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- Masculinity, Morality, and the State in Northern Kenya: The Case of
Baringo County's Il Chamus
Authors: Uroš Kovač, Dorothea E. Schulz
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Since the early 2000s, armed attacks and inter-ethnic violence have increased in parts of northern Kenya's Baringo County. This article examines how the Maa-speaking Il Chamus men respond to the growing insecurity as they draw on long-standing notions of morality and on the Kenyan state. In contrast to tropes of (agro)pastoralist northern Kenya being plagued by inter-ethnic animosity, lawlessness, and absence of governance, Il Chamus men situate inter-ethnic violence and gun ownership in notions of peace, prosperity, and security and engage the Kenyan state in an effort to achieve these values. Analyses of men in precarious conditions as experiencing “waithood” and turning to violence “in search of respect” need to be complemented by attention to emic notions of morality, masculinity, and intergenerational hierarchy, albeit not as simple remnants of “culture” but as points of debate in contemporary contexts of political and ecological insecurity.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-11-21T07:11:56Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231215366
- Afropolitan Masculinity: Forgeries of Wife-Owning Husbands in West Africa,
1850s–1950s
Authors: Ndubueze L. Mbah
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Between the 1850s and 1950s, when abolitionism masked neoslavery and engendered displacement and forced labour migration in West Africa, Africans used forgery as a survival mechanism. They forged legal documents, claimed multiple forms of citizenship and belonging as Afropolitans, and manipulated kinship and imperial bureaucracy in the quest for freedom. One arena of forgery examined in this article entailed the invention of “husband” as “wife-owner,” within a context of gendered aspirations for social reproduction in the age of abolition. Southeastern Nigerian male migrants mobilised freedom papers, labour contracts, marriage certificates, and the medium of petition-writing to fashion themselves into Afropolitan wife-owners in a bid to survive transimperial displacement, marginalisation, and subordination that arose from abolition forgery. Afropolitan masculinity illuminates how abolition forgery generated enduring structures of hierarchical gender relations in West Africa.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-11-15T07:18:48Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231206133
- Back in Youth. Social Unbecoming in the Study of West African
Masculinities
Authors: Jesper Bjarnesen
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
African youth became a central research theme in anthropology and related disciplines in the early 2000s, drawing renewed attention to the lives and aspirations of a segment of the continent's population that, since the independence era, has become increasingly demographically dominant but socially and politically marginalised. Reflecting on an extended case study of male ex-combatants in urban Burkina Faso, this paper offers a critical reading of the anthropological scholarship on African youth, emphasising, first, that much of this literature is most usefully read as studies of diverse (West) African masculinities and, second, that the literature has underplayed the extent to which achievements of social progression tend to be acutely reversible in contexts of precarity or radical social change, throwing the unfortunate, as it were, back in youth.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-11-09T08:53:37Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231211615
- Book Review: Hexerei in Nigeria zwischen Christentum, Islam und
traditionellen Praktiken. Globale Verflechtungen und lokale
Positionierungen bei den Yoruba by Judith Bachmann
Authors: Insa Nolte
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-10-17T04:05:02Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231190939
- Community Awareness and Restitution of Isanzu Ancestors’ Human Remains
from the University of Göttingen Collections to Mkalama District,
Tanzania
Authors: Maximilian Felix Chami, Alma Simba, Holger Stoecker
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
This paper investigates the restitution of Tanzanian human remains from colonial contexts in the Anthropological Collection at the University of Göttingen, Germany. This collection contains 66 human remains from Tanzania whereby 22 of them are from the Isanzu ethnic group. This paper focuses on the Isanzu human remains from Mkalama District in Singida Region and examines the circumstances of acquisition and their historical background. This interdisciplinary research combines methodological approaches from critical historical provenance research and cultural anthropology to study the Isanzu remains. We include investigation of the Isanzu ethnic group's awareness, emotions, opinions, and concerns over the restitution of their Ancestors’ remains back to the community. This paper proposes a plan for best practices in restitution and urges that wisdom, agreement, and negotiation results of Isanzu stakeholders should be taken into account to bring the restitution process of Isanzu's Ancestors to fruition.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-10-04T04:24:41Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231202806
- Women's Descriptive Representation in Burundi: The Mixed Effects of Gender
Quotas
Authors: Réginas Ndayiragije, Stef Vandeginste, Petra Meier
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Building on original data collected for the period between 2001 and 2020, this article contributes to the research on the effectiveness of gender quotas. It does so, first, by looking into the salience of ministerial portfolios allocated to women, and, secondly, by examining the spillover effect of the gender quotas in positions where they do not apply. We find that the implementation of gender quotas gradually resulted in women being assigned to high-salience ministerial portfolios. Also, gender quotas have produced mixed results in positions where they are not mandated. These findings can be explained mobilising a multi-perspectival argument that takes into account the history of gender quotas adoption in Burundi, the specific political context of their implementation, as well as an interpersonal resources perspective.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-10-04T04:08:39Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231203021
- Book Review: Youthquake: Why African Demography Should Matter to the World
by Paice Edward
Authors: Artur Colom-Jaén
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-08-07T08:26:07Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231192122
- Patriarchal Anxieties and Masculine Sexual Privilege in Contemporary Urban
Mali
Authors: Bruce Whitehouse
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
The neoliberal transformation of Mali's burgeoning capital city, Bamako, has undermined men's capacity to provide for their households and dependents even as it has boosted women's economic participation, leading senior males to express mounting anxieties over their declining economic power. As more men find themselves unable to assure economic stability for the women and children under their charge, many double down in their bid to exercise authority over women, particularly their wives. Some men use polygynous marriage as a means of performing certain masculine ideals, acquiring social prestige despite their diminished roles as breadwinners. Others find maintaining multiple female partners outside marriage similarly useful for offsetting their economic disadvantages. Based on ethnographic fieldwork and interviews with men and women in Bamako, this paper examines the extent to which modern masculinity in the city remains predicated on the control of women and their bodies.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-07-26T05:32:57Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231185158
- Beyond Toxic Masculinity: Reading and Writing Men in Post-Apartheid
Namibia
Authors: Jack Boulton
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Over the past few years, the term ‘toxic masculinity’ has entered public debate in Namibia as a way to describe apparently problematic forms of masculine behaviour, particularly in the light of high levels of gender-based violence. Originating in Western discourse, the term itself is difficult as it can stifle meaningful and transformative conversations concerning men. Describing ‘toxic masculinity’ as a trope, and indicating that tropes of violence have been used and politicised before, this article proposes a different way of reading men: via the mask. To do this, the ‘tropological place’ is introduced as a space of intimacy and trust, in which the kinds of masks that men wear become visible. Although the introduction of ‘toxic masculinity’ into debates around masculinities in Namibia should be acknowledged as an important starting point for conversations, this article urges researchers to think beyond it, encouraging more lateral relations with those that we research.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-05-24T06:40:48Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231175170
- Belonging and Agrarian Labour Exchanges in Zimbabwe: Navigating Between
Communal Areas and Fast Track Villagised Settlements
Authors: Malvern Kudakwashe Marewo
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
This article examines the nature of labour exchange between A1 farmers with people in communal areas of origin based on kinship and friendship relations. While agrarian labour in Zimbabwe has attracted considerable interest in land reform debates, limited attention has been paid to agrarian labour exchange and livelihoods based on belonging to communal areas of origin under the Fast Track Land Reform Programme (FTLRP). Using a qualitative case study from Mashonaland West, Zimbabwe, I argue that belonging plays an important role in labour exchange and enabling livelihoods. This article illustrates that labour exchange in farm households still matter despite changes in land distribution and the economy. The article concludes that belonging-based labour exchange enhances agricultural production and livelihoods in a new land ownership and economic circumstances.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-05-22T03:28:06Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231173709
- Book Review: Confinement, Punishment and Prisons in Africa by Morelle,
Marie, Frédéric Le Marcis, and Julia Hornberger
Authors: Chloé Ould Aklouche
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-05-15T06:10:31Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231168903
- Book Review: Women in Solitary: Inside South Africa's Female Resistance to
Apartheid by Shanthini Naidoo
Authors: Anirban Banerjee
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-01-25T05:49:44Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397231151967
- Book Review: Nomades de Mauritanie by Himpan, Brigitte, and
Himpan-Sabatier, Diane
Authors: Carmen de Jong
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2023-01-19T07:06:34Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397221147063
- Retraction Notice
Abstract: Africa Spectrum, Ahead of Print.
Citation: Africa Spectrum
PubDate: 2022-11-25T08:03:52Z
DOI: 10.1177/00020397221134879
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