African Feminism

The Politics of Survival in Sub-Saharan Africa

Gwendolyn Mikell

• Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
• Year: 2010
• Print ISBN: 9780812215809
• eBook ISBN: 9780812200775
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Anthropology
• Index: Social Sciences

African feminism, this landmark volume demonstrates, differs radically from the Western forms of feminism with which we have become familiar since the 1960s. African feminists are not, by and large, concerned with issues such as female control over reproduction or variation and choice within human sexuality, nor with debates about essentialism, the female body, or the discourse of patriarchy. The feminism that is slowly emerging in Africa is distinctly heterosexual, pronatal, and concerned with "bread, butter, and power" issues.Contributors present case studies of ten African states, demonstrating that—as they fight for access to land, for the right to own property, for control of food distribution, for living wages and safe working conditions, for health care, and for election reform—African women are creating a powerful and specifically African feminism.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• List of Tables
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Part I. Legal Interactions in the Domestic Realm
• Part II. Economic Change, Political Economy, and Women's Lives
• Part III. Surviving Crisis in the Community
• Conclusions: Theorizing and Strategizing about African Women and State Crisis
• Appendix
• List of Contributors
• Index