Gendering Global Transformations: Gender, Culture, Race, and Identity

The authors collected in Gendering Global Transformations: Gender, Culture, Race, and Identity probe the effects of global and local forces in reshaping notions of gender, race, class, identity, human rights, and community across Africa and its Diaspora. The essays in this unique collection employ diverse interdisciplinary approaches--drawing from subjects such as history, sociology, religion, anthropology, gender studies, feminist studies--in an effort to centralize gender as a category of analysis in developing critical perspectives in a globalizing world. From this approach come a host of exciting insights and subtle analyses that serve to illuminate the effects of issues such as international migration, globalization, and cultural continuities among diaspora communities on the articulation of women’s agency, community organization, and identity formation at the local and the global level. Bringing together the voices of scholars from Africa, Europe and the United States, Gendering Global Transformations: Gender, Culture, Race, and Identity, offers a multi-national and wholly original perspective on the intricacies of life in a globalized era.

Table of Contents:
Foreword. Acknowledgements. Introduction: Gendering Questions of Culture, Race, and Identity in a Globalizing World Philomena Ihejirika-Okeke and Chima J. Korieh. PART 1: Organizing Resistance in Local and International Contexts. 1. Building Solidarities for Human Rights: Diasporic Women as Agents of Transformation Faye V. Harrison. 2. Wangari Maathai: Nobel Laureate, Environmentalist and her Engagement with the State of Kenya Eudora Chikwendu. PART 2: Gendered Perceptions and Positionalities. 3. Cookbooks, Cuisine, Nationalisms: A Comparative Study of National Cuisine, Nation Building and Gender Formation in Africa and in the United States Patricia E. Clark. 4. Civilizing the Savages: Towards a Cross-Cultural Dialogue on Human Rights and Reproductive Self-Determination for Women in Developing Countries Obijiofor Aginam. 5. Unmasking the Macho Male: Masculinity and the U.S. Media in the Caribbean. Jerome Teelucksingh. PART 3: Spirit and Agency from the Subaltern. 6. Soothing the Wounds of the Nation: Oromo Women Performing Ateetee in Exile Martha Kuwee Kumsa. 7. Understanding Spirituality and Models of Black Women’s Creative Endeavors as Source of Empowerment Hannah Chukwu. 8. Wicked Women and Femmes Fatales: Gender, Power and Pomba Gira in Brazil Kelly E. Hayes. PART 4: Gender in Diasporic and Transnational Contexts. 9. Building Bridges and Shifting Frontiers: Gender, Culture and Shifting Identity in Buchi Emechata’s Kehinde and The New Tribe Ijeoma Nwajiaku. 10. Home-Sweet-Home, but Exactly Where? Gender, African Immigration and Settlement in a North American Context Phil Okeke-Ihejirika. 11. Making Links between Each Others’ Oppressions: Witch-hunt, Colonialism and Globalization across Diasporas Ursula Troche. PART 5: Gender and Social Change in Transitional Contexts. 12. Gender Transformations in War and Peace: The Sierra Leonean Experience Aisha Fofana Ibrahim. 13. UN Security Council Resolution 1325, Gender, and Transitional Justice: The Case of Uganda Christina Binder, Karin Lukas and Romana Schweiger. 14. Discourses on Race and Gender in South Africa’s Transition Process: A Challenging Liaison Beatrix Schwarzer. 15. Women’s Labor and Identity in Transitional Societies: A Case of Rural Tanzania Elinami Swai. Contributors. Bibliography. Index.