Women in Africa: An Endless Struggle - Essay Example

Women in Africa: An Endless Struggle This essay is on the struggle of women in Africa and how they were affected during the 19th century colonizationof Africa. The essay has three parts. The first part is a brief history of the colonization of Africa. The second part is a discussion of African culture and the social status of women during the colonization period. The third part is on the struggle of African women in recent years to improve their status and face the challenges. History of Colonization in Africa Not much was known about the interior of the African continent, a mysterious and massive land mass sparsely populated by a dark-skinned people who typically welcomed other cultures. For hundreds of centuries, the continent that had been the cradle of civilization was crisscrossed by Arab and Jewish traders who carried out an active commercial activity with the Africans along the coast. Diamond even argued that the languages spoken by Arabs and Jews originated from West Africa, which explains why Jewish, Islamic and Christian communities easily took root.1 However, it was not until the 15th century after Europe experienced severe labor shortages from the disastrous waves of wars, diseases and foreign colonization did Africa turn into a prime source of slave labor. By the middle of that century, Portugal began importing slaves from African trading posts along the western coast. African tribal society of conquest and slavery was a natural supply source as victorious tribes sold their captives to whoever was willing to buy them. The slave trade was born as Arab and African traders saw demand for slave labor rise in Europe. Aside from Portugal, Spain, Britain, France, and Germany found use for cheap labor. Arab traders, too, shipped Africans sold by their conquerors to slave markets in Arabia, Iran, and India, using sea trade routes from Africa to Indonesia that had been used since 5,000 years ago.2 Africa became Slave Central as European nations were joined in the 17th century by the British colonies in America and rising nations like the Netherlands and Denmark, whose powerful navies allowed trading in slaves to continue for the next two centuries. By the middle of the 19th century, slavery was abolished, first in Britain and then in America and soon, other European nations followed. Thus, after centuries of being brutalized by Arab, and then European, slave traders who bought and sold captured prisoners from other native tribes to sell along the coast all the way to Southeast Asia, Africa was free once again, but not for long.3 About that time, the discovery of great mineral wealth in Africa began a wave of colonization after the so-called West African Conference in Berlin in 1884-1885, which became known as "The Scramble." Seven European nations agreed to divide and conquer African territory. Of these, it was Belgium, France, and Britain that carried out the most brutal work of colonization, one that practically made the Africans slaves in their own land.4 Despite their claims of wanting to civilize the people of the continent and turning them away from their destructive tribal tendencies, converting them from pagans into Christians, and preparing the native people for ultimate independence, the colonizers took advantage of the social, cultural, and geographical traits of Africa to squeeze as much as they could from the land and its people. This took place until the middle of the 20th century when these European nations gave their African colonies the independence that they thought they deserved, but by then, the centuries of slavery and the decades of corruption and abuse left deep wounds that, until now, are still in the healing process. Colonization and the Wounds of Culture Colonization weakened African society as cruelty decimated a people wracked by insect-borne diseases like malaria; greed led colonizers (except for the Britain) to withhold the education of the population; and the arbitrary nature by which geographical boundaries of the colonies were established during "the Scramble" disregarded the presence of indigenous ethnic diversity.5 The result was disaster and confusion as tribes from different cultures were forced to become artificial nations, preventing the formation of a unified spirit that is crucial in building a nation, and the high death rates left an insufficient number of natives to cultivate and develop the country. Africa could be likened to young children speaking different languages who were let loose inside a candy shop, each one following his or her own rules without regard for the rights of others. However, what was perhaps the worst legacy left by the colonizers is a culture of ignorance, corruption, and cruelty that prevailed in African societies by the time of their independence. This situation became a fertile ground for traditional superstitions, evil native practices, mass forms of cruelty and starvation, ancient human habits, modern forms of slavery, tribal wars as the means of settling conflict, and sexual promiscuity to take quick and deep roots. Worse, the patriarchal nature of African society was emphasized at this time of so much confusion and conflict as their colonizers imposed their own social biases against women upon the people (Oyewumi, 1998). African tribal society was characterized by the low social status and class afforded to women, who were expected to take care of the home, husband and children, to stay uneducated, and to train their daughters to perpetuate the feminine culture by preparing themselves to find and marry suitable husbands. This status of feminine oppression that has prevailed in the ancient tribal culture, though not in the degree they did after colonization, made a turn for the worse especially after colonization, finding expression in the loss of internal, external, psychological, emotional, socio-economic, political, and philosophical freedom (Coquery-Vidrovitch, 1996). Colonization left African people severely wounded, more so its women, a process that would take many years to heal. There have been many debates on the nature of the struggle of women in Africa. Patricia McFadden and Gwendolyn Mikell are two key thinkers with their own points of view on this issue6. McFadden argued that gender hierarchies have existed in African societies and that the subsequent power inequities were made worse by colonialism. On the other hand, Mikell argued that contemporary gender inequality is primarily the result of traumatic colonization by the West in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Thus, African women were integrated into pre-colonial structures and that contemporary gender inequities were primarily the result of colonial processes. Amina Mama (1995) argued, in commenting on these two viewpoints, that McFadden and Mikell reflect two different positions about women's struggle in Africa. McFadden refers to a political praxis that emanates from a very cogent analysis of political, economic, and social conditions that shape the lives of African women. Mikell, based on her extensive research, bases her viewpoint on deductive generalization and observation, describing the status of African women as she sees it from the outside, from a physical and analytical distance, rather than from the perspective of someone engaged in feminist activism on the African continent. What academics like Amina Mama found disturbing was Mikell's definition that the struggle of African women is distinctly heterosexual, pro-natal, and concerned with what she refers to as the politics of survival. This is certainly a conservative viewpoint to which Mikell is entitled, but her critics find her emphasis on fertility rates and poverty levels to be too tame to challenge the way that contemporary patriarchies in Africa constrain women and prevent them from realizing their potential beyond their traditional roles as hardworking, income-generating wives and mothers. The obvious conclusion from this is that African women forego all the other things that women the world over are fighting for: respect, dignity, equality, lives free from violence and the threat of violence (Oloka-Onyango & Tamale, 1995). African women have aspirations that go far beyond securing their survival. These aspirations include political, economic, social, intellectual, professional, and personal desires for change. It may be true that African women are trapped in the daily business of securing their own survival and that of their families and communities, but this is merely symptomatic of the global trend of patriarchal power with its corresponding social, political, and economic injustices that it causes to all women around the world, not only among Africans (Preis, 1996; O'Barr, 1975) The struggle of women in Africa has taken the nature of women's movements and outright feminist struggle that may be similar to, but is markedly different from, white western feminism. In Africa, these two seem to be compatible where women can be mobilized to mass action while continuing to fight for their rights. For example, the African experience includes all manner of women's mobilization that is not of their own design or choosing. As recent history has demonstrated, even the most undemocratic and patriarchal political regimes do not hesitate to involve women. Victorious dictators mobilized women to dance on the streets even as these actions celebrated women within their traditional roles as wives and mothers. The wives and mothers of corrupt Nigerian military officers have sponsored massive women's protests to mobilize support for the dictatorships run by their husbands. These and many others are examples of how women are mobilized or take to the streets themselves to support an agenda that is not exclusively feminist (Mama, 1995). Thus, part of the struggle of African women is developing a clearer idea of what is meant by a gender politics that is geared towards the wholesale liberation of women, which would work for transformation at three levels: at the level of their subjectivity, at the level of their personal lives and relationships, and at the level of the political economy. Women's liberation requires addressing gender injustice all the way from micro- to the macro-political level, and not running away from any form of struggle (Coquery-Vidrovitch, 1996). Current State of African Women's Struggles As African women gain more experience in struggling for their liberation from traditional subjugating roles but without losing their subjective, cultural, and socio-politico-economic personal identity, they must realize the importance of alliances in order to overcome gender injustice. The need to form strategic alliances is important if their struggle is to succeed. These alliances, both local and international, have proven to be tricky as past experiences have shown that the struggles have worked with gender and power in ways that have not transformed gender relations as they hoped it would. Intimidation and confrontation threatened the existing structures, and instead of opening these up to change, the reactions have been extreme and negative. Thus, there is a need to be more discerning in the alliances they make and the strategies they adopt. There is also a need to rethink the intellectual and political challenge posed by the problematic nature of gendered identity. The complex phenomena currently described as identity politics have not been adequately theorized and ignores all the feminist theory on the gendered nature of identity despite the general perception that all identity is gendered, whether one is talking of identity at the individual, social, or political level. The African women's struggle could help us in arriving at a better understanding of statecraft and politics, alerting us to the partial and limited manifestations of individuality in social or political life.7 Several interesting questions need answers, such as the link between male domination of social and political life and the prevalence of war and militarism. Take Somalia, where warring factions battle each other on the basis of clan identities. Because these clans are exogamous, women do not have a clan identity in the same way. Their ties with brothers, husbands, sons, and fathers extend across clans, which is why Somali women's gendered identities transcend clans and are therefore less likely to fight and kill on the basis of clans. In Somalia, women can tell their husbands to step aside after slaughtering each other, tired of paying the price of male-driven conflict. And in Rwanda where Hutu men commonly marry Tutsi women, during the genocide Hutu men killed their Tutsi wives, women who bore children fathered by Hutu men. There are lessons hidden somewhere in these realities that would allow a deeper understanding of how gender identities could mitigate or consolidate ethnic identities, contributing to our theoretical knowledge of ways by which social, political, and economic progress can be achieved in the continent (Oyewumi, 1998; Mama, 1995). African societies continue to be so clearly demarcated by gender divisions, so the struggle continues to transform the way African women see themselves. Their best weapons in the search for identity are the intellectual tools that could assist them in their pursuit of gender justice. They must not allow suppressive intellectual arguments and must realize the importance of intellectual work and scholarship in an age when knowledge and information define power more than ever. Women must engage with theory and analysis from different perspectives, and develop strategically useful skills to make use of information technology, research, and writing skills, training, teaching, and communication to influence the world with their concerns and transform to serve their collective interests, instead of allowing it to perpetrate intellectual and epistemic violence against women (Mama, 1995). Nevertheless, African women at the forefront of the ongoing struggle are hopeful that the ongoing learning process will usher a brighter future for succeeding generations. Bibliography Coquery-Vidrovitch, C. (1996). African women: A modern history. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Diamond, J. (2005). Guns, germs, and steel: The fates of human societies. New York: W.W. Norton. Mama, A. (1995). Beyond the masks: Race, gender and subjectivity. London: Routledge. McFadden, P. (2001). "Political power: The challenges of sexuality, patriarchy and globalization in Africa." Paper delivered at a seminar hosted by the Mauritius Women's Movement (MLF) and the Workers Education Association (LPT). Port Louis, Mauritius, February 12-17, 2001. Mikell, G. (1995). African feminism: Towards a new politics of representation. Feminist Studies, 21(2), 405-424. O'Barr, J.F. (1975). Making the invisible visible: African women in politics and policy. African Studies Review, 18 (3), 19-27. Oloka-Onyango, J. & Tamale, S. (1995). The personal is political, or why women's rights are indeed human rights: An African perspective on international feminism. Human Rights Quarterly, 17, 691-731. Oyewumi, O. (1998). The invention of women: Making an African sense of western gender discourse. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota. Pakenham, T. (1991). The scramble for Africa. New York: Random House. Preis, A.B.S. (1996). Human rights as cultural practice: An anthropological critique. Human Rights Quarterly, 18, p. 286-315. Shillington, K. (2005). History of Africa (Revised 2nd ed.). New York: Macmillan. Read More