Challenging Patriarchy: Trade, outward migration and the internationalization of Commercial sex among Bayang and Ejagham women in Southwest Cameroon

Ngambouk Vitalis Pemunta

Abstract


This paper documents the specific local and global socio-economic forces that led to the outward migration of Bayang and Ejagham women to work as commercial sex workers on the Cameroon-Nigeria border regions in the 1980s and 1990s. It demonstrates that these women’s personal accumulation strategies are adaptative- drawing on time and space specific modes of capitalist accumulation and kinship systems of power. The intertwined nature of these forms of accumulation demonstrate that patriarchal forms of power and capitalist forms of accumulation in this region were not competitive, but rather complementary systems. This conjuncture also gave women the latitude to claim some form of sexual and economic agency, suggesting that at least in Africa, patriarchy as a power field is dynamic and relational, simultaneously opening up spaces for both resistance and agency.

The impact of sex work is disproportionate since most women of our study were involved in subsistence sex, with the risk of exposure to violence and HIV/AIDS. These women nevertheless sought to reconfigure gender relations.


Keywords


Commercial sex, HIV/AIDS, capitalist accumulation,patriarchy, power, agency

Full Text:

PDF

References


REFERENCES

ABEMO. 2002. Report on Legal Awareness Programme in Ejagham Community. Buea, Cameroon: ABEMO.

Abu-Lughod, Lila. ‘‘The Romance of Resistance: Tracing Transformations of Power through Bedouin Women.’’ American Ethnologist (1990):1:41-55.

Adams, Melinda. ‘‘Colonial policies and Women’s participation in public Life: The case of British Southern Cameroons”. African Studies Monograph. (2006):3:1-22.

Allman, Jean. ‘Rounding Up Spinsters: Gender Chaos and Unmarried Women in Colonial Asante’ In: “Wicked Women and the Reconfiguration of Gender in Africa. Edited by

Dorothy L. Hodson and Shirley A. McCurdy, 130-148. (Portsmouth N. H: Heinemann, 2001).

Amadiume, Ife. Male daughters, female husbands: Gender and sex in an African society. (London: Zed Books, 1987).

Ardener, Shirley. A and W. A Warmington. Plantation and Village Life in the Cameroons: Some Economic and Social Studies. (London: Oxford University Press, 1960).

Askew, Marc. Bangkok: Place, practice and representation. Asia’s Global Cities. (London: Routledge, 2002).

Bizzel., Patricia. ‘Contact Zones and English Studies’. Cross-Talk in Composition Theory.(Urbana, Illinois, NCFE, 1997).

Bourdieu, Pierre. Distinction. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1984).

------------. Outline of A Theory of Practice. Trans. Richard Nice. (Cambridge. Cambridge University Press,1977).

Brennan, Denise. Love work in Sex Work (and After) Performing Love. In Intimacies. Love + Sex Across Cultures .edited. William. R. Jankowiak, 172-193. (Columbia: Columbia University Press, 2008).

Brewis, Joanna. and Linstead, Stephen. ‘‘The Worst thing is the Screwing’’(1):Consumption and the management of identity in sex work. Gender, Work and Organisation. (2000): 2:85-97.

Burawoy, Michael. ‘‘The Extended Case Method’’. Sociological Theory (1998):16:4-33. American Sociological Association.

Castle, Sarah, and Kanoute, Mamadou, K. “Moment des premiers rapports sexuels des adolescents du Mali et implications pour la pratique contraceptive. Perspectives Internationale sur le planning familial.Numero Special. 1(2001) : 1-9.

Chanock, Martin. 1982. “Making Customary Law: Men, Women, and Courts in Colonial Northern Rhodesia”. In African Women and the Law: Historical Perspectives. Edited. Margaret. Jean Hay and Marcia Wright, 53-67. (Boston: Boston University Press, 1982).

Chapkis, Wendy. Live sex Acts: Women Performing Erotic Labor. (New York: Routledge, 1997).

Chuen-Juei, Ho Josephine. “Self-empowerment and ‘professionalism’: conversations with Taiwanese sex workers”. Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, (2000):1:283-299.

Castañeda, Xochitl., et al. Sex Masks: The double life of female commercial sex workers in Mexico City. Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry (1996):2: 229-247.

Civil Military Alliance. “Spirit of Harare Prevention Efforts”. Major Regional Seminar. On African Military HIV/AIDS. Alliance Newsletter.1996 April. 2(2).

Cutrufelli, Maria. R. Women of Africa: Roots of Oppression. (London: Longman, 1983).

Ford, Carolyn, M. 1937. ‘Land and Labour in a Cross River Village in Southern Nigeria’ Geographical Journal 90 (1937): 24-51.

Derby., Lauren. H.”The Dictator’s Seduction: Gender and State Spectacle during the Trujillo Regime.” In Latin American. Popular Culture. An Introduction, Edited William. H. Beezley and Linda. A. Curcio-Nagy, 213-39. (Wilmington, Del: Scholarly Resources, 2000).

Edwards, Anne, and Talbot, Robin. The Hard-pressed Researcher, (New York: Longman, 1994)

Ford, CD. “Double Descent Among the Yako’ In: African Systems of Kinship and Marriage. Edited. Radcliffe-Brown and Daryll Ford, 18-49, London: Oxford University Press, 1950.

------------. Marriage and family Among the Yako in South- Eastern Nigeria, London: The International African Institute, 1951.

Giddens, Anthony. Sociology, third edition, (London: Polity, 1987).

Gomme, Roger. M, Hammersley., Marttyn, and Foster, Peter. Case Study Method, (Sage Publications, 2000).

Harris, Richard. ‘The History of Trade at Ikom’. (Africa (1972): 43.

Hodson, Dorothy, L., McCurdy, Shirley. A. (Eds). “Wicked Women and the Reconfiguration of Gender in Africa. (Heinemann, 2001).

Hubbard, Phil. Red-light districts and toleration zones: geographies of female street prostitution in England and Wales, Area, (1997): 29:128-140.

---------------.Sexuality, immorality and the city: Red-light districts and the marginalization of female street prostitutes. Gender, Place and Culture. (1998):.5: 55-72.

Hunter, Mark. The Materiality of Everyday Sex: thinking beyond ‘prostitution’. African Studies, (2002):99-120.

Jeffreys, Sheila. Marginal Millions. The idea of Prostitution. (North Melbourne: Spinifex, 1997).

Jua, Nantang. Differential Responses to Disappearing Transitional Pathways: Redefining Possibility among Cameroonian Youths. African Studies Review, (2003): 2:13-36.

Kalb, Don.On the Cheap. Focaal. (2004): 43(1) v-vi.

Kempadoo, Kamala. and Doezema, Jo. (Eds). Global Sex Workers: Rights, Resistance andRedefinition, (New York: Routledge, 1998).

Kempadoo, Kamala. “The Migrant Tightrope: Experiences from the Caribbean”. In , Kamala Kempadoo and Jo

Doezema. P.(Eds) 124-138. Global Sex Workers: Rights, Resistance and Redefinition, (New York: Routledge, 1998).

--------------------. Women of Color and the Global Sex Trade: Transnational Feminist. Perspectives. Meridians, (2001): 28-51.

--------------------.Sexing the Caribbean: Gender, Race and Sexual Labour. (London: Routledge, 2004).

Konings, Piet. Labour Resistance in Cameroon: Managerial Strategies and Labour. (James Currey Publisher, 1993).

Law, Lisa. Sex Work in Southeast Asia. The Place of Desire in a time of AIDS. (London: Routledge, 2000).

----------. “A Matter of “Choice”: Discourses on Prostitution in the Philippines”. In Sites of Desire, Economies of Pleasure.. Sexualities in Asia and the Pacific. Edited. Lenore Manderson and Margaret, Jean. 229-261. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997).

Lazreg, Marnia. ‘Feminism and Difference: The Perils of Writing as a Woman on women in Algeria’. Feminist Studies, Vol. 14(1998): 81- 107.

Leclerc-Madlala, Sabina. “Chasing King cash could prove to be our undoing”. Mail and Guardian, June 15, 2001.

Leigh, Carol. ‘‘Inventing sex work’’. In Jill Nagle (ed)Whores and Other Feminists. 225-231. (New York: Routledge, 1997).

Lincoln, Yvonna, Guba, Egon. Naturalistic Inquiry, (Beverley Hills, CA: Sage, 1985).

McCurdy, Sherley. A. ‘‘Urban Threats: Manyema Women, Low Fertility, and Venereal Diseases in Tanganyika’’ In “Wicked Women and the Reconfiguration of Gender in Africa. Edited

Dorothy Hodson. L, Shirley McCurdy. A.. 212-233. (Portsmouth N. H. Heinemann, 2001).

Marchand, Marianne. H, Julian, Reid, and Berents, Boukje.1998. “Migration, (Im)mobility and Modernity: Toward a Feminist Understanding of the ‘Global’ Prostitution Scene in Amsterdam.” Millenuim 27.(1998)4:955-83.

Miles, Mathew. B., and Huberman, Michael. Qualitative Data

analysis. An Expanded Source Book.(Sage Publications,1994).

Meiss, Maria. Patriarchy and Accumulation on a World scale: Women in the International Division of Labour. (London: Zed Books, 1998).

Mohanty, Chandra, Talpade. Under western eyes: Feminist scholarship and colonial discourses. In Third World women and the politics of feminism. Eds. Chandra Talpade Mohanty,

Russo Ann, and Torres Lourdes, 51–80.(Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1991).

Naanen, Benedict. B. “Economy and Society in eastern Nigeria, 1900- 1966: A Study of the

Problems of Development and Social Change”. Phd Dissertation, Dalhousie University,1988.

………….. “Itinerant Gold Mines”: Prostitution in the Cross River Basin of Nigeria, 1930- 1950’. African Studies Review, (1991): 34 (2): 57- 79.

Niger-Thomas, Margaret. "Women and the Arts of Smuggling." African Studies Review. (2001):44 (2): 43-68.

O’Connell Davidson, Julia. ’The Sources and limits of resistance in a privatized utility’, in J Jermier, John. M,

Knights, David and Nord, Walter, R. (eds) Resistance and Power in Organizations, 69-101. (London: Routledge, 1994).

------------------------.’Sex tourism in Cuba’. Race and Class, (1996): 38: 39-48).

Orubuloye, I.O, Caldwell, Pat and Caldwell, John, C. ‘The role of high risk occupations in the spread of AIDS: truck drivers and itinerant market women in Nigeria’. In Sexual Networking and AIDS in Sub-Saharan Africa: Behavioural Research and the Social Context. Edited. I.O Orubuloye , John. C Caldwell,

Pat .Caldwell and G. Santow.: 89-101. (The Australian National University, 1994).

Owasi, Beatrice.2009. Report of Eyumojock HIV Risk Map Submitted to GTZ PROPSFE Support Programme to the implementation of the Forest Environment Sector Programme.

Oyewumi, Oyeronke. The invention of women: Making an African sense of Western gender Discourses . (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997).

Reynolds, Helen. The economics of prostitution. (Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas,1986).

Santasombat, Yos. Women selling Themselves: Community and the sale of Commercial sex in Thai Society. (Bangkok: Community Development Press, 1992).

Spivak,Gayatri. ”Can the subaltern Speak?”,. In: Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture. Edited Cary Nelson and

Lawrence Grossberg, 271-313 (Chicago, IL:University of Ilinios Press,1988).

Smith, Dorothy. The everyday World as Problematic: A Feminist Sociology. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1987).

Stake, Robert. The Art of Case Study Research, (Sage, 1995).

Standing, Hilary. AIDS: conceptual and methodological issues in researching sexual behaviour in sub- Saharan Africa. Social Science & Medicine, 34(1992): 475–483.

Schmidt, Elizabeth. “Patriarchy, Capitalism and the Colonial State in Zimbabwe. Women, Family, State and Economy in Africa” .Signs. 16(1991): 732-756.

Stravrose, Stavro, E and Kaufman, Carol. E. ‘‘Bus fare please’’: The economics of sex, gifts and violence among adolescents in urban South Africa.’’ Personal Communication. Population Association of America, March 23-25, Los Angeles, 2000.

Tierney, John. ‘AIDS in Africa: Experts study the role of promiscuous sex in the Epidemic’. New York Times. October, 19:A10, 1990.

Troung, Thanh-dam. Sex, Money and Morality: Prostitution and Tourism in Southeast Asia. (London: Zed Books, 1990).

Von Reyn, Charles. F. Epidemiology of HIV Infection in Africa, AIDS and Society. April/May: 3:8, 1990.

Wolf, Eric. Europe and the People without History. (California: University of California Press, 1982).

Yin, Robert. K. Case Study Research. Design and Methods, (London: Sage, 1989).

----------. Case Study Research, Second Edition, (Newbury, CA: Sage, 1994).




DOI: https://doi.org/10.5195/hcs.2011.58

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Bookmark and Share