In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Is Feminism Global?

Aulelia

I am in many ways a hybrid. I am an African girl who has lived abroad for such a long time that both European and African cultures have become fused together in me. One thing that I struggle a lot with when I return to Tanzania for my holidays is the traditional female role that I have to slip back into in order to integrate with everyone else. I love returning back home – the food, the music, the hilarious Tanzanian TV shows. Yet what pains me the most is how people expect and in fact want me to act like a “woman”, ie, do not wear trousers if you are a girl and do not watch football with the men of the house (the former and the latter which I do all the time).

Why are we always assigned certain images that we must live up to? In the West, there is a certain amount of freedom given to women as we can choose what we want to do with our lives and whatever we want to wear just judging from how liberal society is here. Yet when I return to Tanzania, I see that while the country’s cosmopolitan cities are embracing women to have freedom in terms of how they move in society, not all of the citizens of the country are embracing this ideology. In my midriff baring time, it used to irk my grandmother so much as she thought I was showing off my flesh. I suppose this is natural in traditional societies but from what I can see when I return to my mother’s village, no one wants this to change.

Women have their place being reminded that they have their duties ie, keeping the house spotless, raising the children and being submissive to the patriarch of the family. No doubt things are changing in our neighbouring country Kenya where Rebecca Lolosoli started her own all-female village to help Samburu tribeswomen who were being beaten yet general attitudes towards women don’t seen like they want to change at all because that would be “un-African” to embrace feminism. That appears to be the bottom line for many people at home that feminism is a foreign parasite that is trying to destroy African communities.

Feminism is becoming global I believe and encompassing all women of ethnic backgrounds too which is incredibly important to that it has scope. The problem that is lying ahead for it is to penetrate Africa. The HIV/AIDS crisis needs a breakthrough – and who knows? Perhaps the women’s movement is the answer.

16 thoughts on Is Feminism Global?

  1. That appears to be the bottom line for many people at home that feminism is a foreign parasite that is trying to destroy African communities.

    This is a really interesting point, and seems to be true in many non-Western places. It’s a reasonable enough fear, too, considering the history of colonialism and Western cultural imperialism throughout the rest of the world.

    The problem, of course, is that it assumes feminism to be a Western invention, which it most certainly isn’t.

  2. women don’t seem like they want to change at all because that would be “un-African” to embrace feminism.

    Feminism was un-American and un-European when it arose on these continents. The pre-feminist, American and European duties for women included keeping the house spotless, raising the children and being submissive to the patriarch of the family. American feminists sure get accused of being parasites out to destroy the community.

  3. That’s true, Frumius, but I wouldn’t discount the idea that there’s something special going on in post-colonial countries or among communities that don’t have a lot of cultural power. I think it’s pretty common for members of cultures that feel under assault, either directly or indirectly, to decide that “traditional” gender roles are one part of their culture that they can hang on to. It’s often pretty superficial: women may be taking on all sorts of new responsibilities and roles, but hey, they’re not wearing trousers! And I also think that men sometimes demand that they be compensated for loss of status or power by demanding that they have more power over women and children. It’s a kind of compensatory patriarchy, which women often go along with for various reasons. Finally, I think that women often derive satisfaction and a sense of self from conforming to traditional (or “traditional”) gender roles. You get to know that you’re better, more moral, less selfish, etc. than those greedy women who have more power and more goodies than you.

    I have no idea if any of these things are going on in Tanzania, though. I think most of my ideas about this stuff come from reading stuff about early-20th-century India, which I’m sure was a really different dynamic.

  4. That appears to be the bottom line for many people at home that feminism is a foreign parasite that is trying to destroy African communities.

    It’s true, like Frumious says, that this really can be applied almost universally as feminism rises. Except, maybe for the word foreign. Cold War era conservatives could tie it to Communism and throw the whole thing back on Russia, but it was flagarantly untrue and meaningless.

    Communities in the global south are getting a million messages from American and Europe – and almost all of them imply (or demand) change. It’s a situation that makes it easy to trigger a backlash, and even easier to aim it at more vulnerable populations. You can’t tell anyone to fuck off and not go work in a sweatshop when it’s the only work available. You can’t tell your neighbors to stop buying American corn because it’s running your farm under.

    But you can tell your daughter to stop wearing pants, and you’ll get backed up. And you can tell that story to the missionary who’s coming through and be praised.

  5. Communism and socialism itself was often linked to foreign influences, so I don’t think that the American experience is so different just because feminism was tied to foreign communism rather than foreign capitalism/imperialism. During the end of the 19th, beginning of the 20th century it was all those unAmerican migrants bringing these foreign ideas to our good and loyal American workers (sounds familiar?), during the Cold War it was all about Moscow’s influence and a fifth column of Bolshevik agents working within the USA to dismantle it.

    I believe it is common modus operandi for elites to blame subversive ideas on outsiders, furthering the myth that the current status quo is one of mutual agreement between the elite and its subjects. This serves both to preserve the moral ego of the elite (by letting them assume their rule is consensual, thus moral) and to unite disparate classes with one another through false consciousness, by getting the oppressed to identify more with their oppressor than with a different category of the oppressed.

  6. Communism and socialism itself was often linked to foreign influences, so I don’t think that the American experience is so different just because feminism was tied to foreign communism rather than foreign capitalism/imperialism.

    I think that’s true during the Cold War, but I’m not convinced that was the dynamic in the early 20th century. Mainstream feminists at the time tended to position themselves as a defense against immigrant radicalism: by enfranchising sensible American women who understood democracy, you’d dilute the power of crazy immigrant men. (And it wasn’t lost on anyone that immigrants were disproportionately male.) To the extent that feminists were accused of supporting foreign radicals, that support was generally construed as accidental, because feminists were contributing to “race suicide.”

    I guess I do think that elite anti-feminism is a bit different from subaltern (academic buzzword alert! Sorry!) anti-feminism. I think that the anti-feminism you see from super-powerful people is different from the anti-feminism you see from people who are conscious, rightly, that they’re being denied power and agency.

  7. Then there’s the difficulties of wanting to balance embracing parts of your culture and heritage while being true to your feminist self- hard to do sometimes when on paper, the two goals would seem to be in direct conflict. Years ago I knew folks originally from Eritrea, India and Pakistan (we all worked in a large inner-city hospital) who faced that conflict, with mixed results. “Hybrid” is a very apt phrase. It was especially difficult for my Indian friend, who while she enjoyed her trips home, was so relieved to come back to the States for some of the reasons described here.

  8. Beautiful essay, Aulelia. Do you risk upsetting your family and watch football or do you miss your favorite teams play? It’s an upsetting choice to have to make.

  9. Great post, Aulelia. I think the point about people conscious of change they don’t want jumping into backlash is very true, especially with women’s improving status.

    It reminds me of growing up in a pretty much working-to-middle-class neighborhood and being challenged by other kids with “Who do you think you are, talking like that?” simply because I talked like the books I read (I just loved the sounds of those big words with such precise meanings). This was at the time of the decay of a culture of well-paid blue-collar jobs-for-life, leading to a backlash against those chasing the booksmarts (and some kids giving in and refusing to learn in solidarity with the threatened-by-change mob).

  10. I’m travelling through russia at the moment and the attitudes towards me as a single female traveller are a mixture of shock, awe and confusion; how could a woman be so foolish to travel alone, why would she? and yet there is a certain jealousy too from the women.
    The most difficult thing about the trip so far (apart from cyrillic, which is hard) has been trying to remain myself while not stand out too much from the local culture. This seems to be an impossible goal as the gender balance here seems to lie somehwere in the 1960’s.
    As someone who has moved between countries, cultures and classes throughout my life (the hardest thing definetly being working class in a middle/upper class world where my life experiences of do not exist and my childhood as the smart kid) I have experience at having to be a different person in different enviroments if I wanted to conform. But it’s something I am trying to stop doing, because I think that I should be setting an example in all environs.
    Feminism is often seen as a sort of cultural imperialism in my experience; I’ve experienced that attitude in the working class and the devloping world. But I think that that comes from the fact that these are the people whose leadership think that feminism means they will loose something. The working class has its own societal systems built on gender differences, and the idea of female equality can be own that is difficult to accept where the unpaid female labour underpins the fabric of your society.

  11. Tigtog, I completely understand. My grandparents attended school only to middle school level (pre-WW II), my parents graduated high school, and I was the first one in my family to attend and graduate college 20+ years ago. About that time, my grandfather one evening observed that I “used alot of 5 syllable words”.

    As he was exceptionally well self-educated, despite his 8th grade eduaction, he was proud of me- but it was the first time I realized how diferent I was from the rest of my family and local network. He encouraged all of us grandkids to learn as much as we could. Versus some family, including my dad’s twin, who has always been disdainful of his brother’s “wasting money” to put his daughters through college. Go figure.

  12. Great post, Aulelia. There’s a bit of an argument going on in Australia at the moment to the tune of, “feminists” don’t care about cultures and practices that are harmful to women (such as FGM) because we don’t believe in bombing Muslim cities.

    Some of us just don’t think that kind of thing is very helpful (yes, that’s a bit of an understatement). But this is the general level of debate about feminism in Australia.

    The only consensus is that we haven’t quite arrived at a method to change patriarchal mindsets yet. Even here, they are still alive and well.

  13. Great post, Aulelia. There’s a bit of an argument going on in Australia at the moment to the tune of, “feminists” don’t care about cultures and practices that are harmful to women (such as FGM) because we don’t believe in bombing Muslim cities.

    Some of us just don’t think that kind of thing is very helpful (yes, that’s a bit of an understatement). But this is the general level of debate about feminism in Australia.

    The only consensus is that we haven’t quite arrived at a method to change patriarchal mindsets yet. Even here, they are still alive and well.

  14. Thank you all for your comments.

    Jill — I think it is the imperialism aspect that makes people suspicious of feminism. Some African women want new terms for feminism and “motherism” is one that I heard has some popularity.

    Frumious B– I think you make a good point about feminism from that viewpoint. However, I think that if you said that in the average African country, some people may think that you are looking from a specifically western lense. I have to had debates with some people about the female cause at home but the same answer always comes: it is European and un-African.

    3 — Sally, you raised some pertinent points there. Especially when you said this “

    You get to know that you’re better, more moral, less selfish, etc. than those greedy women who have more power and more goodies than you.

    This is so true — all part of divide and conquer!

    4 — Mikey – you hit the nail on the head when you said this

    But you can tell your daughter to stop wearing pants, and you’ll get backed up. And you can tell that story to the missionary who’s coming through and be praised

    5 — BlackBloc said

    elites to blame subversive ideas on outsiders

    — the thing is that at home, it is not the elite. many people who are not interested in the concept of people are your average citizens, going to work and coming home etc. I dont know when it will change but I hope soon because the HIV crisis is getting out of hand.

    6 — Louise, you are so right about the balacing one’s culture and one’s feminist self. Saying you are a feminist scares people and creates confusion. Should I even try talking about feminism with them in the fear of being labelled?

    7 — Thank you Haydin, my mother is very much pro-women and created her own group which did not go down to well with certain spheres of the government to say the least. So she always encourages me when it comes to being a women but it was always those periphery members of the family who would make snide comments about me liking football.It used to really upset me but my immediate family (mum, siblings) always supported me when i was playing football at school so that is all that mattered. It hurts when people laugh at you for supposedly playing a “male” sport but then I get happy because football is one of my passions.

    8 — Tigtog, it seems that people get scared when someone is not like them and does their own thing. everyone wants everyone else to conform but then when you don’t, you are seen as a traitor. really makes me furious

    9 — Miss Sophie, what you say there about not standing out too much from the culture is exactly what i aim to do as well when i go back home. i am a tanzanian who has lived abroad for so long that even some people dont see me as a “real tanzanian” but at the end of the day, i know that i have to assimilate to a certain extent and not rebel against the gender rules.

    10 — Thank you Helen, FGM is horrific. And the fact it happens in East Africa brings chills down my spine since that is my area. Challenging patriarchal mindsets needs men in the equation. I think feminists need to start trying to recruit men. Bigoted men could be swayed by an open-minded man?

    –A

  15. Pingback: Belated Friday Fluffy at Hoyden About Town
  16. Pingback: Feministe » Recapin’ Your Ass

Comments are currently closed.