Land, Food, Freedom
Struggles for the gendered commons in Kenya, 1870-2007
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6024917 |
|---|---|
| Authors | M Osborne (University of Colorado System, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2011 |
| Volume | 110 |
| Issue | 440 |
| Pages | 512-513 |
| Publication date | 2011-07-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | African Affairs (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0001-9909 • E-ISSN: 1468-2621 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/afraf/adr038 |
| OpenAlex | W2321660140 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 4 |
No reader of Leigh Brownhill's new book will ever accuse her of lacking ambition. Over a period she describes as the ‘long twentieth century’, Brownhill addresses ‘women's engagement in social movements for the defense and control of the commons’ in Kenya (p. 6). She identifies fifteen moments of resistance punctuating this period, arguing that these actions have been consistently necessary because various male actors in combination with ‘corporate rule’ (the colonial and post-colonial states, as well as modern corporate interests) have acted to restrict women's access to land and its products. In this, Brownhill builds upon the excellent research on women in Kenya by scholars such as Tabitha Kanogo, Fiona Mackenzie, Cora Ann Presley, and Claire Robertson. In the first of this book's four parts, Brownhill explains why her work differs from that of these authors. Most important is her focus on the central theme of ‘subsistence’ over more than one hundred years. She understands the concept broadly, defining it as a ‘set of practices against commodification’ from which ‘revolutionary movements have arisen’ (p. 7, p. 20). Women have continuously defended their position against men who have sought to dominate their fertility (by which she means their access to land, reproductive capabilities, and labour). Marx looms large over this entire work, as his theories clearly mesh with the author's own convictions: by tracing the development of women's resistance, Brownhill notes, ‘we can better prepare ourselves to win the continuing global struggle against capital’ (p. 24).
Agrarian society · Archaeology · Colonialism · Commodification · Commons · Economics · Economy · House of Commons · Political science · Politics · Resistance (ecology) · Sociology · Subsistence agriculture · Agriculture, Land Use, Rural Development · Ecology · Gender Studies · Historical Gender and Feminism Studies · History · Land Rights and Reforms · Law
| Citations per year | 0.29 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2012 - 2024 (13) |
| Highly cited | No |