Track Changes: Asking Questions about Gendered Representations of Culture, Religion and Violence

In our ongoing series, “Track Changes,” we link to online content that we have found to be problematic in its assumptions, framing, or language and provide a question or thought(s) provoked by each piece. We ask how portrayals and representations need to be not only rephrased, but also reframed and rethought.

This is ours for this week. We invite our readers to contribute other articles and posts that could benefit from a critical eye.

(Robyn Dixon for The Los Angeles Times)

We include this piece in “Track Changes” because it represents a one-sided view of Masai culture as always violent, and perpetuates the myth that female genital cutting is forced by sadistic violent African male domination (the “beer drinking” celebration during the ritual).  While we support Peninnah Tombo in her efforts to provide an alternative, we also highlight the perspective and role of Jackie Ogega, a Kenyan who runs Mpanzi and wrote Pervasive Violence.  Jackie notes how much the ritual of circumcision as a social norm is inscribed into village life, how much parents do love their children even when they encourage or require them to undergo it, and how much many young women themselves want to undergo the ritual so that they can “fit in”. The LA Times piece, therefore, oversimplifies the challenges of eliminating female genital cutting by presenting men as the primary perpetrators, and recommending only short-term measures of “saving” girls from the ritual. As Jackie notes, ending female genital cutting requires a more systematic and long-term approach that engages multiple actors and addresses socio-cultural and structural inequalities between women and men, boys and girls. A more critical analysis of African cultures that goes beyond shaming them as barbaric and violent is necessary.

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