Gendered globalisation discourses: Implications for the African Renaissance

Abstract

This article explores the discursive construct of globalisation through the prism of gender and its implications for and effects on the quest for an African Renaissance. It argues that since humans are gendered, so human institutions and discourses such as globalisation are permeated and informed by the discourse of gender and the hierarchies inherent in them. Since discourses on the African Renaissance are conceptualised and framed within the hegemonic discourse of globalisation, they become entangled in globalisation's gendered nature and become either complicit or subversive. The article identifies and discusses the multifaceted implications and effects of a hegemonic, masculine neoliberal globalisation discourse on the various facets of the African Renaissance, and suggests possible solutions. The purpose is then to explore the notion of the multiciplicity of discourses on both globalisation and the African Renaissance.

Keywords:

• Africa
• African Renaissances
• discourses
• feminisation
• gendered
• globalisation
• hegemony
• masculinisation
• neoliberalism
• Othering
• patriarchy
• representation
• the West
• ubuntu