Gender and Culture at the Limit of Rights (Pennsylvania Studies in Human Rights)

In this interdisciplinary, international collection of original essays, distinguished scholars, lawyers, and activists probe the complex relationship between gender, culture, and rights. The authors offer thoughtful, provocative case studies to suggest that the power of women's rights is also the source of its limits. In this interdisciplinary, international collection of original essays, distinguished scholars, lawyers, and activists probe the complex relationship between gender, culture, and rights. The authors offer thoughtful, provocative case studies to suggest that the power of women's rights is also the source of its limits.

An interdisciplinary collection, Gender and Culture at the Limit of Rights examines the potential and limitations of the "women's rights as human rights" framework as a strategy for seeking gender justice. Drawing on detailed case studies from the United States, Africa, Latin America, Asia, and elsewhere, contributors to the volume explore the specific social histories, political struggles, cultural assumptions, and gender ideologies that have produced certain rights or reframed long-standing debates in the language of rights.

The essays address the gender-specific ways in which rights-based protocols have been analyzed, deployed, and legislated in the past and the present and the implications for women and men, adults and children in various social and geographical locations. Questions addressed include: What are the gendered assumptions and effects of the dominance of rights-based discourses for claims to social justice? What kinds of opportunities and limitations does such a "culture of rights" provide to seekers of justice, whether individuals or collectives, and how are these gendered? How and why do female bodies often become the site of contention in contexts pitting cultural against juridical perspectives?

The contributors speak to central issues in current scholarly and policy debates about gender, culture, and human rights from comparative disciplinary, historical, and geographical perspectives. By taking "gender," rather than just "women," seriously as a category of analysis, the chapters suggest that the very sources of the power of human rights discourses, specifically "women's rights as human rights" discourses, to produce social change are also the sources of its limitations.

Annotation An interdisciplinary collection, Gender and Culture at the Limit of Rightsexamines the potential and limitations of the "women's rights as human rights" framework as a strategy for seeking gender justice. Drawing on detailed case studies from the United States, Africa, Latin America, Asia, and elsewhere, contributors to the volume explore the specific social histories, political struggles, cultural assumptions, and gender ideologies that have produced certain rights or reframed long-standing debates in the language of rights. The essays address the gender-specific ways in which rights-based protocols have been analyzed, deployed, and legislated in the past and the present, and the implications for women and men, adults and children in various social and geographical locations. Questions addressed include: What are the gendered assumptions and effects of the dominance of rights-based discourses for claims to social justice? What kinds of opportunities and limitations does such a "culture of rights" provide to seekers of justice, whether individuals or collectives, and how are these gendered? How and why do female bodies often become the site of contention in contexts pitting cultural against juridical perspectives?The contributors speak to central issues in current scholarly and policy debates about gender, culture, and human rights from comparative disciplinary, historical, and geographical perspectives. By taking "gender," rather than just "women," seriously as a category of analysis, the chapters suggest that the very sources of the power of human rights discourses, specifically "women's rights as human rights" discourses, to produce social change are also the sources of its limitations An interdisciplinary collection, Gender and Culture at the Limit of Rights examines the potential and limitations of the "women's rights as human rights" framework as a strategy for seeking gender justice. Drawing on detailed case studies from the United States, Africa, Latin America, Asia, and elsewhere, contributors to the volume explore the specific social histories, political struggles, cultural assumptions, and gender ideologies that have produced certain rights or reframed long-standing debates in the language of rights. The essays address the gender-specific ways in which rights-based protocols have been analyzed, deployed, and legislated in the past and the present and the implications for women and men, adults and children in various social and geographical locations. Questions addressed include: What are the gendered assumptions and effects of the dominance of rights-based discourses for claims to social justice? What kinds of opportunities and limitations does such a "culture of rights" provide to seekers of justice, whether individuals or collectives, and how are these gendered? How and why do female bodies often become the site of contention in contexts pitting cultural against juridical perspectives? The contributors speak to central issues in current scholarly and policy debates about gender, culture, and human rights from comparative disciplinary, historical, and geographical perspectives. By taking "gender," rather than just "women," seriously as a category of analysis, the chapters suggest that the very sources of the power of human rights discourses, specifically "women's rights as human rights" discourses, to produce social change are also the sources of its limitations. Introduction: Gender And Culture At The Limits Of Rights / Dorothy L. Hodgson -- Gender, History, And Human Rights / Pamela Scully -- Between Law And Culture: Contemplating Rights For Women In Zanzibar / Salma Maoulidi -- A Clash Of Cultures: Women, Domestic Violence, And Law In The United States / Sally F. Goldfarb -- Making Women's Human Rights In The Vernacular: Navigating The Culture/rights Divide / Peggy Levitt And Sally Engle Merry -- The Active Social Life Of Muslim Women's Rights / Lila Abu-lughod -- How Not To Be A Machu Qari (old Man): Human Rights, Machismo, And Military Nostalgia In Peru's Andes / Caroline Yezer -- These Are Not Our Priorities: Maasi Women, Human Rights, And The Problem Of Culture / Dorothy L. Hodgson -- The Rights To Speak And To Be Heard: Women's Interpretations Of Rights Discourses In The Oaxaca Social Movement / Lynn Stephen -- Muslim Women, Rights Discourse, And The Media In Kenya / Ousseina D. Alidau -- Fighting For Fatherhood And Family: Immigrant Detainees' Struggle For Rights / Robyn M. Rodriguez -- Defending Women, Defending Rights, Transnational Organizing In A Culture Of Human Rights / Mary Jane N. Real. Edited By Dorothy L. Hodgson. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [235]-282) And Index. Contents Introduction. Gender and Culture at the Limit of Rights PART I. Images and Interventions Chapter 1. Gender, History, and Human Rights Chapter 2. Between Law and Culture: Contemplating Rights for Women in Zanzibar Chapter 3. A Clash of Cultures: Women, Domestic Violence, and Law in the United States PART II. Travels and Translations Chapter 4. Making Women’s Human Rights in the Vernacular: Navigating the Culture/Rights Divide Chapter 5. The Active Social Life of “Muslim Women’s Rights” Chapter 6. How Not to be a Machu Qari (Old Man): Human Rights, Machismo, and Military Nostalgia in Peru’s Andes Chapter 7. “These Are Not Our Priorities”: Maasai Women, Human Rights, and the Problem of Culture PART III. Mobilizations and Mediations Chapter 8. The Rights to Speak and to Be Heard: Women’s Interpretations of Rights Discourses in the Oaxaca Social Movement Chapter 9. Muslim Women, Rights Discourse, and the Media in Kenya Chapter 10. Fighting for Fatherhood and Family: Immigrant Detainees’ Struggles for Rights Chapter 11. Defending Women, Defending Rights: Transnational Organizing in a Culture of Human Rights Notes Bibliography Contributors Index Acknowledgments Lucretia Coffin Mott was one of the most famous and controversial women in nineteenth-century America. Now overshadowed by abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison and feminists like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Mott was viewed in her time as a dominant figure in the dual struggles for racial and sexual equality. History has often depicted her as a gentle Quaker lady and a mother figure, but her outspoken challenges to authority riled ministers, journalists, politicians, urban mobs, and her fellow Quakers. -- Publisher's description This collection examines the potential and limitations of the 'women's rights as human rights' framework as a strategy for seeking gender justice