Mariblanca Sabas Alomá (February 10, 1901 – July 19, 1983) was a Cuban feminist, journalist and poet. A political activist, she was also a

Minister without portfolio A minister without portfolio is either a government minister with no specific responsibilities or a minister who does not head a particular ministry. The sinecure is particularly common in countries ruled by coalition governments and a cabinet w ...

in the Cuban government under

Ramón Grau Ramón Grau San Martín (13 September 1881 in La Palma, Pinar del Río Province, Spanish Cuba – 28 July 1969 in Havana, Cuba) was a Cuban physician who served as President of Cuba from 1933 to 1934 and from 1944 to 1948. He was the last pres ...

and

Carlos Prio Carlos may refer to: Places ;Canada * Carlos, Alberta, a locality ;United States * Carlos, Indiana, an unincorporated community * Carlos, Maryland, a place in Allegany County * Carlos, Minnesota, a small city * Carlos, West Virginia ;Elsewhere ...

. Her writing was devoted to the cause of women's rights, particularly the right to vote.

Biography

She was born in

Santiago de Cuba Santiago de Cuba is the second-largest city in Cuba and the capital city of Santiago de Cuba Province. It lies in the southeastern area of the island, some southeast of the Cuban capital of Havana. The municipality extends over , and contains t ...

in 1901. Her parents were Francisco Sabas Castillo and Belén Alomá Ciarlos. She studied at

University of Havana The University of Havana or (UH, ''Universidad de La Habana'') is a university located in the Vedado district of Havana, the capital of the Republic of Cuba. Founded on January 5, 1728, the university is the oldest in Cuba, and one of the first ...

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

and

University of Puerto Rico The University of Puerto Rico ( es, Universidad de Puerto Rico, UPR) is the main public university system in the U.S. Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. It is a government-owned corporation with 11 campuses and approximately 58,000 students and 5,3 ...

. A founding member of the Grupo Minorista, she also served as president of the Partido Democrata Sufragista, and editor of ''La Mujer''. She wrote columns in the leftist periodicals, ''Social'' and ''Carteles''. For ''Carteles'', she wrote a series of homophobic articles in 1928 on female homosexuality, identifying

lesbianism A lesbian is a homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate nouns with fema ...

as a social disease. She also wrote for ''Bohemia'' and ''Avance'' (1920s-1930s), in 1930 she published a book titled Feminismo - Cuestiones Sociales - Critica Literarea and founded the magazine ''Astral'' (1922). Her poetry won two gold medals in 1923 at Juegos Florales in Santiago de Cuba. In 1919, following the death of her parents, she moved to Havana. In 1923, Sabas Alomá attended the first Congreso Nacional de Mujeres de Cuba. After working for several newspapers and journals between 1924 and 1927, She took time off from her journalistic career to pursue art and literature studies in

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

, at

and at the

. After her return to

Havana Havana (; Spanish: ''La Habana'' ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of the La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.

, she worked on a regular basis for the ''Carteles''. Her writing were critical of the bourgeois (the social elite) and considered them as contributing to the suffering of majority of women. She was given the epithet "Red Feminist" for her writings in the ''Carteles'' because of her strong feminist perspective and her leftist leanings. In her writings, she protested against the stereotyping of feminists, defended nudity, rejected elitism, and argued for the radical revision of masculinity and femininity categories. She served as a Minister without portfolio in 1949.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Aloma, Mariblanca Sabas 1901 births 1983 deaths Cuban feminists Cuban journalists Cuban women journalists Columbia University alumni University of Puerto Rico alumni University of Havana alumni Women government ministers of Cuba 20th-century journalists