"These four volumes in this major series... provide a single-source reference to the status of the field of women's history and to ways that the field can be expanded.... A basic set for all academic libraries." -- Library Journal Academic NewswireBerger and White focus on Sub-Saharan Africa, tracing women's history from earliest times to the present. By exploring their place in social, economic, political, and religious life, the authors highlight the changing societal position of women through shifts over time in ideas about gender and the connections between women's public and private spheres.

This exhaustive exploration of the sociocultural, political, and economic roles of African women through history demonstrates how African women have shaped—and continue to shape—their societies. Women play essential, critical roles in every society; African women south of the Sahara are certainly no different. Women's Roles in Sub-Saharan Africa adds significantly to our understanding of the ways in which women contribute to the fabric of human civilization. This book provides an in-depth exploration of African women's roles in society from precolonial periods to the contemporary era. Topical sections describe the roles that women play in family, courtship and marriage, religion, work, literature and arts, and government. Each of the six chapters has been structured to elucidate women's roles and functions in society as partners, as active participants, as defenders of their status and occupations, and as agents of change. Authors Nana Akua Amponsah and Toyin Falola present a thought-provoking work that looks at the complicated victimhood/powerful-female paradigm in women and gender studies in Africa, and challenge ideological interest in African historiography that privilege male representation.

African women’s history is a vast topic that embraces a wide variety of societies in over 50 countries with different geographies, social customs, religions, and historical situations. Africa is a predominantly agricultural continent, and a major factor in African agriculture is the central role of women as farmers. It is estimated that between 65 and 80 percent of African women are engaged in cultivating food for their families, and in the past that percentage was likely even higher. Thus, one common thread across much of the continent is women’s daily work in their family plot. This second edition of Historical Dictionary of Women in Sub-Saharan Africa contains a chronology, an introduction, appendixes, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 700 cross-referenced entries on individual African women in history, politics, religion, and the arts; on important events, organizations, and publications; and on topics important to women in general (marriage, fertility, employment) and to African women in particular (market women, child marriage, queen mothers). This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about the Women in Africa.

This book illuminates the complex and constantly shifting social and cultural dynamics that shape peoples identity. Specifically, the volume focuses on the intersections of gender with, culture and identity, and at different historical epochs; on the way men and women define themselves and are defined by diverse peoples and cultures across time and space in sub-Saharan Africa. The discussions presented in this anthology primarily focus on being as a state or condition, defined by sex identity, and how this identity shifts, and hence becoming, assuming diverse meanings in disparate societies, contexts, and time. The discourse, therefore, moves from how the perception of the self in cultural and historical contexts has informed actions and at some other times shaped interpretations given to historical facts, to how changing economic realities also shape the definitions and constructions of social and relational issues in Sub-Saharan Africa. The historical trajectories of Islamic religion, colonialism and Christian missionary activities in sub-Saharan Africa have shaped the worlds of the peoples of the region and impacted on gender relations.

African feminism, this landmark volume demonstrates, differs radically from the Western forms of feminism with which we have become familiar since the 1960s. African feminists are not, by and large, concerned with issues such as female control over reproduction or variation and choice within human sexuality, nor with debates about essentialism, the female body, or the discourse of patriarchy. The feminism that is slowly emerging in Africa is distinctly heterosexual, pronatal, and concerned with "bread, butter, and power" issues. Contributors present case studies of ten African states, demonstrating that—as they fight for access to land, for the right to own property, for control of food distribution, for living wages and safe working conditions, for health care, and for election reform—African women are creating a powerful and specifically African feminism.

African women's history is a topic as vast as the continent itself, embracing an array of societies in over fifty countries with different geographies, social customs, religions, and historical situations. In African Women: Early History to the 21st Century, Kathleen Sheldon masterfully delivers a comprehensive study of this expansive story from before the time of records to the present day. She provides rich background on descent systems and the roles of women in matrilineal and patrilineal systems. Sheldon's work profiles elite women, as well as those in leadership roles, traders and market women, religious women, slave women, women in resistance movements, and women in politics and development. The rich case studies and biographies in this thorough survey establish a grand narrative about women's roles in the history of Africa.

A Companion to Gender History surveys the history of womenaround the world, studies their interaction with men in genderedsocieties, and looks at the role of gender in shaping humanbehavior over thousands of years. An extensive survey of the history of women around the world,their interaction with men, and the role of gender in shaping humanbehavior over thousands of years. Discusses family history, the history of the body andsexuality, and cultural history alongside women’s history andgender history. Considers the importance of class, region, ethnicity, race andreligion to the formation of gendered societies. Contains both thematic essays and chronological-geographicessays. Gives due weight to pre-history and the pre-modern era as wellas to the modern era. Written by scholars from across the English-speaking world andscholars for whom English is not their first language.