Women's Land Research Articles

The Sexual Shame of the Chaste: ‘Abortion Miracles’ in Early Medieval Saints’ Lives

The Sexual Shame of the Chaste: ‘Abortion Miracles’ in Early Medieval Saints’ Lives

What community-level strategies are needed to secure women's property rights in Western Kenya? Laying the groundwork for a future structural HIV prevention intervention

Despite the recognized need for structural-level HIV prevention interventions that focus on economic empowerment to reduce women's HIV risks, few science-based programs have focused on securing women's land ownership as a primary or secondary HIV risk reduction strategy. The current study focused on a community-led land and property rights model that was implemented in two rural areas of western Kenya where HIV prevalence was high (24–30%) and property rights violations were common. The program was designed to reduce women's HIV risk at the community level by protecting and enhancing women's access to and ownership of land. Through in-depth interviews with 50 program leaders and implementers of this program we sought to identify the strategies that were used to prevent, mediate, and resolve property rights violations. Results included four strategies: (1) rights-based education of both women and men individually and at the community level, (2) funeral committees that intervene to prevent property grabbing and disinheritance, (3) paralegal training of traditional leaders and community members and local adjudication of cases of property rights violations, and (4) referring property rights violations to the formal justice system when these are not resolved at the community level. Study participants underscored that local mediation of cases resulted in a higher success rate than women experienced in the formal court system, underscoring the importance of community-level solutions to property rights violations. The current study assists researchers in understanding the steps needed to prevent and resolve women's property rights violations so as to bolster the literature on potential structural HIV prevention interventions. Future research should rigorously test property rights programs as a structural HIV prevention intervention.

Reshaping women's land rights on communal rangeland

This paper aims to contribute to the debates on communal rangelands and analyses the gendered dimension of land rights and land access in the rural areas of Namaqualand. The actual gender relations within rural communities and the emergence of strategies that are being pursued in communal land processes are obscured and often ignored in policies about communal rangelands, which overemphasise ‘the ecological and economic impact’ and the balancing of these dimensions. As active, primary users, women play a central role in livelihoods supported by communal rangelands yet their access to land is mediated through their relationships with men, effectively circumventing women's land autonomy. A wider debate is necessary to advance the largely superficial policy considerations of women's position in relation to communal rangelands land and their social exclusion on the basis of traditional control of land, forms of access and claiming of use rights. The paper discusses the complexity of land rights under communal land tenure and argues that, despite traditional and policy barriers, women in traditional systems of male-dominated land rights have had some success in accessing communal rangelands. Greater policy impetus is necessary to leverage equitable and independent land access for women amidst debates about management of communal rangelands.

Land Tenure System: Women’s Access to Land in a Cosmopolitan Context

Land tenure is a concept that looks at how people gain access to land and how they make use of it. In various African societies, there are cases where women's land ownership is complicated by the gender ideology that women should not own property, particularly land and housing. Women who own property tend to be stereotyped as self-assertive and unruly, and therefore not marriage worthy. This study utilized primary data and combined quantitative and qualitative methods in analyzing the data collected. Focused group discussions (FGDs) were also organized as a source of qualitative information to support the quantitative data. Findings from the research are that there is an increase in net registration of titles to land by males over the period, compared to a reduction in females registering titles. There is a gender difference in the number of plots owned by males and females. Males owned more plots of land as compared to females. While the majority of male respondents directly negotiated for their land purchases, it was more usual for females to use male intermediaries in an effort to prevent being duped by predominantly male land sellers. Recommendation from the study is that equal inheritance rights to land should be guaranteed to both men and women.

Recent Changes in Women's Land Rights and Contested Customary Law in South Africa

This paper discusses the phenomenon of single women claiming, and acquiring, residential sites in the former homelands since the end of apartheid in 1994, against the backdrop of steadily declining marriage rates. It argues that the transition to democracy changed the balance of power within which ‘living customary law’ is negotiated at the local level, and emboldened women. The changes are put at risk by controversial traditional leadership laws enacted since 2003. These restore the power of definition to chiefs, and reassert constructs of customary law that obscure the dynamics of the changes under way. I suggest that the ‘changes’ may, in part, reflect the re‐emergence of pre‐existing repertoires that were suppressed by official customary law. The paper contrasts the Constitutional Court's inclusive approach to ‘living customary law’ and the legislative process, with the autocratic approach of the new laws, one of which has already been struck down by the Court.

How to recognize a werewolf

How to recognize a werewolf B.A. Wingate (bio) The old verses suggest a cannibal; a man who can tell youyou taste like pig. Here is the meaning in the myth: A real werewolf howls not to the moon but for the moon. He will say she is silver. Leviathan in the night window. So brightall he can see are stains in glass. He will project a small madness on the monthly fulls. He is the silver-blind gull calling to silver fish in the sea water. Driven to blind-dive into the musk he steals without knowinghe's swallowed something whole. Real werewolves four-finger your upper arm like the first man took the pomegranatefrom woman's land. He lotus positions himself in your door. He deep kisses with flat plane eyes. He resonates on a frequencyso unknown you will long to receive his diseases. He will discharge silver with his semen.In the throes, he will gull call. Gull call. There will be weddings. There will be orbits. He will tear out your throat unless you violate him overand over. [End Page 157] B.A. Wingate B.A. Wingate is an ocean climate scientist and poet who grew up near Lake Erie. She currently resides in northern New Mexico with her partner, Geoffrey K. Vallis, and their parrot, Noah. Her poems have appeared in journals such as Terrain, Natural Bridge, Iowa Review, and Santa Fe Literary Review, and in several anthologies such as Looking Back to Place (Old School Books). Copyright © 2012 University of Nebraska Press

Implications of Customary Practices on Gender Discrimination in Land Ownership in Cameroon

Africa, before European colonization, knew no other form of legal system outside customary arrangements. Based on secondary sources and a primary survey conducted between 2009 and 2010 on the situation of women and land rights in anglophone Cameroon, this paper examines the grounds for discrimination in customary laws against women's rights to land in the context of legal pluralism, and discusses the implications of this custom of gender discrimination. In drawing from Cameroon as an exemplar, it concludes that the strong influence and impact of customs on current land tenure systems have global implications on women's land rights, food security and sustainable development, and that gender equality in land matters can be possible only where the critical role of ethics is recognized in pursuit of the economic motive of land rights.

A human rights-based approach: A gate to development of African women's land rights?

The global competition for African land is at a historical peak. Local effects of large-scale land acquisitions depend on multiple factors, but women's rights and livelihoods are generally very fragile due to historical and contemporary injustices. Good land governance is important for turning the land acquisitions into equal and equitable development opportunities. The human rights-based approach promotes good governance by adding strength and legal substance to the principles of participation and inclusion, openness and transparency, accountability and the rule of law, and equality and nondiscrimination. By empowering rights-holders and enhancing duty-bearers' capacity, international development cooperation can lead to wider and more gender-balanced inclusion of civil society in negotiations of large-scale land acquisitions and greater adherence of duty-bearers to the rule of law. This is especially important in African countries with large amounts of land and weak legal and institutional frameworks to protect rights, especially those of women.

Rural women's access to land in sub-Saharan Africa and implications for meeting the Millennium Development Goals

abstract Increasingly, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have been critiqued in relation to the neglect of social inequalities and for reinforcing the subordinate position of women. The neglect extends to concerns of current development agendas that tend to undermine women's empowerment and reinforce gender inequalities. Southern-based countries’ priorities have been often defined around the need to meet basic necessities and national debt and the MDGs may require much activism on the ground to ensure that gender equality is addressed. This Article examines the implications of pervasive and persistent gender inequalities in access to and control over land resources in rural sub-Saharan Africa in relation to the MDGs. In particular, widespread patriarchal practices that prevent women's access to and control over land will result in MDG 3, the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of women, being undermined. Land access and rights are critical in relation to meaningfully empowering women (economically, socially and politically) and to address practical and strategic gender needs. This Article examines impacts of unequal access to land, an important socio-economic and political resource, on MDGs 1 (the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger), 2 (achieving universal primary education) and 7 (ensuring environmental sustainability). Attention to linkages with other MDGs is a contribution to the literature which tends to focus almost exclusively on women's empowerment (MDG 3). Additionally, the Article critically examines policy gaps and provides recommendations to advocate for strengthening women's land rights and creating conditions for broadening their access to land.

State and Ethnicity in China’s Southwest by Xiaolin Guo (review)

Reviewed by: State and Ethnicity in China’s Southwest by Xiaolin Guo Tami Blumenfield (bio) Xiaolin Guo. State and Ethnicity in China’s Southwest. China Studies, vol. 15. Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2008. ix, 346 pp. Hardcover $149.00, isbn 978-90-04-16775-9. State and Ethnicity in China’s Southwest is an ambitious volume that examines statecraft and local politics from multiple perspectives dating from the Nanzhao era (738–902) to the mid-2000s, emphasizing fluidity and pragmatic adaptation of both those being governed and those attempting to influence their lives. Over the [End Page 73] centuries discussed in the book, the interplay between the Chinese state, in its varying incarnations; its regional representatives; and those dwelling in mountainous regions of present-day northwest Yunnan and environs receives explicit attention. The book reframes discussions of ethnicity to include a more state-centered analysis, looking at both ethnic minorities and Han communities, one of the first volumes to examine state function in this area of China. While not the only ethnography focusing explicitly on the state in this region (Erik Mueggler’s The Age of Wild Ghosts [2001] comes to mind,1 as does Thomas Mullaney’s recent publication Coming to Terms with the Nation [2011]2), this is the first to cast its focus with equal intensity on historical interactions and contemporary ethnic politics. Unlike the many single-group ethnographies of ethnicity in Southwest China, Guo’s work is explicitly comparative, both temporally and geographically.3 The study is at the nexus of political science and anthropology, grounded in historical anthropology. This leads to both positive outcomes and challenges. The author’s careful consultation of archival materials, gazetteers, and contemporary Chinese scholarship offers a strong contribution to understandings of the way early ethnic policies played out. She repositions ethnicity policy as part of a larger set of continuous state approaches to the problem of political integration, not an attempt at Sinicization, regardless of the particular governing authority. While historians may take issue with this generalization, noting distinctions from one era and one reign to the next in terms of minority policies, scholars of the southwest will appreciate the argument in part because it emphasizes the limited knowledge of, and engagement with, most smaller groups by the central state. This means that until the twentieth century, government engagements varied less than previously assumed. Guo astutely points out that Han identity should be seen not as a stark opposition to ethnic minority identity, as is often assumed, but rather interpreted as “political power or economic dominance rather than to ethnic membership per se—it thus included individuals whose standing was perceived by the local community as markedly different from the local majority, irrespective of their ethnic backgrounds” (p. 67). By way of example, she describes literate Naxi and Bai, whose social mobility and power meant that Nu people, another one of the diverse region’s ethnic groups, took them for Han. Acculturation proceeded unevenly in the complex circumstances of Yunnan, where in some areas Han or other newcomers assimilated completely, and in others assimilation was prevented by local endogamy rules, as in the Cold Mountain Yi areas. Guo argues cogently for a place-based understanding of ethnicity informed as much by ecology and geography as by social structures and superficial ethnic markers. Case Studies of Mosuo and Han Townships Guo deserves praise for her detailed analysis of kinship, social structure, and economy in two areas: the Three River Basin, a fertile area whose history as the site [End Page 74] of a Ming-era garrison is still evident in its predominately Han ethnic makeup (an anomaly within an area of ethnic diversity), and the unfortunately titled yet worthy chapter on “The Land of Women,” home to the group known today as Mosuo and Mongol. Following these two chapters are portraits of the counties that today encompass the Three River Basin and part of “The Land of Women,” Yongsheng, and Ninglang. These benefit from wonderfully candid interviews with government officials of those counties, whose remarks enliven the discussion of local-regional-national policies (although the discussion lacks the perspectives of villagers). The chapters that sketch out kinship and economy in “The...

Karma Eaters: The Politics of Food and Fat in Women's Land Communities in the United States

Why is thinness so important among women who have largely rejected mainstream definitions of femininity? The idea of health has great cultural power and has come to symbolize not simply bodily but also spiritual, social, and moral well-being. These ideas permeate U.S. culture, and in women's land communities, the virtue of hunger and the morality of health take on differently inflected but no less potent meanings. Ironically, in a context where women reject many gender restrictions—restrictions increasingly, as Sandra Bartky notes, focused on the female body—the importance of the thin (and thus properly feminine) body persists through the symbolism of health and virtue.

Women's struggles to access and control land and livelihoods after fast track land reform in Mwenezi District, Zimbabwe

Women's access to land and the shaping of livelihoods after fast track land reform should be viewed with a new social and economic lens in Zimbabwe. This paper examines the extent to which negotiations and bargaining by women with the family, state, and traditional actors has proved to be useful in accessing land in one semi-arid district, Mwenezi, in southern Zimbabwe. Based on multi-site ethnography, it shows the complex and innovative ways women adopted in accessing land and shaping non-permanent mobile livelihoods. I challenge the assumption that Western notions of individual rights to land are the best mechanisms for women in Africa; rather it is the negotiated and bargaining processes that exist in patriarchal structures that lead to cultural contracts enabling women's land access. Off-farm activities involving trading in South Africa became a major activity undertaken by the women. Trips to South Africa intensified due to land acquisition, leading to new market searches beyond national borders. The role of collective action and women's agency in overcoming the challenges associated with trading in South Africa is examined within the ambit of the livelihoods analysis.

Birgit Englert and Elizabeth Daley, eds. Women's Land Rights and Privatization in Eastern Africa. Eastern Africa Series. 2008. James Currey, Fountain Publishers, EAEP, and E&D Vision Publishing. 180 pp. Maps. Bibliography. Index. $37.95. Cloth.

Birgit Englert and Elizabeth Daley, eds. Women's Land Rights and Privatization in Eastern Africa. Eastern Africa Series. 2008. James Currey, Fountain Publishers, EAEP, and E&D Vision Publishing. 180 pp. Maps. Bibliography. Index. $37.95. Cloth. - Volume 54 Issue 2

The British occupational cancer burden study

ObjectivesPrioritising control of occupationally-related cancers should be evidence based. We have estimated the current burden of cancer in Great Britain attributable to occupation for IARC group 1 and 2A carcinogens.MethodsWe...

WOMEN, LAND STRUGGLES, AND THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE COMMONS

This article examines the question of communal land property in Africa and its implications for women's land rights. Among the themes discussed are: the reforms of communal land tenure attempted by the World Bank in the 1990s, the critique of communal land relations that feminist organizations have made on account of their patriarchal discrimination against women, and the simultaneous efforts by landless rural and urban women to appropriate unused plots of public land for subsistence farming. While warning that the feminist attack on communal land ownership may strengthen the neo‐liberal drive towards the privatization of land, the article looks at women's reclamation of unused public land for subsistence farming as the path to the constitution of new commons.

Gender and ‘Land Grabbing’ in Sub-Saharan Africa: Women's land rights and customary land tenure

Jessica Chu seeks to enquire into the understanding of gender impacts with the new proliferation of cross-border, large-scale land transactions or global ‘land grabs’. There has been a lack of discussion of gender in considering land grabs, most notably in the World Bank's recent report and in the various proposed guidelines. However, by not having addressed the current debates on women's land rights, particularly in regard to the return of customary law, current proposed solutions will fail to address the gender inequalities propagated by the land grabs.

Ahead of the game: land tenure reform in Rwanda and the process of securing women's land rights

The Rwandan Constitution of 2003, the National Land Policy of 2004 and the Organic Land Law of 2005 all contain clear provisions which add up to a mandate for gender equality in land rights and set out a context in which all land shall be registered and rights gained under different means of access to land shall be considered equal. The Rwandan Succession Law of 1999 had already established the principle of equal inheritance rights to land for men and women. Articles from these four core documents together comprise the new body of land policy and law in Rwanda which is currently in the process of being implemented. This paper argues that an iterative approach to planning for the implementation of land tenure reform in Rwanda over a long period of research and consultations, including field consultations and subsequent “trial interventions”, and involving both government and civil society, has enabled the issue of how to secure women's land rights to be more fully considered within the overall land tenure reform process. This comes in a country with particular and unique post-Genocide circumstances that enabled women to gain their new land inheritance rights on paper early on. Evidence gathered by the authors suggests that these paper rights are already beginning to affect social relations and land inheritance patterns in practice. Moreover, women's land rights retain a prominence on the political agenda in Rwanda, positing an “enabling” environment for some crucial articles in the secondary legislation required for implementation to be drafted.

Securing land rights for women

This collection of papers on Securing Women's Land Rights presents five articles relating to eastern Africa. Four of these illustrate practical approaches to securing land rights for women in distinct situations: law-making for women's land rights (Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda); land tenure reform in practice (Rwanda); women's rights under pastoral land tenure (Ethiopia); and women's rights in areas of matrilineal-matrilocal land tenure (Malawi). This article serves as an overall introduction to the subject, reviewing past issues and highlighting new ones, and setting out the shape of a positive, pragmatic approach to securing women's land rights in eastern Africa. Five key themes emerge: the role of customary institutions; the continuing central role of legislation as a foundation for changing custom; issues of gender equity and equitability, and underlying goals; the challenges of reform implementation and of growing women's confidence to claim their rights; and the importance of encouraging effective collaboration among all those working in the field of women's land rights. The article calls for a stronger focus on gender equity – on securing equal land rights for both women and men – in order to achieve sustainable positive change in broader social and political relations.

“Our daughters inherit our land, but our sons use their wives' fields”: matrilineal-matrilocal land tenure and the New Land Policy in Malawi

Renewed efforts in recent years to reform land tenure policy in Sub-Saharan African countries have – in some cases – included provisions aimed at improving women's land rights. The premise of such provisions is that women's land rights under customary tenure are fragile, threatened, and/or in the process of being undermined. The matrilineal-matrilocal areas in Southern Malawi described here present a counter case. Only daughters are the heirs of their matrilineage's land, while sons use their wives' land or, in special circumstances, have temporary use of fields belonging to their female matrikin. This pattern has prevailed in the face of a long and continuing history of prejudice against matriliny. Now, a new land policy, not yet passed into law, includes an explicit aim to protect and improve land rights for women. Yet the means selected by the policy – land inheritance by both sons and daughters and extension of greater authority to traditional leaders in the administration of land – will be likely, if implemented, to have opposite effects in matrilineal-matrilocal areas.

Sitting at the table: securing benefits for pastoral women from land tenure reform in Ethiopia

The pastoral areas of Ethiopia are witnessing radical change in terms of both increasingly restricted mobility and access to vital resources. A cause and consequence of such constraints has been a move toward sedentarised forms of livestock and agricultural production. This is occurring in a political and socio-economic vacuum, in which the customary institutions responsible for resource allocation and access to land are becoming weaker, and where the Ethiopian government has yet to develop a clear policy or strategy for resource distribution and tenure security in pastoral areas. To date, pastoral women's property rights have been afforded a certain degree of protection by customary institutions; however, the impact on such protection is likely to be negative as these institutions weaken. Appropriate and effective government protection for women's property rights do not yet exist. Land tenure reform in pastoral areas appears imminent, partly due to increasing conflicts over access to resources, and to the existence of such reforms in other parts of the country. This paper discusses the changing nature of pastoral land rights in Ethiopia through a detailed case study of the Boran people in Oromia Regional State. It sets the case within wider national land reform processes and makes recommendations regarding how civil society and other actors can best engage with land policy and law formulation and implementation processes to secure women's land rights.