WOMEN BIOGRAPHIES AND SOCIO-CULTURAL TRANSFORMATION: REFLECTIONS ON PHOEBE ASIYO’S LIFE AND CAREER IN KENYA

Abstract

This paper focuses on a historical subject that has not been critically addressed: life writing about an African woman who has served in public office in the past and exercised some sort of political authority. It provides not only a summary of the socio-demographic condition and details about her life but also touches on her life's subjective perceptions and interpretations of facts and events. The knowledge gap that informed this study was that her life history has not been critically analyzed, although interest in Phoebe's political life is significant. What exists is her autobiography that presents her early life and political career without underlining her shortcomings and struggles in political practice. This paper interrogates the strategies she used to grapple with the intricacies of patriarchy in Kenya’s socio-political space. Interpretations of findings in this paper were based on the principles of Public Patriarchal Theory by Walby that posits that women are involved in public realms, such as politics and the labor market, but remain segregated from wealth, power, and status. This paper relied on both primary and secondary data and used Biographical Narrative Interpretative design and purposive sampling techniques to select the informants for interviews. This paper underscores that the writing of women biographies even though underdeveloped, is a political act that gives agency to diverse agendas such as anti-fundamentalism, women’s participation in politics, and the complexities of negotiating private roles of wifehood and motherhood, among many other subjectivities, for women in public spaces. The paper has established that the inability of most women to venture into elective politics is grounded on the patriarchal nature of society and some cultural norms. The study recommends that the direct participation of women in politics and decision-making should be expanded to mitigate against patriarchal limitations on women in politics.