico, Talleres de la Imprenta Franco Mexicana, 1921 (in Spanish) La verdad sobre el matrimonio ... estudio importantisimo sobre la triste condicion de la mujer en el matrimonio, Mexico, Talleres de la Imprenta Franco Mexicana, 1923 (in Spanish) Derechos civiles de la mujer y ley de relaciones familiares, Mexico, 1923 (in Spanish)