Men in African Film and Fiction

Through their analysis of the depictions in film and literature of masculinities in colonial, independent and post-independent Africa, the contributors open some key African texts to a more obviously politicized set of meanings.
Collectively, the essays provide space for rethinking current theory on gender and masculinity:
- how only some of the most popular theories in masculinity studies in the West hold true in African contexts;
- howWestern masculinities react with indigenous masculinities on the continent;
- how masculinity and femininity in Africa seem to reside more on a continuum of cultural practices than on absolutely opposite planes;
- andhow generation often functions as a more potent metaphor than gender.

Lahoucine Ouzgane is Associate Professor of English & Film Studies, University of Alberta, Canada.