GENDER AND WAR, A CROSSROAD AND AN OPPORTUNITY

Abstract

As in so many other aspects of our culture, it is necessary to refer to classical Antiquity when dealing with gender roles; It is not for nothing that these are, first and foremost, cultural constructions. That's why we put up this Millars dossier. Espai i Història under the double invocation of Hestia, the goddess of the home voluntarily secluded in it, and of Athena, the armed and tutelary deity to whom the Athenians entrusted themselves in their struggles. From one to the other, almost the entire range of roles assigned to women in armed conflicts unfolds: servants, administrators, nurturers, educators, moral support, warrior rests, or bartenders. They only appear as combatants symbolically, as totems: Athena is a flag, not a soldier.