Browsing by Department "African Gender Institute"
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- ItemOpen AccessA Tribute to Ray Alexander 1913 - 2004(2005) Scanlon, HelenI remember reacting very strongly to the Jewish prayer [which Orthodox Jewish men say] in the morning, “Thank you God for making me a man and not a woman”. I don't know whether I was five years old or six ... but I refused to accept this prayer (Suttner, 1997: 43). By the time of her death on 12 September 2004, Ray Alexander was known around the world as a prominent agitator for political and human rights in apartheid South Africa. Her name had become synonymous with the Food and Canning Workers Union and the Federation of South African Women. In spite of 25 years of exile from South Africa (between 1965 and 1990), Alexander remained a consistent force in radical politics, eventually becoming the longest serving Communist Party functionary in South Africa. There were many facets to Ray's life: the young Zionist, the revolutionary, the trade unionist, the Communist Party activist, and the exile. In all these roles, she displayed a unique and progressive approach to the status of women in South Africa.
- ItemRestrictedAkuko Ntaka Inokubhabha Ngephiko Elinye ( No Bird Can Fly on One Wing): The 'Cattle-Killing Delusion' and Black Intellectuals, c1840-1910(2008) Bradford, HelenThe agenda was set a century and a half ago. In a war zone in southern Africa, bureaucrats manning the states of the Cape Colony and adjacent British Kaffraria were witnessing – and transforming – what they deemed an extraordinary event.They coined names for it: ‘Cattle-Killing mania’, ‘Cattle-Killing’, ‘delusion’. They delineated its spatial boundaries: the mania was confined to Xhosaland and colonised Thembuland. They periodised it: the delusion lasted a year, beginning one thousand eight hundred and fifty-six years after the birth of Our Lord, Jesus Christ. They defined its racial and gender dynamics: the central actors were black men (who virtually monopolised cattle); they were inspired by a male prophet, Mhlakaza, assisted by his niece, Nongqawuse. Subsidiary pathologies were noted, including goat-killing, a ‘non-planting mania’ and preparations for an apocalypse, when the English would be replaced by peace, prosperity and black rulers, headed by resurrected forefathers bearing resurrected cattle.
- ItemOpen AccessBlack feminist intellectual activism: a transformative pedagogy at a South African university(2016) Hames, Mary Margaret Philome; Bennett, JaneThis dissertation engages with critical pedagogic theories and activism from a black feminist perspective. The central argument is that education is not only confined to the formal classroom but also takes place in the most unlikely places outside the classroom. This work is premised on the educational philosophies of liberation, embodiment and freedom of the oppressed and the marginalised. The qualitative research is largely presented as ethnographical research, with the researcher located as both participant in the evolvement of the two educational programmes and as writer of this dissertation. Both educational programmes deal with performance and performativity and aim to give voice to the marginalised bodies and lives in the university environment. The research demonstrates how two marginalised groups claim space on campus through performativity involving the body and voice. In the Edudrama, Reclaiming the P…Word, young black women, via representation of word and body, transform the performance space into one in which the misogynistic and racist gaze is transformed. This feminist theatre is intrinsically related to the feminist political work of reclamation of the black female body, which became invisible and objectified for abuse under colonialism, apartheid and patriarchy. The various feminist elements and processes involved in creating feminist text and theatre are discussed. The praxis involved in these processes is then theorised in terms of critical pedagogy as black feminist intellectual activism. In the case of the lesbian, gay and transgender programme, Loud Enuf, the bodies and voices are used differently in the public campus domain to challenge homophobia. This programme is used to raise awareness about sex, sexuality, sexual orientation and gender identity. This programme is intensely political and challenges ambiguous understandings regarding the notion of equality in South Africa post-1994.
- ItemOpen AccessCircles and Circles: Notes on African Feminist debates around gender and violence in the 21 Century(2010) Bennett, JaneThis article set out to sketch a terrain in which there are multiple, differently rooted, conversations among African feminists about gender and violence. There are few resolved debates, and many ways in which discussion which leads, in a pan-African gaze, towards mutual understanding and cohesive strategizing remains a naÁ¯ve idea. It is safe to suggest that the terms “gender” and “violence” remain simultaneously deeply entwined and infinitely separable. In the past few years, there have been vibrant, critical discussions on the nature, shape and direction of “women’s movement” organizing, and in African contexts, there are four overarching debates which have circled continually through intellectual writing on “women’s movements”, activist organization at several levels, and within numerous fora. The first debate concerns the meaning of the state. This debate is interlinked with a second: the meaning of the interaction between the North and diverse initiatives concerned with “women’s human rights,” “South-based feminisms,” and “gender-alert social justice”. The third debate concerns the very existence of a “women’s movement” and the fourth concerns access to reproductive health and to freedom from gender based violence.
- ItemOpen AccessThe country we want to live in: hate crimes and homophobia in the lives of black lesbian South Africans(HSRC Press, 2010) Mkhize, Nonhlanhla; Bennett, Jane; Reddy, Vasu; Moletsane, RelebohileBased on a Roundtable seminar, held during the 2006 16 Days of Activism for no Violence against Women and Children, the text engages the heteronormative focus of the campaign, profiles aspects of the dynamic conversations, and builds strong arguments about violence against lesbians. The country we want to live in: Hate crimes and homophobia in the lives of black lesbian South Africans offers a refreshing perspective on violence perpetrated against black lesbians. It also profiles the voices of women who are central to the activism around hate crimes and homophobia. In capturing key aspects of the lively discussion of 2006, an update of subsequent events that have bearing on the original seminar is provided, concluding with recommendations that have relevance for research, policy and practice. The country we want to live in makes an impassioned plea about citizenship, belonging and social justice, confirming that silence about these issues is not an option. PART I: Context and History: *Context and socio-political background; *Language and vocabulary; *The delimitations of this report; PART II: Perspective and Profile: *Roundtable Seminar on Gender-Based Violence, Black Lesbians, Hate Speech and Homophobia; PART III: Current and Future Prospects; *Legally-focused campaigning; *Conclusions and Recommendations: a way forward?
- ItemOpen AccessFrom care inside the laboratory to the world beyond it: a multispecies ethnography of TB science towards growing a decolonised science in South Africa(2022) Shain, Chloë-Sarah; Abrams, Amber; Macdonald, HelenThis anthropological research began with curiosity about human relationships with microbes. Inside the contained environment of a Biosafety Level 3 laboratory at a South African university-based tuberculosis research division, the fieldwork focused on the relationships between scientists and Mycobacterium tuberculosis − the pathogenic bacterium that causes the disease tuberculosis (TB). These deadly bacteria were cared for and nurtured by women scientists. This care extended to the cells and various species with which they worked. Moreover, this care moved beyond the scope of their immediate scientific research projects and well beyond the laboratory. Care was also central to how the participants conducted their scientific research and themselves in the world. This long-term, qualitative ethnographic research weaves together many layers of care in biomedical scientific research, highlighting that scientific research is a deeply personal, caring and subjective practice. The natural and the social are not − and can never be − mutually exclusive. Boundaries between mind/body, subject/object, human/nonhuman, researcher/researched, subjectivity/objectivity and science/society are porous. Acutely aware of the socio-political moment in which this research was embedded, these findings are put into conversation with South African student calls to decolonise science that emerged alongside the #RhodesMustFall student movement. In particular, the focus is on a 2016 meeting about decolonising science at the University of Cape Town where students argued for connection between the university and the community, science and society and the world of academia and the world of Africans. Implicit was the need for science to be relevant to Africans and deeply complex African social formations and problems. The care by women scientists that was observed inside the laboratory and beyond it speaks volumes to cultivating a more caring science and caring institutions of science that connect the laboratory to the world in which it exists in meaningful, relevant and impactful ways. I demonstrate how the participants embodied a decolonised science, and that what they cared about and how they acted upon those cares could serve as important guides for decolonising science and scientific institutions. This research provides important contributions to the field of science and technology studies (STS), to anthropological research on TB and to the conversation on decolonising science in South Africa.
- ItemOpen AccessGender and women’s studies in Africa : teaching and learning materials(2014-09-08) Radloff, JenniferThe resources presented here were created in the mid-2000's and are augmented by Feminist Africa journals as well as updated 'related' resources. The materials are diverse and include course outlines, review essays as well as profiles of individuals and organisations involved in the areas of gender teaching and activism in Africa. The resources can be used as guides for discussion, for planning course outlines or used as references. It is suggested that the materials are best used to generate debate and discussion. Taking into account the kinds of opportunities and challenges faced by feminists located in African universities, the GWS Africa project offers African-authored and African-centred material that takes gender seriously. Here we offer Teaching & learning resources developed by the project. GWS Africa uses Information and communication technologies for the development and dissemination of intellectual resources to support and strengthen African-based teaching and research in gender studies. The project started out of a need to respond to the challenges faced by higher education institutions on the continent and in particular, to the development of Gender and Women’s Studies programmes. There is a dearth of home-grown gender research that addresses the poorly understood realities of African gender relations and cultures. To augment the materials presented here, we suggest that you consult the journal, Feminist Africa. Feminist Africa is a continental gender studies journal produced by a community of feminist scholars. It provides a platform for intellectual and activist research, dialogue and strategy. We are constantly updating the materials with related news, events and resources relevant to the subject areas. We hope that you will find both the learning materials and related information useful in your teaching and research.
- ItemOpen AccessRepresenting lobola : exploring discourses of contemporary intersections of masculinity for Zimbabwean men in Cape Town : lobola, religion and normativity(2016) Mwamanda, Sharon; Bennett, JaneThe following study is an exploration of religious Zimbabwean migrant men's representations of lobola. The study was undertaken to strengthen conversations about hegemonic masculinity which often marginalize both the role of religion in shaping masculinities and simultaneously may homogenize the notion of 'cultural tradition'. The research uses qualitative methods which seek to uncover the way in which Zimbabwean men who identify as Christian negotiate aspects of masculinity in relation to their lived experience of undertaking marriage through lobola. My main methodological aim was to allow participants to represent their own experiences, as these engage with both changing economic circumstances and Pentecostal Christianity. In order to analyse the empirical data I employ a theoretical framework which explores contextual and relational understandings of masculinity, religion and marriage. The dominant themes discussed include discourses on normativities; economic migration; religiosity and marriage which are used to further understand narratives of Zimbabwean men's lived experience of lobola. I argue that the negotiation of these intersectional aspects creates zones of tension which Zimbabwean men must negotiate with on an ongoing basis. The study argues that the past two decades of economic and political stress, coupled with a plethora of changing 'norms' about the meaning of heterosexuality, marriage, and partnership, mean that daily performativities of Christian-identified masculinity are both strongly embedded in fixed notions of gender normativity and simultaneously seek to accommodate changing circumstances.
- ItemOpen AccessRestore, reform but do not transform: The gender politics of higher education in Africa(2003) Mama, AminaThis paper uses gender analysis to reflect on the emergence and development of higher education in Africa. The available statistical picture indicates that despite the absence of formal exclusions, women's entry into higher educational institutions—as students and as employees—has remained slow and uneven, suggesting the need to look beyond the numbers. The overall pattern of exclusion and marginalization is true for both administrative and academic tracks but is at its most extreme for senior academic and research positions. The persistence of extreme gender inequality is most easily and often attributed to external social and familial factors. Here, however, it is argued that there is sufficient evidence to suggest that, despite institutional and managerial claims of administrative neutrality, the institutional and intellectual cultures of African institutions are, in fact, permeated with sexual and gender dynamics.