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Rebekah Pite

Lafayette College, History, Faculty Member

University of Michigan, Women's Studies, Alumna

University of Michigan, History, Alumna

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Rebekah E. Pite is an Professor and Head of the History Department at Lafayette College (USA). She is a social and cultural historian of Latin America, especially Argentina and the Río de la Plata region, with an analytical focus on food, gender, class, race, and domestic labor. In 2013, she published her first book, Creating a Common Table in Twentieth-Century Argentina: Doña Petrona, Women, and Food (UNC Press), which won book prizes from Gourmand and LASA. In 2016, she published La mesa está servida. Doña Petrona C. de Gandulfo y la domesticidad de la Argentina del siglo XX (Edhasa). Her third book, Sharing Yerba Mate: How South America's Most Popular Drink Defined a Region, came out with UNC Press in 2023. For more of her work (including presentations and illustrations), please see www.rebekahpite.com.
Phone: Office: 610-330-5173
Address: Lafayette College
Ramer History House, 718 Sullivan Rd.
Easton, PA 18042 U.S.A.

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Papers by Rebekah Pite

Sharing Yerba Mate book info and coupon

Sharing Yerba Mate: How South America's Most Popular Drink Defined a Region is now available. Th... more

La china cebadora: género, mate e identidades nacionales en el Río de la Plata, 1869-1929

Indicios, 2022

A fines del siglo XIX, las imágenes del ritual del mate campero eclipsaron a las más antiguas y c... more A fines del siglo XIX, las imágenes del ritual del mate campero eclipsaron a las más antiguas y conocidas del consumo de mate en la ciudad. El gaucho se convirtió en el tomador de mate por excelencia y la china en su cebadora preferida. Rastrear la historia visual del ritual del mate en litografías, fotos y, en especial, postales revela la forma cotidiana en la que las personas de la región construyeron, consumieron y circularon visiones jerárquicas de la nación. A medida que la figura del gaucho se convertía en un símbolo nacional popular y controvertido en la Argentina y Uruguay, la figura de la china se convertía en símbolo de la mujer local cuya lealtad al gaucho y a la nación era codiciada por los hombres de todo el espectro sociopolítico. Por un lado, este artículo es una historia interseccional de las dinámicas del servicio en el ritual del mate. Por el otro, es una hipótesis sobre el rol importante —y generalmente devaluado— que jugaron las mujeres rurales en el sustento de la vida diaria y en la construcción de las identidades nacionales en el Río de la Plata.http://revistas.filo.uba.ar/index.php/indicios/article/view/3944

The Rural Woman Enters the Frame: A Visual History of Gender, Nation, and the Goodbye Mate in the Postcolonial Río de la Plata

Journal of Social History

Around the turn of the twentieth century, the image of a rural woman handing a gaucho on horsebac... more Around the turn of the twentieth century, the image of a rural woman handing a gaucho on horseback a drink before he trotted away began to circulate with increasing frequency in the Río de la Plata region. The drink the woman passed the man was the local infusion yerba mate, and, in earlier illustrations, it had been served by another man. This gendered shift occurred alongside a dramatic expansion of common peoples’ access to images via photographs and postcards. Tracing the social and visual history of the goodbye mate ritual from the early nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth reveals the quotidian manner in which locals in this region constructed, consumed, and circulated overlapping visions of their nations. As the gaucho become a popular and contested national symbol in Argentina and Uruguay alike, the rural woman (then referred to as la china, but now largely unnamed) became a local one whose faithfulness to the gaucho and, by extension, the nation, was coveted by men ...

Raza y etnicidad en la cocina argentina: una historia de la cocina criolla y de Doña Petrona

Apuntes De Investigacion Del Cecyp, Dec 18, 2012

Digital Resources: Latin American Food and Food History Digital Resources: Latin American Food and Food His tory

Oxford Research Encyclopedia, Latin American History, 2020

Dunstan and Pite Mistress v Maid -2018-Gender_History.pdf

This article analyzes the historical construction of the ‘maid’ and the ‘mistress’ in Argentine l... more This article analyzes the historical construction of the ‘maid’ and the ‘mistress’ in Argentine literature from the mid-19th century through today. Inspired by the surprising continuities, as well as the less dramatic changes, in the portrayal of the mistress-maid relationship, it explores literary representations of this ubiquitous but understudied duo. Adopting an intersectional perspective reveals how overlapping constructions of gender, race, class, sexuality, and national identity have shaped differential understandings of women’s ‘appropriate’ domestic roles. Situating such ideas in relation to contemporary politics and historical legacies of slavery and violence against indigenous and mixed-race peoples highlights the long shadows cast by institutionalized racism. Writers have frequently associated a privileged Argentine identity with the figure of the white mistress and set her in opposition to the figure of the ‘inferior’ non-white maid, suggesting that the white mistresses should maintain racial and class boundaries to preserve order. While this article also examines works that highlight the oppression of the maid, it finds they too have reiterated features of the dominant discourse. We argue that the fraught place of the mistress and the maid in Argentine literature reveals a larger unease with the place of women, especially subaltern women, in Argentina’s national imagination.

La cocina criolla: A History of Food and Race in Twentieth-Century Argentina

3 2 A ven u e o f the A m e rica s, N e w Y o r k , ny 10013-2473, U SA C am b rid ge U niversity... more 3 2 A ven u e o f the A m e rica s, N e w Y o r k , ny 10013-2473, U SA C am b rid ge U niversity Press is p art o f the U n iversity o f C am b rid ge. It furthers the U n iversity' s m ission by dissem inatin g k n o w led ge in the p u rsu it o f ed ucation , learn in g, an d research at the highest intern atio nal levels o f excellence. w w w .c a m b rid g e .o rg In form ation on this title: w w w .c a m b r id g e .0 r g / 9 7 8 1 10 7 1 0 7 6 3 2 © P au lin a A lb erto and E d u a rd o Elen a 2 0 1 6 T h is pu blication is in co p y righ t. Su b ject to statu tory excep tion an d to the p ro visio n s o f relevan t collective licensing agreem ents, no rep rod u ctio n o f an y p art m ay tak e p lace w ith o u t the w ritten perm ission o f C am b rid g e U n iversity Press. First p ublished 2 0 1 6 Printed in the U nited States o f A m erica A catalog record fo r this publication is available from the British L ibrary Library o f Congress Cataloging in Publication Data R eth in k in g race in m odern A rg en tin a / P au lin a L . A lb erto and E d u a rd o E len a, eds. p ages cm Includes bib liograp h ical references an d in d ex. isbn 9 7 8 -1 -1 0 7 -1 0 7 6 3 -2 (H ard c o p y : alk . p aper) 1 . A rg en tin a-R ac e relation s. I. A lb erto , P au lin a L ., 1 9 7 5 -ed itor, au th or. E len a, E d u a rd o , 1 9 7 2 -ed itor, au th or. F3021.AIR48 2015 305.8oo982-dc23 2015028908 isbn 9 7 8 -1 -1 0 7 -1 0 7 6 3 -2 H a rd b a c k C am b rid g e U niversity Press has no respo n sibility fo r the persistence or accu ra cy o f U R L s fo r extern al o r th ird -p arty Internet W eb sites referred to in this p u b lication an d does n ot gu arantee th at an y content on such W eb sites is, o r w ill rem ain , accurate or ap p rop riate.

“Engendering Argentine History: A Historiographical Review of Recent Gender-Based Histories of Women during the National Period”

Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe, 25 no. 2, 2014

“¿Así en la tele como en la casa? Patronas y empleadas en la década del sesenta en Argentina," Revista de Estudios Sociales 45 (Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia: January-April 2013): 212-224.

“Entertaining Inequalities: Doña Petrona, Juanita Bordoy, and Domestic Work in Mid-Twentieth-Century Argentina,” Hispanic American Historical Review 91, no 1 (February 2011): 97-128.

“¿Sólo se trata de cocinar?: Respensando las tareas domésticas de las mujeres argentinas con Doña Petrona, 1970-1983” in De minifaldas, militancias y revoluciones: Exploraciones sobre los 70 en la Argentina (2009).

Kathleen López and Rebekah E. Pite, “Letters from Soledad in the Atkins Family Papers at the Massachusetts Historical Society,” Massachusetts Historical Review 9 (2007): 35-54.

by Rebekah Pite and Kathleen Lopez

“The Force of Food: Life on the Atkins Family Sugar Plantation, Cienfuegos, Cuba 1884-1900.” Massachusetts Historical Review 5 (2003): 58-93.

Book by Rebekah Pite

La mesa está servida.

Mi nuevo libro, La mesa está servida. Doña Petrona y la domesticidad de la Argentina del siglo XX... more Mi nuevo libro, La mesa está servida. Doña Petrona y la domesticidad de la Argentina del siglo XX, acaba de salir. Este libro está inspirado en la versión en inglés, pero no igual a ella. Para más información, favor de consultar la reseña de la revista Mora por Dra. Paula Caldo y el link abajo de la editorial.

Creating a Common Table in Twentieth-Century Argentina: Doña Petrona, Women, and Food (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2013).

Teaching Documents by Rebekah Pite

I recently wrote a post about Doña Petrona's most popular recipe, pan dulce de navidad. By clicking here, you can see it and the actual footage of her making it on television during the mid 1960s. In addition, my post contains my transcription of video in Spanish and translation into English.

Sharing Yerba Mate book info and coupon

Sharing Yerba Mate: How South America's Most Popular Drink Defined a Region is now available. Th... more

La china cebadora: género, mate e identidades nacionales en el Río de la Plata, 1869-1929

Indicios, 2022

A fines del siglo XIX, las imágenes del ritual del mate campero eclipsaron a las más antiguas y c... more A fines del siglo XIX, las imágenes del ritual del mate campero eclipsaron a las más antiguas y conocidas del consumo de mate en la ciudad. El gaucho se convirtió en el tomador de mate por excelencia y la china en su cebadora preferida. Rastrear la historia visual del ritual del mate en litografías, fotos y, en especial, postales revela la forma cotidiana en la que las personas de la región construyeron, consumieron y circularon visiones jerárquicas de la nación. A medida que la figura del gaucho se convertía en un símbolo nacional popular y controvertido en la Argentina y Uruguay, la figura de la china se convertía en símbolo de la mujer local cuya lealtad al gaucho y a la nación era codiciada por los hombres de todo el espectro sociopolítico. Por un lado, este artículo es una historia interseccional de las dinámicas del servicio en el ritual del mate. Por el otro, es una hipótesis sobre el rol importante —y generalmente devaluado— que jugaron las mujeres rurales en el sustento de la vida diaria y en la construcción de las identidades nacionales en el Río de la Plata.http://revistas.filo.uba.ar/index.php/indicios/article/view/3944

The Rural Woman Enters the Frame: A Visual History of Gender, Nation, and the Goodbye Mate in the Postcolonial Río de la Plata

Journal of Social History

Around the turn of the twentieth century, the image of a rural woman handing a gaucho on horsebac... more Around the turn of the twentieth century, the image of a rural woman handing a gaucho on horseback a drink before he trotted away began to circulate with increasing frequency in the Río de la Plata region. The drink the woman passed the man was the local infusion yerba mate, and, in earlier illustrations, it had been served by another man. This gendered shift occurred alongside a dramatic expansion of common peoples’ access to images via photographs and postcards. Tracing the social and visual history of the goodbye mate ritual from the early nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth reveals the quotidian manner in which locals in this region constructed, consumed, and circulated overlapping visions of their nations. As the gaucho become a popular and contested national symbol in Argentina and Uruguay alike, the rural woman (then referred to as la china, but now largely unnamed) became a local one whose faithfulness to the gaucho and, by extension, the nation, was coveted by men ...

Raza y etnicidad en la cocina argentina: una historia de la cocina criolla y de Doña Petrona

Apuntes De Investigacion Del Cecyp, Dec 18, 2012

Digital Resources: Latin American Food and Food History Digital Resources: Latin American Food and Food His tory

Oxford Research Encyclopedia, Latin American History, 2020

Dunstan and Pite Mistress v Maid -2018-Gender_History.pdf

This article analyzes the historical construction of the ‘maid’ and the ‘mistress’ in Argentine l... more This article analyzes the historical construction of the ‘maid’ and the ‘mistress’ in Argentine literature from the mid-19th century through today. Inspired by the surprising continuities, as well as the less dramatic changes, in the portrayal of the mistress-maid relationship, it explores literary representations of this ubiquitous but understudied duo. Adopting an intersectional perspective reveals how overlapping constructions of gender, race, class, sexuality, and national identity have shaped differential understandings of women’s ‘appropriate’ domestic roles. Situating such ideas in relation to contemporary politics and historical legacies of slavery and violence against indigenous and mixed-race peoples highlights the long shadows cast by institutionalized racism. Writers have frequently associated a privileged Argentine identity with the figure of the white mistress and set her in opposition to the figure of the ‘inferior’ non-white maid, suggesting that the white mistresses should maintain racial and class boundaries to preserve order. While this article also examines works that highlight the oppression of the maid, it finds they too have reiterated features of the dominant discourse. We argue that the fraught place of the mistress and the maid in Argentine literature reveals a larger unease with the place of women, especially subaltern women, in Argentina’s national imagination.

La cocina criolla: A History of Food and Race in Twentieth-Century Argentina

3 2 A ven u e o f the A m e rica s, N e w Y o r k , ny 10013-2473, U SA C am b rid ge U niversity... more 3 2 A ven u e o f the A m e rica s, N e w Y o r k , ny 10013-2473, U SA C am b rid ge U niversity Press is p art o f the U n iversity o f C am b rid ge. It furthers the U n iversity' s m ission by dissem inatin g k n o w led ge in the p u rsu it o f ed ucation , learn in g, an d research at the highest intern atio nal levels o f excellence. w w w .c a m b rid g e .o rg In form ation on this title: w w w .c a m b r id g e .0 r g / 9 7 8 1 10 7 1 0 7 6 3 2 © P au lin a A lb erto and E d u a rd o Elen a 2 0 1 6 T h is pu blication is in co p y righ t. Su b ject to statu tory excep tion an d to the p ro visio n s o f relevan t collective licensing agreem ents, no rep rod u ctio n o f an y p art m ay tak e p lace w ith o u t the w ritten perm ission o f C am b rid g e U n iversity Press. First p ublished 2 0 1 6 Printed in the U nited States o f A m erica A catalog record fo r this publication is available from the British L ibrary Library o f Congress Cataloging in Publication Data R eth in k in g race in m odern A rg en tin a / P au lin a L . A lb erto and E d u a rd o E len a, eds. p ages cm Includes bib liograp h ical references an d in d ex. isbn 9 7 8 -1 -1 0 7 -1 0 7 6 3 -2 (H ard c o p y : alk . p aper) 1 . A rg en tin a-R ac e relation s. I. A lb erto , P au lin a L ., 1 9 7 5 -ed itor, au th or. E len a, E d u a rd o , 1 9 7 2 -ed itor, au th or. F3021.AIR48 2015 305.8oo982-dc23 2015028908 isbn 9 7 8 -1 -1 0 7 -1 0 7 6 3 -2 H a rd b a c k C am b rid g e U niversity Press has no respo n sibility fo r the persistence or accu ra cy o f U R L s fo r extern al o r th ird -p arty Internet W eb sites referred to in this p u b lication an d does n ot gu arantee th at an y content on such W eb sites is, o r w ill rem ain , accurate or ap p rop riate.

“Engendering Argentine History: A Historiographical Review of Recent Gender-Based Histories of Women during the National Period”

Estudios Interdisciplinarios de América Latina y el Caribe, 25 no. 2, 2014

“¿Así en la tele como en la casa? Patronas y empleadas en la década del sesenta en Argentina," Revista de Estudios Sociales 45 (Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá, Colombia: January-April 2013): 212-224.

“Entertaining Inequalities: Doña Petrona, Juanita Bordoy, and Domestic Work in Mid-Twentieth-Century Argentina,” Hispanic American Historical Review 91, no 1 (February 2011): 97-128.

“¿Sólo se trata de cocinar?: Respensando las tareas domésticas de las mujeres argentinas con Doña Petrona, 1970-1983” in De minifaldas, militancias y revoluciones: Exploraciones sobre los 70 en la Argentina (2009).

Kathleen López and Rebekah E. Pite, “Letters from Soledad in the Atkins Family Papers at the Massachusetts Historical Society,” Massachusetts Historical Review 9 (2007): 35-54.

by Rebekah Pite and Kathleen Lopez

“The Force of Food: Life on the Atkins Family Sugar Plantation, Cienfuegos, Cuba 1884-1900.” Massachusetts Historical Review 5 (2003): 58-93.

La mesa está servida.

Mi nuevo libro, La mesa está servida. Doña Petrona y la domesticidad de la Argentina del siglo XX... more Mi nuevo libro, La mesa está servida. Doña Petrona y la domesticidad de la Argentina del siglo XX, acaba de salir. Este libro está inspirado en la versión en inglés, pero no igual a ella. Para más información, favor de consultar la reseña de la revista Mora por Dra. Paula Caldo y el link abajo de la editorial.

Creating a Common Table in Twentieth-Century Argentina: Doña Petrona, Women, and Food (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2013).

I recently wrote a post about Doña Petrona's most popular recipe, pan dulce de navidad. By clicking here, you can see it and the actual footage of her making it on television during the mid 1960s. In addition, my post contains my transcription of video in Spanish and translation into English.