The Body Matters: Rights and Rites of African Sexualities and the Body in the context of 1Cor.6 Eric Nii Bortey Anum, P.h. The 1860s travel memoirs of English explorer Sir Richard Burton, for example, described the women that he encountered in the kingdom of Dahomey (present day Benin) as 'hideous' and 'taken in adultery or too shrewish to live with their husbands'. Skip to main content Accessibility help We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. What is Africanness: Contesting nativism in culture, race and sexualities, by Charles Ngwena, Professor of Law at the Centre for Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Pretoria, is a peer-reviewed monograph aiming to contribute to the ongoing scholarly conversation in and beyond South Africa about who is African and what is African. Gender roles are the activities, responsibilities, and rights that a society considers normal and appropriate for men and women. Professor Bennett co-edited, with Charmaine Pereira the book Jacketed Women: Researching the Politics of Gender and Sexualities in African Contexts. The Erotic is an inclusive interdisciplinary project with three overarching themes: 1. Culture, Health & Sexuality: Vol. 7, No. African American Political Thought: A Collected History (University of Chicago Press, 2021) is both a reference, providing insight into one or more African American thinkers, and also an education, since the depth and span of the included work are so substantial. Uganda's Anti-Homosexuality Bill of 2009 aimed at protecting the cherished culture of the people against emergent threats to the traditional heterosexual family. The erotic as a bridge in the context of social, cultural and historical behaviour. It will further Abstract. About the publication. D Department of Religion and Human Values University of Cape Coast, Private Mail Bag Cape Coast, Ghana eniibanum@gmail.com Abstract: In this paper rights and rites related to sexualities of Africans with respect to their bodily These include two books edited by Steyn and van Zyl, from Kwela in South Africa; Re-thinking Sexualities in Africa (edited by Signe Arnfred of the Nordic Africa Institute), African Feminist Politics of Knowledge (published in 2010, and edited by Akosua Ampofo and Signe Arnfred), and now, Sylvia Tamale’s African Sexualities: A Reader has been published by Pambazuka Press. Before getting started on our own research, we need to think carefully about the language, methods, and ethics used by not always well-intentioned sojourners. They are complex, multi – faceted and dynamic. The Atlantic covers news, politics, culture, technology, health, and more, through its articles, podcasts, videos, and flagship magazine. There are no systematic and comprehensive works on the philosophy of love and sex in Africa and other cultures. This Lecture was held on Tuesday 4 June 2013 at 5pm in Rooms SG1 and SG2 at the Alison Richard Building in Cambridge and was followed by a reception in the ARB atrium. Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: This article addresses African indigenous same-sexualities using indigenous ways of knowing to unpack the practice. Sex and secrecy: A focus on African sexualities. They fit well with this African Arguments series exploring the study of sexuality on the African continent. ... Africa, and the sexual in the writing of culture. This diverse terrain is often flattened by hetero-sexist representations and societal limitations. Many of the stereotypes of Africa originate from colonialism and media representation. On the Epprecht: New Perspectives on Sexualities in Africa 5 contrary, à la Marx and Gramsci, we hold that the view from the margins helps to penetrate the inversions and fog of hegemonic culture that is so particularly thick around heteronormative sexu- ality. These glances are often alienating and insulting. There is no single model of gender roles in Africa. The article suggests a different approach on African same-sex practice based on ancestral knowledge found in African traditional religion and in African culture. The Bill's justification, however, lay in myopic imaginings of a homogenous African-ness and pedestrian oblivion to pluralities within African sexualities. 2: AFRICANNESS, RACE AND CULTURE. Moreover, even if we wanted to imagine an authentic African culture, like all others, it would not be static. 3, pp. The idea of Africa's negative stereotypes come from historical and media interactions. The erotic as a bridge in the context of personal relationships. 185-194. As appealing as the notion of African culture may be to some people, no such thing exists. 2. As well as using popular culture to help address the 'what, why, how, when and where' questions, the contributors also provide a critical mapping of African sexualities that informs readers about the plurality and complexities of African sexualities - desires, practices, fantasies, identities, taboos, abuses, violations, stigmas, transgressions and sanctions. Moreover, when the topic did come up, authors across the disciplines commonly assumed or asserted an African (“native,” customary, tribal, or premodern) sexuality, in the singular and in implicit timelessness. To demonstrate their rejection of what they perceived as the increasingly liberal sexual culture of Western societies, endorsement of heterosexuality in the postcolonial time became connected with “African culture” and “African … Livermon provides a brief overview of how sexualities have been discussed in the African continent, making the argument that there is no one ‘African sexuality’, and that instead African sexualities emerge as discursive and political formations shaped by Africans themselves as much as by colonial formations. the African societies before the European contact with the African traditional culture, was not as a result of primitiveness (if there is any situation which can capture such coinage), however it was the evidence of developed human social group with a harmonious coexistence. Exploring the contours of African sexualities: Religion, law and power Sylvia Tamale* School of Law, Makerere University, Uganda Summary This article explores of the diverse ways through which organised religion, personal spiritual convictions, culture and the law shape, challenge and potentially transform the sexualities of African peoples. (2005). The erotic as a bridge in the context in intellectual enquiry. An Ethnography of Silences: Race, (Homo)sexualities, and a Discourse of Africa - Volume 43 Issue 3. In 2004, the African Gender Institute ran a continental research project, Mapping Sexualities, among the objectives of which was the development of a research methodology suited to carrying out in-depth case studies of the dynamics of gender and contemporary sexual cultures in Ghana, Nigeria, South Africa … Despite all the challenges, Nyanzi’s and my experiences as heterosexual Africans attempting to study alternative African sexualities are especially valuable and make for an interesting discussion of these methodological issues. Her research interests include questions of sexualities, gender, and violence within African contexts, and also questions of African feminist theorising and strategic activism. The continent's diverse cultures have many different ideas about male and female roles, although in general women have been subordinate to men in both public and family life. 3: HETEROGENEOUS SEXUALITIES The third part of the book “comprises three chapters organised around interrogating representations of African sexualities and ultimately suggesting a philosophical way forward in the manner sexual citizenship is contested.” (p. Stereotypes and generalizations about Africa, its inhabitants, and their culture have evolved in the Western world since the years of colonial settlement. African women's sexualities, however, were characterised as the antithesis of European mores of sex and beauty and were labelled primitive. Analyzing African sexualities also means revisiting the issue of genital mutilation, gender-based violence based and homosexuality. As well as using popular culture to help address the 'what, why, how, when and where' questions, the contributors also provide a critical mapping of African sexualities that informs readers about the plurality and complexities of African sexualities – desires, practices, fantasies, identities, taboos, abuses, violations, stigmas, transgressions and sanctions. ‘African Sexualities’ is a groundbreaking new volume, forthcoming from Pambazuka Press. Popular cultural representations offer rare glimpses into the galaxies which lesbian and non – gender conforming women create. In Kenya sexuality has become a deeply politicized landscape in the postcolonial period. Professor Sylvia Tamale, Makerere University Exploring the Contours of African Sexualities: Statutory, Customary and Religious Laws. Queer women’s lives are lush. 3. The context of globalization that takes a critical look at the universal sphere, by giving greater visibility to the demand for and recognition of diversity and by crystallizing identities and traditions, makes this debate essential in Africa. Writing about sexualities in Africa has historically been heavily dominated by non-Africans, often using the language of science that obscured political motivations. For a long time, research on sexualities in Africa was marked by colonial representations of ‘African sexuality’ as primitive, exotic and excessively sexual – i.e., profoundly Other, compared to European Christian norms of decency and morality – and/or by medicalised approaches centred on reproduction. In reality, however, Africa is made up of thousands of ethnic groups with rich and diverse cultures and sexualities. 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