The African Gender Institute (AGI) is a department in the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Cape Town. Since its inception, the AGI has been instrumental in providing high quality scholarship in the interdisciplinary field of Gender and Women’s Studies (GWS) particularly in the African context. Guided by some of the best academics and activists in the field, the Institute continues to offer highly competitive undergraduate and postgraduate courses in GWS. In addition to teaching and research, the African Gender Institute has several projects running that complement the teaching of GWS in tertiary institutions throughout the African continent. 

 

 

WHAT'S NEW FOR US

 

AGI staff member, Adelene Africa graduates with a PhD in Psychology

 

Adelene Africa, a Lecturer at the African Gender Institute  graduated on 14 December 2011 from the University of Cape Town with a PhD in Psychology.

 

Adelene Africa has an MA (Guidance and Counselling) from the University of Durham (UK) and an MA (Clinical Psychology) with distinction from UCT. She taught in the Department of Psychology at UCT for several years.

Adelene’s PhD thesis is titled, ‘Women Offenders’ Narratives of Violent Crime.’ Her PhD thesis examines the narratives of South African women who have been incarcerated for murder, culpable homicide and robbery with aggravating circumstances. Her work analyses their subjective accounts of violent perpetration thus investigating the meaning which they attach to these acts. Life stories were used as narrative devices within which to communicate crime narratives – significantly these acts were not necessarily the focus of the macronarratives and were constructed as part of overarching narratives of the self. Three narrative forms were identified: Conversion narratives focused on how violent crime and subsequent incarceration were necessary for the transformation of the bad girl into a good woman. Stability narratives concentrated on the consistent goodness of the protagonist thus violence was constructed as a temporary aberration. Incoherent narratives were typified by narrators’ inability to attribute any meaning to their violence or convey particular stories about the self. Adelene Africa’s work challenges mainstream discourses of women’s violence which construct women as pathological, victimised or deviant and therefore devoid of agency. She shows how women variedly attributed agency and occupied various subject positions in their accounts. Her work contests views that violence and aggression are masculine attributes and illustrates how an analysis of women’s perpetration challenges gender stereotypes and contributes to understanding the culture of violence in South Africa. Congratulations Adelene!

 

AGI staff at the Saartjie Baartman Centre for Women and Children
On the 9th of December 2011, some staff members from the African Gender Institute were at the Saartjie Baartman Centre for Women and Children (SBCWC) for the Centre’s, ‘Airing the Dirty Laundry’ event and also to witness the planting and dedication of a tree at the Centre to honour Wangari Maathai. The SBCWC use the metaphor of ‘airing the dirty laundry’ to surface and honour women’s myriad and varied; often unspoken stories and experiences of violence, survival, life and voice. In addition to honouring the many women’s voices, the AGI and the SBCWC honoured Wangari Maathai’s life by planting a wild acacia tree at the Centre. Jane Bennett, the Head of the African Gender Institute dedicated the tree. Witnessing this special dedication were some women from the Centre and the surrounding community, staff from the Centre and the AGI. See pictures from the event.

 

 

 

Gender DynamiX and the AGI co-host a stimulating conversation on Transgender Research to Action: Meaningful Curricular and Services

 

Gender DynamiX and the AGI on the 29th of November 2011 co-hosted a stimulating conversation titled; ‘Transgender Research to Action: Meaningful Curricular and Services.’ This conversation was linked to a successful conference on Transgender and Public Health co-ordinated by Gender DynamiX. Despite the fact that the semester ended at UCT, this conversation was well attended by a mix of people from non-governmental organisations as well as students and staff from the University of Cape Town community.
The presenters included Joanne Keatley from the Center of Excellence for Transgender Health and the University of California, San Francisco; Sel Hwahng from the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race at Columbia University and Jamison Green, the President Elect for the World Professional Association for Transgender Health. Joanne Keatley spoke about ‘Public Health and Human Rights’ and the respondent was Mzikazi Nduna from the Department of Psychology at the University of the Witwatersrand. Sel Hwahng spoke about ‘Intersectionalities- Race, Class and Migrancy’ and the respondent was Zethu Matebeni from the Institute for Humanities in Africa at the University of Cape Town. Jamison Green spoke on ‘Law and Ethics’ and the respondent was Juan Nel from the Center for Applied Psychology at the University of South Africa. See pictures from the event.

 

Resisting the Neo-colonial/Neo-liberal Collusion: Reclaiming our lives, our futures

Patricia McFadden – UWC (presented at AGI – October, 2011)

 

Thank you for attending this seminar, and for ‘infusing the space with energies critical and otherwise’. Let me begin by ‘situating myself’ cautiously, (albeit with a large dose of temerity - meant as a well understood and deliberate sense of recklessness on my part), within the terrain of South Africa as a convoluted and complex socio-political site; a space that has been trampled over and upon by some for centuries, as well as being the location and home of an idea, a reality that has travelled with and accompanied many bright and courageous lives – present and past - and which continues to be endowed with the potential of becoming new and dignified through the courage of each generation that embraces the possibilities of being free. Read MORE and See Pictures from the lecture.

 

The AGI & the WGS programme of UWC successfully co-hosted two events at which Professor Sylvia Tamale was a presenter

 

The African Gender Institute & the Women and Gender Studies programme of the University of the Western Cape successfully co-hosted two events on the 11th and 12th of October 2011 at which renowned Ugandan Feminist Lawyer, Academic and Activist, Professor Sylvia Tamale was a presenter.
 

The Cape Town launch of the book, African Sexualities, A Reader edited by Professor Sylvia Tamale was extremely well attended. The launch took place on the 11th of October 2011 at the Book Lounge. People attending the launch included some contributing authors, activists, academics and students. Professor Tamale eloquently spoke about the aims of the book, the contents of the book, the authors, the process of putting the book together and she also read excerpts from it. On the 12th of October 2011, Professor Tamale presented a seminar at the University of Cape Town. For the greater part of the seminar, she engaged in conversation with people who attended the seminar around issues related to the book. See pictures from the book launch and the seminar.

 

“Worst woman of the year”: Sylvia Tamale publishes African Sexualities: A Reader (published by Pambazuka Press)
Jane Bennett, African Gender Institute, University of Cape Town

In 2003, Sylvia Tamale was named as the “Worst Woman of the Year” by a conservative bloc within Uganda. Working at the time as an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Law at Makerere University (she later became its Dean), she was vilified for weeks within one of Kampala’s major daily newspapers, New Vision, as responsible for everything from the moral degeneration of the nation to the reason Ugandan teenagers were going to go to hell. Her crime: suggesting to the (then) proposed Equal Opportunities Commission, in her status as a lawyer, that the term “minorities” should cover lesbian and gay citizens of Uganda. Those who suggested that she should be “lynched” for her opinion then must be in great trouble now; they must be struggling for an intense enough vocabulary of distress to respond to the recent publication by Pambazuka Press of Sylvia Tamale’s edited collection, African Sexualities: A Reader. Read MORE (PDF file).

 

OUTSIDE EVENTS, OPPORTUNITIES AND RESOURCES

 

Registration for the 2012 AWID Forum is now Open!

 

AWID is excited to announce that registration for the 12th AWID International Forum on Women's rights and development is now open. For further information, please visit the AWID 2012 Forum website.

 

 

 

 

 

 

OUR OTHER SITES
GWS Africa

The AGI’s Strengthening Gender and Women’s Studies for Africa’s Transformation (GWS Africa) project uses Information and communication technologies (ICTs) for the development and dissemination of intellectual resources to support and strengthen African-based teaching and research in gender studies. 

 

Feminist Africa

Feminist Africa is a publication of the African Gender Institute and its Strengthening Gender & Women's Studies for Africa's Transformation (GWS Africa) Project. It provides a forum for progressive, cutting-edge gender research and feminist dialogue focused on the continent. The latest edition of the journal is Feminist Africa 14- Rethinking Gender and Violence.