Rights Discourse and Claiming Dignified Existence

Sor Juana explicitly framed her intellectual pursuits in terms of rights and justice—the right to learn, the injustice of gendered restrictions on knowledge, the fundamental entitlement to intellectual respect regardless of birth status. She did not beg for permission to think but claimed it as legitimate. This concept applies powerfully to poverty by shifting language from needs and deficits to rights and claims. Rather than framing people in poverty as needing charity, help, or uplift, a rights-based approach asserts that adequate material conditions, education, healthcare, and dignified work are entitlements, not privileges. It reframes poverty not as an individual moral failing but as a justice issue where rights are systematically violated. This shift in discourse transforms identity: a person in poverty is not a recipient of charity but a rights-bearer making legitimate claims on institutions and society. Sor Juana's example shows the power of refusing victimhood language and instead asserting, 'This is my right.' For individuals and communities in poverty, adopting rights discourse means speaking from a position of dignity and justice rather than neediness, fundamentally altering the psychological and political terrain of identity development.