A collection of writings on how the structures of power have exerted systematic governance over women in Africa. It addresses how the rhetorical devices of tradition and modernity have played important roles in the control and appropriation of African women's bodies. The chapters draw on history, literature, political science, journalism, sociology, comparative studies, and women and gender studies to offer multidisciplinary perspectives from which to understand the diversity of women's experiences, gender issues, and sexualities as they intersect with class, race, ethnicity, and nationality. This volume not only shows how the macro-narratives of colonialism and post-colonialism provide frameworks for understanding the micro-narratives of empowerment and disempowerment of women, but also considers resistance strategies women have used to guard against the subjugation of their bodies and sexualities. Themes covered include constructions of African motherhood and womanhood, femininity and health, gender and sexual representations and contestations, and gendered nationalism and culture.
Interdisciplinary reader demonstrates how widely feminist thinking has spread, how deeply it has shaken settled assumptions in the disciplines and how much new light it throws on contemporary controversies.This volume offers not only a reference manual to what we now know about gender relations as social forces but also gives impetus to future thinking in imaginative and utopian ways about questions of gender, power and knowledge. Each chapter explores contemporary questions and dilemmas in feminist theory and research, assessing the impacts of past research and feminist actions. Leading scholars discuss such topics as the state of women's and gender studies, feminist epistemology, cultural representations, globalization and the state, families, and work.