No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
Stitching Womanhood in the Zongo: Seamstress Apprenticeship in Accra
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 02 September 2022
Abstract
Focusing upon the daily lives of young female Muslim apprentices in the sewing shops of Accra’s zongo communities, Cassiman argues that the sewing workshop may be understood as a playground in which young women may experiment with the normative chronologies shaping women’s lives, and with ideals of female respectability, self-making, and autonomy. Opening up the possibility to subvert the chrononormativity of apprenticeship and marriage, young seamstress apprentices carve out a platform from which they can exert specific forms of agency, by suspending marriage or hastening it, while trying out various possible futures.
Résumé
En se concentrant sur le quotidien des jeunes apprenties musulmanes dans les ateliers de couture des communautés zongo d’Accra, Cassiman fait valoir que l’atelier de couture peut jouer le rôle d’un terrain de jeu au niveau duquel les jeunes femmes peuvent expérimenter les chronologies normatives qui façonnent la vie des femmes, avec des idéaux sur la respectabilité féminine, la construction de soi et l’autonomie. Ouvrant la possibilité de subvertir la chrononormativité de l’apprentissage et du mariage, de jeunes apprenties couturières se taillent une plate-forme depuis laquelle elles peuvent exercer des formes spécifiques d’actions, en suspendant ou en précipitant le mariage, tout en expérimentant avec un éventail de futurs possibles.
Resumo
Cassiman debruça-se sobre a vida quotidiana das jovens mulheres muçulmanas que trabalham como aprendizes nas lojas de costura das comunidades zongo em Acra, argumentando que as oficinas de costura podem ser entendidas como espaços de preparação nos quais as jovens mulheres testam as cronologias normativas que enquadram a vida das mulheres, bem como os ideais de respeitabilidade, autoformação e autonomia femininas. Ao abrir a possibilidade de subverter a crononormatividade do tirocínio e do casamento, as jovens aprendizes de costureira constroem uma plataforma a partir da qual podem exercer formas específicas de agência, seja suspendendo ou antecipando o casamento, ao mesmo tempo que experimentam vários futuros possíveis.
- Type
- Article
- Information
- Copyright
- © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the African Studies Association
References
Ayentimi, Desmond T., Burgess, John, and Dayaram, Kantha. 2018. “Skilled Labour Shortage: A Qualitative Study of Ghana’s Training and Apprenticeship System.” Human Resource Development International 21 (5): 406–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barkow, Jerome H. 1972. “Hausa Women and Islam.” Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue Canadienne des Études Africaines, Special Issue: The Roles of African Women: Past, Present and Future 6 (2): 317–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cassiman, 2018. “Browsers and Phone Girls: The Intricate Socialities of Friendship, Trust and Cyberlove in Nima (Accra).” Africa 88 (S1): S72–S89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cole, Jennifer, and Durham, Deborah, eds. 2007. Generations and Globalization: Youth, Age and Family in the New World Economy. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Christiansen, Catrine, Utas, Mats, and Vigh, Henrik E., eds. 2006. Navigating Youth, Generating Adulthood: Social Becoming in an African Context. Stockholm: Elanders Gotab AB.Google Scholar
Cooper, Barbara. 1997. Marriage in Maradi: Gender and Culture in a Hausa Society in Niger, 1900–1989. Oxford: James Currey.Google Scholar
Danfulani, Umar H.D. 1999. “Factors Contributing to the Survival of the Bori Cult in Northern Nigeria.” Numen 46: 412–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Daniels, Brandy. 2017. “Chrononormativity and the Community of Character: a Queer Temporal Critique of Hauerwasian Virtue Ethics.” Theology & Sexuality 23 (1–2): 114–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dilley, Roy. 2010. “Reflections on Knowledge Practices and the Problem of Ignorance.” The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 16, Making Knowledge: S176–S192.Google Scholar
Durham, Deborah. 2005. “‘They’re Only Playing’: Song, Choirs and Youth in Botswana.” In Makers and Breakers: Children and Youth in Postcolonial Africa, edited by Honwana, Alcinda and De Boeck, Filip, 150–71. Oxford & Codesria: James Currey.Google Scholar
Durham, Deborah. 2018. “Elusive Adulthoods: Introduction.” In Elusive Adulthoods: The Anthropology of New Maturities, edited by Durham, Deborah and Solway, Jacqueline, 1–38. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Frazer, Garth. 2006. “Learning the Master’s Trade: Apprenticeship and Human Capital in Ghana.” Journal of Development Economics 81: 259–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Freeman, Elizabeth. 2010. Time Binds: Queer Temporalities, Queer Histories, Perverse Modernities. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Gilbert, Juliet. 2016. “‘They’re My Contacts, Not My Friends’: Reconfiguring Affect and Aspirations through Mobile Communication in Nigeria.” Ethnos, DOI: 10.1080/00141844.2015.1120762.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansen, Karen T. 2005. “Getting Stuck in the Compound: Some Odds against Social Adulthood in Lusaka, Zambia.” Africa Today 51 (4): 3–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamayon, Roberte. 2016. Why We Play: An Anthropological Study. Translated by Damien, Simon. Chicago: Hau Books.Google Scholar
Herzfeld, Michael. 2004. The Body Impolitic: Artisans and Artifice in the Global Hierarchy of Halue. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Honwana, Alcinda. 2012. The Time of Youth: Work, Social Change, and Politics in Africa. Sterling: Kumarian Press.Google Scholar
Honwana, Alcinda, and de Boeck, Filip, eds. 2005. Makers and Breakers: Children and Youth in Postcolonial Africa. Oxford: James Currey.Google Scholar
Johnson, Jessica. 2018. “Feminine Futures: Female Initiation and Aspiration in Matrilineal Malawi.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (N.S.) 24: 786–803.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Johnson-Hanks, Jennifer. 2002. “On the Limits of Life Stages in Ethnography: Toward a Theory of Vital Conjunctures.” American Anthropologist 104 (3): 865–80.Google Scholar
Lave, Jean. 2011. Apprenticeship in Critical Ethnographic Practice. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Marchand, Trevor H. J. 2009. “Negotiating License and Limits: Expertise and Innovation in Djenné’s Building Trade.” Africa: Journal of the International African Institute 79 (1): 71–91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Masquelier, Adeline M. 2001. Prayer has Spoilt Everything: Possession, Power and Identity in an Islamic Town of Niger. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Masquelier, Adeline M. 2005. “The Scorpion’s Sting: Youth, Marriage and the Struggle for Social Maturity in Niger.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 11(1):59–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Masquelier, Adeline M. 2013. “Teatime: Boredom and the Temporalities of Young Men in Niger.” Africa 83(3): 385–402.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mattingly, Cheryl. 2014. Moral Laboratories: Family Peril and the Struggle for a Good Life. California: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Muñoz, Jose E. 2009. Cruising Utopia: The Then and There of Queer Futurity. New York: New York University Press.Google Scholar
Sullivan, Joanna. 2005. “Exploring Bori as a Site of Myth in Hausa Culture.” Journal of African Cultural Studies 17 (2): 271–82CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Werthmann, Katja. 2002. “Matan Bariki, ‘Women of the Barracks’: Muslim Hausa Women in an Urban Neighbourhood in Northern Nigeria.” Africa 72 (1): 112–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar