Gendered Encounters: Challenging Cultural Boundaries and Social Hierarchies in Africa

As a result of economic decline and stagnation in the development of infrastructures, as well as an associated lack of investment by multinationals, limited attention has been paid to the fluidity of African cultural formations. But we cannot conclude that African cultures have remained more homogeneous, with more clearly defined boundaries than those in other parts of the world. The essays inGendered Encountersmake it clear that change has been as significant in the making of culture as has continuity. By focusing on intersections of the local and the global through the prism of gender, the contributors elucidate how translocal and transnational cultural currents are mediated by gender, how they reshape gender constructs and relations, and how they both manifest and impinge on relations of power.