LA PAZ, Jun 23, 2011 (IPS) - Hundreds of women belonging to mining cooperatives in Bolivia are striving for the right to mine seams of tin and silver in the country's western highlands, where an age old superstition maintains that the presence of women "scares away" the minerals.

In these freezing high-altitude mineral-rich but impoverished areas, native women have been assigned a secondary economic role for centuries. But now they are seeking to make headway in traditionally male domains, say researchers interviewed by IPS.

Growing international demand for metals and soaring prices for the tin, silver and gold that are abundant in Bolivia have encouraged thousands of mainly indigenous peasant farmers and people from outside the altiplano region to go down the mines, organised in cooperatives.

A creation myth reminds survivors of violence of their capabilities and value.

When Ines Santizo was a young girl her mother woke her up on the middle of the night and told her to get out of the house: Her stepfather was coming home in a drunk and violent state. Before Ines could escape, her stepfather kicked her in the face and broke her nose. “My mother thought I was going to die, there was so much blood,” Ines said. “I swore right then that I would never allow a man to treat me like that again.”

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