Guerrilla Beauty Queens: Beauty as a Political Force in Anti-Martial Law Movements

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Abstract

The title, “Guerrilla Beauty Queens,” adapts a section from a pamphlet entitled “Capture of a ‘Guerrilla Queen.” This pamphlet circulated globally during the 1970s to gain attention and build support for the release of Nelia Sancho, a former Filipino beauty queen, and other political detainees held captive, tortured and sometimes disappeared during the Marcos dictatorship. The pamphlet narrates the story of Nelia Sancho, a popular fashion model and winner of an international pageant title who hung up her crown and joined the radical leftist National Democratic Front, an organization among many who sought to end what they called the US-Marcos dictatorship in the Philippines. The sharing of this guerrilla beauty queen’s story was strategic. It used the power of the beauty queen as an icon to capture public attention to the plight of political detainees and teach readers the talking points and objectives of the radical left. Nelia Sancho and other radical former beauty queens and the organizations they worked with used the iconic status of beauty queens to garner local, national, and global attention and support for anti-authoritarian action. Closer attention to their involvement and how their stories are portrayed during and after Martial Law can tell us much about the larger context of activism and radicalization, methods of state-sanctioned control, and Cold War containment.

Author

• Genevieve Clutario, Wellesley College