Gender Roles in African Oral Literature. A Case Study of Initiation Songs Among the Igembe People of Meru of Kenya

This article examines and critically analyses gender images in initiation songs among the Igembe community, an African ethnic group of the Eastern Bantu in Kenya. The concept of gender is traced from Plato’s time to the twenty-first century and placed within the Igembe people’s world-view, using initiation songs as a point of reference. It is revealed that both man and woman play crucial and complementary roles in the socio-economic life of the Igembe community. However, despite the crucial role that women play, they are devalued owing to societal attitudes and beliefs, as is evident in the initiation songs analysed

African studies · Bantu languages · Ethnic group · Linguistics · Sociology · Anthropology · Cultural Identity and Representation · Gender Studies · Gender Studies in Language · History · Postcolonial and Cultural Literary Studies

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