Search results

This chapter reviews developments in the intellectual and activist work of African feminists and gender scholars over the past two decades. African feminists and gender scholar activists have broken with dominant epistemologies to frame their own sites of knowledge production and feminist identity, reflecting shifting conditions in local and global contexts. The knowledge they generate is rooted in a tradition of scholarship, activism, and engagements with state institutions and with transnational and regional feminist movements. I discuss (1) contexts in which African feminist standpoints have emerged over the past 20 years, (2) developments in women and gender studies programs, and (3) ways in which African feminist scholars in the continent and diaspora have stimulated intellectual engagement and activism through feminist research and publishing, collaborative scholarship, influencing policy, and new forms of activism.

Decades after feminist scholars first applied the lens of patriarchy to explain gender inequalities, and wrestled with the consequences of the patriarchal order, masculinity studies have moved from an emphasis on hegemonic masculinities to more nuanced constructions of men’s gendered performances. However, many analyses about men’s social interactions still focus on a limited set of behaviors, and men’s relations with women are often presented as problematic. Many accounts pay insufficient attention to changing contexts and men’s own explanations or perspectives, so we do not see men’s struggles or fully understand why and how some men resist patriarchal norms and perform less conventional masculinities, and what the costs and benefits of contesting dominant constructions are. One of the abiding ideologies of manhood is related to the role of the provider. In this chapter, we propose that the persistence of the social expectation that men should be the (main) family providers, despite changing economic circumstances and historical evidence to the contrary, is profoundly implicated in the tenacity of social expectations for men to perform dominant roles. We explore this contention through conversations with young African men in six cities on the continent and in the diaspora, namely Accra, Kampala, London, Nairobi, Philadelphia and Pretoria.

This chapter critically examines dialogues between indigenous feminists and academic feminists about the role and significance of indigenous epistemologies in constructing social scientific knowledge, particularly feminist epistemologies. We argue that the term indigenous feminisms must be understood as broadly linking gender equality, decolonization, and sovereignty for indigenous peoples. In Latin America, this term typifies an activist and practical movement with cultural, economic, and politically specific dimensions. We posit that analytical and theoretical frameworks developed from indigenous women’s ways of knowledge production should be recognized and legitimated in feminist discourse because much is learned from their worldview about women’s emancipation, the importance of intersectionality in terms of race, ethnicity, and gender in indigenous contexts, in addition to political and cultural critiques. We show that indigenous feminist theoretical formulations are not homogenous but overlap in some areas of theoretical and practical formulations that involve new conceptualizations of the body, space, time, action/movement, and memory.

Of the 105 historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs), there are 6 that have instituted a campus women's center: three women's research and resource centers including Spelman College (SC) in Georgia, Bennett College (BC) in North Carolina, and Howard University (HU) in Washington, DC; and 3 women's centers including North Carolina Central University (NCCU) in Durham, Lincoln University (LU) in Pennsylvania, and Tennessee State University (TSU) in Nashville. Women's centers at HBCUs are a sphere of community, support, intellectual capital, and critical service for Black women in the United States. According to Ross (2003)The literature acknowledges that black women have had the heaviest burden to bear within the African American community. If we contemplate the history of African American women from the period of slavery, we can easily claim that they have endured the greatest suffering of any group of people in American history. African American women should be studied within the context of their silent suffering and courageous overcoming. (p. 2)

Feminist perspectives from women of color did not emerge solely as a result from racism in the white feminist movements; such an assumption negates the agency of feminists of color (Roth, 2004). Instead, feminist perspectives by women of color emerged from historical and sociopolitical dynamics within their own communities of origin, as well as in relationship to each other, including in opposition to, and at times in concert with, the white feminist movements. This chapter explores the development, complexities, and unique contributions of Womanist, Black Feminist Thought, hip-hop, Chicana, Native American, global, Asian American, Arab American and ecofeminism. These feminist perspectives include overarching themes, such as the intersectionality of gender, race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation, ability, age, religion, nationality, and other important identities and issues. Each contemporary feminist theory also explores the interstices of issues such as education, health, economics, reproduction, sociopolitical, historical, organizational, technological, and myriad interrelated dynamics.

The field of education continues to become more diverse with respect to race and gender. Specifically, research on the educational and professional experiences of African American and female scholars have increased (Cubillo & Brown, 2003; Philipsen, 2008; Wolfinger, Mason & Goulden, 2008; Wyche & Graves, 1992). With respect to the field of education, there are a few studies of women's experiences as faculty in educational leadership (Mertz, 2009; Sherman, Beatty, Crum, & Peters, 2010). However, there is a silence in research regarding the experiences of Black (African American) women faculty in the field of educational leadership/administration. The field of leadership is written typically by and for a mainstream, masculine audience. To this end, women and African Americans are “othered” in this discourse. This chapter examines the experiences of four African American female scholars in programs of educational leadership/administration.

This chapter engages cosmopolitan and feminist paradigms of knowledge production through their shared ethics of social justice, equality, and diversity, promoting integration into an emerging postdisciplinary focus on embodied cosmopolitanism(s) as a promising way forward in tourism studies. Cosmopolitan paradigms theorize the dialectics of cultural diversity and universal rights, while feminist cosmopolitanism focuses on gender and sexuality equality and difference within this intersection. An embodied approach combines work on “the body” and “situated embodiment” with the cosmopolitan to embrace all human differences and acknowledge that the researchers’ own embodied cosmopolitanism affects research questions, ethics, and praxis toward transformation in research communities and the academy.

Research on what leads to or detracts from persistence among Black female students is scant and inconsistent in terms of systematic inquiry. Little is known about these women's perspectives on the specific challenges they face that result in either their persistence or departure. Despite the dearth of information, the extant literature on college students can provide some insight. Our understanding of the phenomenon of persistence among Black female students attending PWIs was informed by a conceptual framework incorporating: (a) Social Integration; (b) Student Involvement; and (c) Black Feminist Epistemologies. Together these paradigms help explain the environmental and psychosocial factors that contribute to understanding Black female involvement in college and provide a framework for situating our study in the larger context of the Black female college experience.