gender, ethnicity, and the cultural politics of Maasai development
- Categories
- Book/Boek
- Creator
- Hodgson, Dorothy L.
- Publish Year
- 2004
- Shelfmark
- B6128 - B
- Thesaurus
- etniciteit, identiteit, gender, politiek, kolonialisme, inheemse volkeren, Tanzania, Afrika
- Description
- Drawing on archival sources as well as her extensive fieldwork in Tanzania, Hodgson explores the ways identity, development, and gender have interacted to shape the Maasai into who and what they are today. By situating the Maasai in the political, economic, and social context of Tanzania and of world events, Hodgson shows how outside forces, and views of development in particular, have influenced Maasai lifeways, especially gender relations. Attitudes and assumptions of government and development officials who believed that the Maasai must maintain their pastoralist tradition determined the types of development schemes imposed. But rather than reinforce visions of the Maasai as intrepid warriors, development created new gender hierarchies, new responses to the pressures of modernity, and ambivalent attitudes toward education and local, national, and international politics.