African Masculinities

While masculinity studies enjoys considerable growth in the West, there is very little analysis of African masculinities. This volume explores what it means for an African to be masculine and how male identity is shaped by cultural forces. The editors believe that to tackle the important questions in Africa-the many forms of violence (wars, genocides, familial violence and crime) and the AIDS pandemic-it is necessary to understand how a combination of a colonial past, patriarchal cultural structures and a variety of religious and knowledge systems creates masculine identities and sexualities. The work done in the book particularly bears in mind how vulnerability and marginalization produce complex forms of male identity. The book is interdisciplinary and is the first in-depth and comprehensive study of African men as a gendered category.

Although gender and non-gender scholars have studied men, such an academic exercise requires a critical and focused study of masculine subjects in particular social contexts, which is what this book attempts to do. This empirically rich collection of essays, the seventh of the CODESRIA Gender Series, deals with critical examinations of various shades and ramifications of Africa's masculinities and what these portend for the peoples of Africa and for gender relations in the continent. So much has changed in terms of notions and expressions of masculinities in Africa since ancient times, but many aspects of contemporary masculinities were fashioned during and since the colonial period. The papers in this volume were initially discussed at the 2005 month-long CODESRIA Gender Institute in Dakar. The contributors are gender scholars drawn from various disciplines in the wide fields of the humanities and the social sciences with research interests in the critical study of men and masculinities in Africa. The CODESRIA Gender Series aims at keeping alive and nourishing the African social science knowledge base with insightful research and debates that challenge conventional wisdom, structures and ideologies that are narrowly informed by caricatures of gender realities. The series strives to showcase the best in African gender research and provide a platform for emerging new talents to flower.

Comprises a dozen contributions, focusing on men as gendered actors, the social construction of masculinity, masculinity as a relational category, and hegemonic or subordinate masculinities. Reflects on developments from colonialism to independence in seven sub-Saharan countries.

Studies of gender in African Christianity have usually focused on women. This book draws attention to men and constructions of masculinity, particularly important in light of the HIV epidemic which has given rise to a critical investigation of dominant forms of masculinity. These are often associated with the spread of HIV, gender-based violence and oppression of women. Against this background Christian theologians and local churches in Africa seek to change men and transform masculinities. Exploring the complexity and ambiguity of religious gender discourses in contemporary African contexts, this book critically examines the ways in which some progressive African theologians, and a Catholic parish and a Pentecostal church in Zambia, work on a 'transformation of masculinities'.

This vivid evocation of the lives of 32 boys from a Johannesburg township is essential reading for anybody wishing to understand black masculinity in South Africa Becoming Men is the story of 32 boys from Alexandra, one of Johannesburg's largest townships, over a period of twelve seminal years in which they negotiate manhood and masculinity. Psychologist and academic Malose Langa has documented graphically what it means to be a young black man in contemporary South Africa. The boys discuss a range of topics including the impact of absent fathers, relationships with mothers, siblings and girls, school violence, academic performance, homophobia, gangsterism, unemployment and, in one case, prison life. Dominant themes that emerge are deep ambivalence, self-doubt and hesitation in the boys' approaches to alternative masculinities that are non-violent, non-sexist and non-risk-taking. The difficulties of negotiating the multiple voices of masculinity are exposed as many of the boys appear simultaneously to comply with and oppose the prevalent norms. Providing a rich interpretation of how emotional processes affect black adolescent boys, Langa suggests interventions and services to support and assist them, especially in reducing the high-risk behaviours generally associated with hegemonic masculinity. This is essential reading for students, researchers and scholars of gender studies who wish to understand manhood and masculinity in South Africa. Psychologists, youth workers, lay counsellors and teachers who work with adolescent boys will also find it invaluable.

Explores what it means for an African to be masculine and how male identity is shaped by cultural forces. This book looks at how vulnerability and marginalization produce complex forms of male identity. It is a comprehensive study of African men as a gendered category.