Click the star to add/remove an item to/from your individual schedule.
You need to be logged in to avail of this functionality.
Log in
- Convenors:
-
B Camminga
(University of Wits)
John Marnell (University of the Witwatersrand)
Ntokozo Yingwana (University of the Witwatersrand)
Send message to Convenors
- Stream:
- Social Anthropology
- Location:
- Appleton Tower, Seminar Room 2.06
- Sessions:
- Wednesday 12 June, -
Time zone: Europe/London
Short Abstract:
This panel seeks to consider what happens when borders, sexuality, gender and migration meet on the African continent and what it means to do research with/on migrant LGBTQ bodies, at a time when global contestations around rights have initiated a 'scramble' for narratives of homo/trans/xenophobia.
Long Abstract:
On the 15th of November 1884, the major powers of Europe met in Berlin to carve up an entire continent — haggling over Africa, drawing its boundaries and creating borders. While, as an event, the 'Scramble for Africa' lasted less than a century, its impact in relation to legal, social and cultural change has been enduring. The way in which certain bodies were regulated by colonialism (and its aftermath) is perhaps most clearly evidenced in the ongoing use of colonial penal codes as weapons against non-normative bodies. Policing has often taken the form of violence and persecution directed at gender-nonconforming bodies or those perceived to be 'homosexual', portraying an often homogenous image of a brutal continent that places any expression of sexuality read outside the bounds of heterosexuality as patently unAfrican. In recent years we have seen a new phenomenon in Africa's long history of migration: the journeying of people fleeing persecution on the grounds of their sexuality and gender. This panel seeks to consider what happens when borders, sexuality, gender identity/expression and migration meet on the African continent. The panel aims to reflect on what it means to do research with and on migrant LGBTQ bodies, particularly at a time when global contestations around rights have initiated a 'scramble' for narratives of homo/trans/xenophobia on the African continent. In doing so, it also hopes to highlight the myriad ways in which LGBTQ migrants subvert heteropatriarchal norms, forge solidarity networks and negotiate violent state structures.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Wednesday 12 June, 2019, -Agathe Menetrier (Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology / Ecole Normale Supérieure) Benjamin Lawrance (University of Arizona)
Paper short abstract:
Situated at the intersection of historical and anthropological scholarship on migration, queer refuge and precarity, we advance the concept of "queer mobile marriage" as an example of LGBTQ African reappropriation of heteropatriarchal institutions in contexts of extreme personal adversity.
Paper long abstract:
How do marriage choices influence LGBTQ West Africans' mobilities? Using a hybrid biographical and intersectional approach centered on gender, sexuality, and socioeconomic class, we compare the life experiences of two cohorts of LGBTQ Africans. The first are West African asylum seekers in Europe and North America for whom historian Lawrance personally provided expert testimony as part of an asylum appeal. The second group comprises Gambian and Senegalese would-be refugees whom anthropologist Menetrier encountered in Senegal and Mauritania, while they were awaiting news of potential resettlement in the Global North. We ask to what extent their marriage choices reflect strategies of mobility within Africa as well as how they are conditioned by LGBTQ individuals' knowledge of refugee and asylum procedures. The choice of an opposite-sex union on the African continent may provide temporary security in-country or deflect state or family-based violence and victimization. The decision to be in a same-sex union on the other hand, while representing a higher risk commitment, may open the door to new and creative pathways to protection.
We detail how LGBTQ West Africans endure scrutiny when they choose to marry, and proffer tentative explanation as to why they create particular family structures in precarious contexts of extreme personal adversity. Situated at the interdisciplinary intersection of historical, anthropological, and sociological scholarship on migration, queer refuge and precarity, we advance the concept of "queer mobile marriage" as an example of LGBTQ African reappropriation of heteropatriarchal institutions in contexts of extreme personal adversity.
Marien Gouyon (Angers University)
Paper short abstract:
This proposal aim to understand how internationalization of gay right create borders trough sexuality instead of a fluid migration.
Paper long abstract:
This research is a first step to a larger survey about homosexual migration in north Africa. I made one month field work in Morroco (Rabat) and Spain (Ceuta) in July 2018. I met Cameroonian and Moroccan men aged from 24 to 26 and also agents from UHCR (Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees). Cameroonians were on migration and Morocans were preparing theirs. In fact, the first ones were asylum seekers or refugees. In Morocco, Subsaharan Africans from countries which penalize homosexuality can ask for asylum for sexual orientation and/or gender discriminations through HCR in Rabat. For the record, Morroco also penalizes homosexuality. But the road to HCR is long and most of the time, the results (obtention of refugee status) reducing is not as expected. This situation is paradoxical in many ways. First it spreads Moroccan homosexuals and subsaharan homosexuals into two groups. Subsaharan which can be defended by international institutions implanted in Morocco and Moroccans who are penalized and forced by the state to stay in shadows. No publicity is allowed about subsaharan asking for asylum and the re-installation in countries promoting LGBTQ rights are not so effective. Those procedures create a separation between « good gay immigrants », LGBTQ groups in Africa without giving any solutions to refugees' situations in Morroco. The hypothesis i made is that this phenomenon is an « externalization of asylum procedures and border » of the « sexual democracy » (Fassin, 2006) which is a new form of colonization
B Camminga (University of Wits)
Paper short abstract:
This paper explores the crossing and shiftings in personhood, gender-based relations, bodily borders, land borders and survival strategies of a group of transgender Zimbabwean sex workers living in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Paper long abstract:
Zimbabweans have been migrating into South Africa - navigating the colonial borders of the Limpopo River and the Apartheid era electric fences - for generations. Over the last twenty years though, the emergent global 'gay' rights regime, continental reactions and issues concerning this have brought a relatively new group of migrants into visibility within South Africa, namely transgender and gender non-conforming individuals. This paper explores the crossing and shiftings in personhood, gender-based relations, bodily borders, land borders and survival strategies of a group of transgender Zimbabwean sex workers living in Johannesburg, South Africa. In an era where Africa has become problematically synonymous with homophobia, this paper unpacks the central roles that families have played in facilitating the movement and survival of their transgender children. In-depth interviews were conducted in 2013 in Johannesburg as part of a broader research project on the experiences of transgender asylum seekers in South Africa. While able to apply for asylum, this group, in particular, chose to actively avoid the South African state. Drawing on their experiences, I argue that the border between being legal and illegal for gender non-conforming migrants has always been a porous and precarious space that has required constant creative negotiation between gender identity, survival, and the state-regulated visa, passport and a refugee system which acknowledges gender and sexuality as a means to asylum. For this group of transgender Zimbabweans cross border, familial ties have played a key role in ensuring their survival and self-identification.
John Marnell (University of the Witwatersrand)
Paper short abstract:
This paper investigates how various forms of structural and interpersonal violence shape the experiences of LGBTQ+ migrants, and sheds light on the ways in which these individuals navigate landscapes of abandonment, negotiate violent state structures and confront everyday discrimination.
Paper long abstract:
South Africa remains the only state on the African continent to offer asylum to individuals facing persecution based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. The country's progressive legal framework and nominal acceptance of sexual and gender rights has led to a widespread misperception - particularly in other parts of the globe - that it offers a safe haven for LGBTQ+ persons seeking protection. However, the everyday realities of LGBTQ+ migrants, refugees and asylum seekers paint a very different picture. Drawing on a number of participatory studies, this paper challenges popular discourses about South Africa's role as a defender of LGBTQ+ rights. It shows how various forms of structural and interpersonal violence shape the experiences of LGBTQ+ migrants, refugees and asylum seekers. In particular, it explores how heteronormative discourses drive exclusionary practices, inform contemporary constructions of citizenship and relegate unwelcome/disruptive bodies to a liminal state of existence. By analysing a range of creative artefacts, the paper sheds light on the ways in which LGBTQ+ migrants, refugees and asylum seekers navigate landscapes of abandonment, negotiate violent state structures and confront everyday discrimination. It also points to the myriad ways in which LGBTQ+ migrants, refugees and asylum seekers resist hetero-patriarchal norms and forge identities within contexts of violence. Finally, the paper investigates some of the ethical and methodological tensions associated with participatory research and reflects on the benefits of co-creating knowledge with stigmatised populations.