Sexuality and Gender Politics in Mozambique : Rethinking Gender in Africa

Abstract

The book is about gender politics in Mozambique over three decades from 1975 to 2005. The book is also about different ways of understanding gender and sexuality. Gender policies from Portuguese colonialism through Frelimo socialism to later neo-liberal economic regimes share certain basic assumptions about men, women and gender relations. But to what extent do such assumptions fit the ways in which rural Mozambican men and women see themselves? The author argues that gender relations should be investigated, not assumed, and that policies not matching people’s lives are unlikely to succeed. The empirical data on which the author draws are from a unique body of material collected in 1982-1984 by the Mozambican National Women's Organization, and from more recent fieldwork. Her research demonstrates short-comings in Western feminist conceptualizations, and shows how insights from African feminist thinking may enhance understandings of gender, both in and beyond Africa.