From Pombagiras to Bizet’s Carmen: Undoing Patriarchal (Mis)Representations of ‘Wicked Women’
Preprints.org June 10, 2026 preprint DOI: 10.20944/preprints202606.0836.v1 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Topics | Mysticism |
| Keywords | Undoing Binary opposition Queer Mythology Emblem Scholarship Opposition politics Patriarchy Silence Close reading Gender studies Aesthetics Narrative Musical Feminism Identity music Heteronormativity Art history Literature |
| Key points | Argues that the Pombagira episteme functions as an underlying emblem throughout art and scholarship invested in queering essential binary categories of womanhood. |
Abstract
This essay discusses feminist ideas in connection to the occulture present in opera, musical theatre, and film, focusing on femme fatales, tricksters and ‘wicked women’ in a transcultural approach to religion, (Western) esotericism, and the performing arts. A culturally critic debate is facilitated here via the spiritual-scientific embodiment of Afro-Brazilian traditions, as seen through the figure of Pombagira — a Brazilian occultural creation of a female enchantress with mystical powers connected to healing and sex, often placed in patriarchal opposition to her male counterpart, Exu. Drawing on Christopher Partridge’s notions of occulture and Walter Mignolo’s understanding of decoloniality, the Western gendering imposed on Pombagira as a purveyor of Evil is discussed as both mythology and potential epistemicide. The thesis statement presented here is that the Pombagira episteme is an underlying emblem throughout art and scholarship invested in queering essential binary categories of womanhood, as seen in staged adaptations of Verdi’s La forza del destino (1862), Bizet’s Carmen (1875), and numerous cinematic Lola incarnations — Marlene Dietrich’s in Der blaue Engel (1930), Gwen Verdon’s in Damn Yankees (1958), Almodóvar’s in Todo sobre mi madre (1999). This indisciplinary reading connects Gloria Anzaldúa's queer feminist practice of spiritual mestizaje with the Pombagira as an occultural anti-patriarchal force.