Institutional Critique and Reform

Sor Juana did not simply accept the convent as a refuge; she critiqued its strictures while inhabiting it, pushing against boundaries and creating intellectual space within constraint. This dual posture—working within and against institutions—models how to address animal exploitation embedded in economic and social systems. Industrial animal agriculture is institutionalized; it has legal protections, economic incentives, and cultural normalization. Individual moral choices matter, but they cannot address systemic injustice. Sor Juana's intellectual work involved institutional critique: she questioned the church's authority over knowledge, challenged gender hierarchies in education, exposed contradictions in official positions. Applied to animal rights, this means not merely adopting plant-based diets but interrogating why animal exploitation is legally protected and subsidized. It means working to transform institutional practices: challenging agricultural policy, reforming laboratory protocols, changing food systems. Sor Juana teaches that critique need not mean total rejection of institutions but rather relentless pressure for transformation from within and without, making visible the injustices that systems work to keep hidden.