Daughters of Anowa
Title | Daughters of Anowa PDF eBook |
Author | Mercy Amba Oduyoye |
Publisher | |
Pages | 248 |
Release | 1995 |
Genre | Religion |
ISBN |
Daughters of Anowa provides an analysis of the lives of African women today from an African woman's own perspective. It is a study of the influence of culture and religion - particularly of traditional African cultures and Christianity - on African women's lives. Mercy Amba Oduyoye illustrates how myths, proverbs, and folk tales (called "folktalk") operate in the socialization of young women, working to preserve the norms of the community. Daughters of Anowa reveals how global patriarchy manifests itself in these social structures, in both patrilineal and matrilineal communities. Organized as a narrative in three cycles, Daughters of Anowa demonstrates how folktalk alienates women from power, discourages individuality and encourages conformity. It also considers the possibilities for the future. Oduyoye posits that change will come about only when the daughters of Anowa (the mythic representative of Africa itself) confront the realities of culture and religion in perpetuating patriarchal oppression and work to realize the goal of a new woman in a new Africa.
Male Daughters, Female Husbands
Title | Male Daughters, Female Husbands PDF eBook |
Author | Professor Ifi Amadiume |
Publisher | Zed Books Ltd. |
Pages | 296 |
Release | 2015-03-12 |
Genre | Social Science |
ISBN | 1783603348 |
In 1987, more than a decade before the dawn of queer theory, Ifi Amadiume wrote Male Daughters, Female Husbands, to critical acclaim. This compelling and highly original book frees the subject position of 'husband' from its affiliation with men, and goes on to do the same for other masculine attributes, dislocating sex, gender and sexual orientation. Boldly arguing that the notion of gender, as constructed in Western feminist discourse, did not exist in Africa before the colonial imposition of a dichotomous understanding of sexual difference, Male Daughters, Female Husbands examines the structures in African society that enabled people to achieve power, showing that roles were not rigidly masculinized nor feminized. At a time when gender and queer theory are viewed by some as being stuck in an identity-politics rut, this outstanding study not only warns against the danger of projecting a very specific, Western notion of difference onto other cultures, but calls us to question the very concept of gender itself.
The Girl who Can
Title | The Girl who Can PDF eBook |
Author | Ama Ata Aidoo |
Publisher | Heinemann |
Pages | 164 |
Release | 2002 |
Genre | Fiction in English |
ISBN | 9780435910136 |
In this collection of short stories, Aidoo elevates the mundane in women's lives to an intellectual level in an attempt at challenging patriarchal structures and dominance in African society.
Philip's Daughters
Title | Philip's Daughters PDF eBook |
Author | Estrelda Y. Alexander |
Publisher | Wipf and Stock Publishers |
Pages | 277 |
Release | 2009-01-01 |
Genre | Religion |
ISBN | 163087700X |
This volume brings together twelve scholars from a variety of scholarly fields including biblical studies, history, theology, sociology, anthropology, and missiology in a multi-disciplinary exploration of themes related to women's leadership within the three branches of the renewal movement: Holiness, Pentecostal and Charismatic traditions. These scholars - women and men - from both within and outside the traditions, draw on various methodologies including hermeneutics, ethnography, critical theory, and historical analysis to explore the experiences and contributions of women from the movement's inception to the present. They keep before us the challenges that still impact women's full participation as equal partners in ministry and leadership on both the American and global scene. The volume looks at the multiple roots of women's marginalization within the renewal movement while suggesting progressive solutions that take seriously the social locations of Pentecostal and Charismatic congregations and the theological foundations on which the movement has been built. At the same time, it locates these discussions within the broader postmodern realities facing the church as it attempts to faithfully live out its witness to the biblical truth that both male and female are created in the God's image and endowed with the capacity to work creatively toward the unfolding of the Kingdom.
Dilemma of a Ghost
Title | Dilemma of a Ghost PDF eBook |
Author | Ama Ata Aidoo |
Publisher | |
Pages | 126 |
Release | 2001 |
Genre | Large type books |
ISBN | 9781903552162 |
Re-Inventing Africa
Title | Re-Inventing Africa PDF eBook |
Author | Ifi Amadiume |
Publisher | Zed Books |
Pages | 228 |
Release | 1997-12 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 9781856495349 |
This book reveals how conventional anthropology has consistently imposed European ideas of the "natural" nuclear family, women as passive object, and class differences on a continent with a long history of women with power doing things differently. Amadiume argues for an end to anthropology and calls instead for a social history of Africa, by Africans.
African Women and the Shame and Pain of Infertility
Title | African Women and the Shame and Pain of Infertility PDF eBook |
Author | Damasus C. Okoro |
Publisher | Wipf and Stock Publishers |
Pages | 183 |
Release | 2020-06-24 |
Genre | Social Science |
ISBN | 1725265710 |
In African Women and the Shame and Pain of Infertility: An Ethico-Cultural Study of Christian Response to Childlessness among the Igbo People of West Africa, Okoro discusses the shipwreck that is associated with infertility in marriage in Africa. Within this space, childlessness places a big question mark on a woman's femininity and the self-esteem of the man. The stigma of infertility most often leads to social isolation and humiliation, particularly of married women, even when the source of infertility may not have come from them. Unfortunately, this situation goes against the highly valued Igbo ethical principle of onye aghala nwanne ya, meaning "no kith or kin should be left behind." Therefore, the purpose of the book is to help married people in Igbo land and Africa at large to appropriate this indigenous principle in their response to the problem of infertility. To attain this, the author critically evaluates discrimination and oppression of infertile couples, particularly women, and shedding light on the paradoxes found in Igbo cultural expressions. He employs a constructive, ethical, cultural, religious, contextual, and theological approach that explores important Igbo religious paradigms like Chi (an Igbo religio-cultural understanding of personal destiny) and Ani (the feminine deity in-charge of the land and fertility) to argue the case for the liberation and integration of infertile couples.