An Intimate Rebuke : Female Genital Power in Ritual and Politics in West Africa / Laura S. Grillo.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Grillo, Laura S., 1956- author.

Series:

Religious Cultures of African and African Diaspora People : 47

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Religion.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (306 p.)

Place of Publication:

Durham, NC : Duke University Press, 2019.

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

Throughout West African societies, at times of social crises, postmenopausal women " the Mothers " make a ritual appeal to their innate moral authority. The seat of this power is the female genitalia. Wielding branches or pestles, they strip naked and slap their genitals and bare breasts to curse and expel the forces of evil. In An Intimate Rebuke Laura S. Grillo draws on fieldwork in Côte d'Ivoire that spans three decades to illustrate how these rituals of Female Genital Power (FGP) constitute religious and political responses to abuses of power. When deployed in secret FGP operates as spiritual warfare against witchcraft; in public it serves as a political activism. During Côte d'Ivoire's civil wars FGP challenged the immoral forces of both rebels and the state. Grillo shows how the ritual potency of the Mothers' nudity and the conjuration of their sex embodies a moral power that has been foundational to West African civilization.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Part I. Home and the Unhomely

1 Genies, Witches, and Women: Locating Female Powers

2 Matrifocal Morality: FGP and the Foundation of “Home”

3 Gender and Resistance: The “Strategic Essentialism” of FGP

Part II. Worldliness

4 Founding Knowledge/Binding Power: The Moral Foundations of Ethnicity and Alliance

5 Women at the Checkpoint: Challenging the Forces of Civil War

Part III. Timeliness

6 Violation and Deployment: FGP in Politics in Côte d’Ivoire

7 Memory, Memorialization, and Morality

Conclusion. An Intimate Rebuke: A Local Critique in the Global Postcolony

Notes

References

Index

Notes:

CC BY

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781478091639

1478091630

Access Restriction:

Open access Unrestricted online access