More Than Body Parts

Abstract

This paper questions the reduction of human experience and identity to anatomical determinism in which the category of ‘woman' or ‘man' becomes a universal concept. Through a review of literature on African gender, feminist and masculinity studies, it highlights how people are more than their body parts. It notes how identities are shaped by an intersectionality of various factors such as education, employment status, class, age, physical condition, nationality, citizenship, race and ethnicity. These factors can be spatial and temporal producing differing experiences of gendered lives. African scholars have built up a rich collection of work that repudiates the univerlisation of gender identities based on Western philosophical schools of thought. This work explores in detail current and historical debates in African gender studies.