Andrea Cornwall

International African Institute

Readers from across the landscape of African studies will find this an essential sourcebook.Published in association with the International African Institute, London

Readings in Gender in Africa

Elizabeth Harrison

Ann Whitehead

This collection of essays by leading feminist thinkers from North and South constitutes a major new attempt to reposition feminism within development studies. Feminism's emphasis on social transformation makes it fundamental to development studies. Yet the relationship between the two disciplines has frequently been a troubled one. At present, the way in which many development institutions function often undermines feminist intent through bureaucratic structures and unequal power quotients. Moreover, the seeming intractability of inequalities and injustice in developing countries have presented feminists with some enormous challenges. Here, emphasizing the importance of a plurality of approaches, the authors argue for the importance of what 'feminisms' have to say to development. Confronting the enormous challenges for feminisms in development studies, this book provides real hope for dialogue and exchange between feminisms and development.

Contradictions, Contestations and Challenges

Feminisms in Development

Laura Harvey

Hannah Frith

Paul Boyce

Yingying Huang

Charlotte Morris

Sexuality is a complex and multifaceted domain – encompassing bodily, contextual and subjective experiences that resist ready categorisation. To claim the sexual as a viable research object therefore raises a number of important methodological questions: what is it possible to know about experiences, practices and perceptions of sex and sexualities? What approaches might help or hinder our efforts to probe such experiences? This collection explores the creative, personal and contextual parameters involved in researching sexuality, cutting across disciplinary boundaries and drawing on case studies from a variety of countries and contexts. Combining a wide range of expertise, its contributors address such key areas as pornography, sex work, intersectionality and LGBT perspectives. The contributors also share their own experiences of researching sexuality within contrasting disciplines, as well as interrogating how the sexual identities of researchers themselves can relate to, and inform, their work. The result is a unique and diverse collection that combines practical insights on field work with novel theoretical reflections.

Researching Sex and Sexualities

Nancy Lindisfarne

Frank G. Karioris

Neoliberalism has had a radical impact on the lived, gendered experiences of people around the world. But while the gendered dimensions of neoliberalism have already received significant scholarly attention, the existing literature has given little consideration to men’s identities and experiences. Building on the work of Cornwall and Lindisfarne’s landmark text Dislocating Masculinity, this collection provides a fresh perspective on gender dynamics under neoliberalism. Bringing together a series of short, readable case studies drawn from new ethnographic fieldwork, its subjects range from the experiences of working-class men in Putin’s Russia to colonial masculinities in Southern Rhodesia, and from young British Muslim men to amateur footballers in Jamaica.

Masculinities under Neoliberalism

Comparative Ethnographies

Dislocating Masculinity

Garett Pratt

This book brings together some of the greatest names in development practice including Robert Chambers, and Jules Pretty, embracing a range of entry points and experiences, to articulate the forms of practice that have come to be called 'PRA' Participatory Rural Appraisal; the most popularly recognized and widely used approach to participation..

Reflections on PRA

Pathways to Participation

Samuel Musyoki

Practitioners' Reflections on PRA and Participation in Kenya

In Search of a New Impetus

Readings in Gender in Africa collects the most important critical and theoretical writings on how gender issues have transformed contemporary views of Africa. Scholarship from North America, Europe, and Africa is represented in this comprehensive volume. A synthetic introduction by Andrea Cornwall discusses efforts to include women in research about Africa. The volume not only shows how gender relations have been constructed on the African continent but reflects the changes in approach and inquiry that have been brought about as scholars consider gender identities and difference in their work. Specific themes covered here include the contestation and representation of gender, femininity and masculinity, livelihoods and lifeways, gender and religion, gender and culture, and gender and governance. Readers from across the landscape of African studies will find this an essential sourcebook. Published in association with the International African Institute, London

Sohela Nazneen

Maheen Sultan

Feminist Activism in Transitional Contexts

Voicing Demands

Susie Jolly

Sonia Correa

'We used to talk about development with a human face. We should be talking about development with a body' Arit Oku-Egbas, African Regional Sexuality Resource Centre, Nigeria Sex and sexuality have always had a place at the heart of the development agenda - from concerns regarding population and environment, to practices in education and efforts for protecting reproductive health and rights. Yet this agenda has largely focused on negative dimensions of sexuality - disease, risk, violation - rather than positive aspects, including rights to sexual fulfillment, wellbeing and pleasure. The shift towards a rights-based approach to development has brought the human rights dimensions of sexuality into clearer view, and consequently the need to address discriminatory laws and violations of the human rights of those whose sexual identity and practices diverge from dominant sexual orders/norms. This book offers compelling insights into contemporary challenges and transformative possibilities of the struggle for sexual rights. It combines the conceptual with the political, and offering inspiring examples of practical interventions and campaigns that emphasize the positive dimensions of sexuality. It brings together reflections and experiences of researchers, activists and practitioners from Brazil, India, Nigeria, Peru, Serbia, South Africa, Turkey, the UK and Zambia. From political discourse on sex and masculinity to sex work and trafficking, from HIV and sexuality to struggles for legal reform and citizenship, the authors explore the gains of creating stronger linkages between sexuality, human rights and development.

Sexuality, Human Rights and Development

Development with a Body

This collection of essays by leading feminist thinkers from North and South constitutes a major new attempt to reposition feminism within development studies. Feminism’s emphasis on social transformation makes it fundamental to development studies. Yet the relationship between the two disciplines has frequently been a troubled one. At present, the way in which many development institutions function often undermines feminist intent through bureaucratic structures and unequal power quotients. Moreover, the seeming intractability of inequalities and injustice in developing countries have presented feminists with some enormous challenges. Here, emphasizing the importance of a plurality of approaches, the authors argue for the importance of what ‘feminisms’ have to say to development. Confronting the enormous challenges for feminisms in development studies, this book provides real hope for dialogue and exchange between feminisms and development.

A student's textbook suitable for course adoption

Deborah Eade

Andrea Cornwall is Professor of Anthropology and Development in the School of Global Studies at the University of Sussex. --

Buzzwords and Fuzzwords

Deconstructing Development Discourse

This collection brings together leading feminist thinkers whoexamine the struggles for interpretive power which underliesinternational development. Questions why the insights from years of feminist gender anddevelopment research are so often turned into ‘gendermyths’ and ‘feminist fables’: women are morelikely to care for the environment; are better at working together;are less corrupt; have a seemingly infinite capacity tosurvive Explores how bowdlerized and impoverished representations ofgender relations have simultaneously come to be embedded indevelopment policy and practice Traces the ways in which language and images of development arerelated to practice and provides a nuanced account of the politicsof knowledge production Argues that struggles for interpretive power are not onlyimportant for our own sake, but also for the implications they havefor women’s lives worldwide An informed analysis of how ‘gender’ has beentransformed in its transfer into development policy and how manyauthors are now revisiting and reflecting on their earlierwork

The Struggle for Interpretive Power in Gender and Development

Gender Myths and Feminist Fables

Kate Hawkins

This pioneering collection explores the ways in which positive, pleasure-focused approaches to sexuality can empower women. Gender and development has tended to engage with sexuality only in relation to violence and ill-health. Although this has been hugely important in challenging violence against women, over-emphasizing these negative aspects has dovetailed with conservative ideologies that associate women’s sexualities with danger and fear. On the other hand, the media, the pharmaceutical industry, and pornography more broadly celebrate the pleasures of sex in ways that can be just as oppressive, often implying that only certain types of people - young, heterosexual, able-bodied, HIV-negative - are eligible for sexual pleasure. Women, Sexuality and the Political Power of Pleasure brings together challenges to these strictures and exclusions from both the South and North of the globe, with examples of activism, advocacy and programming which use pleasure as an entry point. It shows how positive approaches to pleasure and sexuality can enhance equality and empowerment for all.

Andrea Cornwall

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