This volume aims to illustrate a broad range of perspectives on issues of Peace, War, Structural violence and Social Justice  among communities. Birthing Masculinity: Dialogues of Peace and Social Justice explores how different people today, respond to and shape the world around them. It explores both the powerful forces of global capitalism and the world’s challenges to those forces by people who address systemic problems and suggests a broad range of possible dialogue among different communities. Capitalism is not simply commodifying the world: it is also increasingly marginalizing large sections of humankind.

The volume brings forth a series of insights from an eclectic group of activists, religious leaders and scholars who are an indispensible part of the possibilities of democracy. Ironically in the media, in the halls of governments, in every land and in every culture, violence is considered by most to be taboo, a last resort. Yet under certain conditions, from the family level to the level of nations, violence is integral to the maintenance of social control and a strategy of social transformation.  This unique collection brings together a number of internationally known contributors, to address the genesis and manifestations of violence in the search of a remedy for this confounding social problem, drawn from a variety of social contexts, and using personal narratives.

“In Birthing Masculinity: Dialogues of Peace and Social Justice Lindah Mhando has brought together diverse authors to capture a range of grounded struggles in antiwar protests that challenge existing hierarchical power structures and their methods of reconstructing social relationships.  From Mhando’s well documented introduction to the interventions by Campbell, Dussel, Quijano and others, we see a daring re-reading of the impact of militarism and global capitalism. This exciting collection encasing eye witness accounts, testimonies and narratives — highly un-sanitized, and unscripted – presents a provocative analysis in the context of decolonization, multicultural capitalism, and discursive practices, while exposing imperialist aggression. The book propels dialogue and provides a platform for the community to discuss the practicality of promoting democracy, peace and justice around the world in the face of antagonistic religious beliefs and strife; advocacy for war; domestic solidarity; the repression of indigenous people and the crippling effects of globalization on the poor.”

—Micere  Githae Mugo, 

Meredith Professor for Teaching Excellence, Syracuse University

ABOUT THE EDITOR

LINDAH MHANDO is Assistant Professor of African & African American Studies and Women Studies at Penn State University. She is currently engaged in three overlapping research projects focusing on the comparative study of cultural mapping and borderland identities in Diaspora; Islamic feminism and social integration in broad processes of global social change. She is co-author (with Ali Mazrui) of the forthcoming volume Nyerere, Africa’s Titan on a Global Stage, and is also currently completing a manuscript, ‘Islamism, Feminism and Other Acts of Subversion in Algeria.

SUBJECT CATEGORIES

Sociology, History, Religion, Anthropology, Women Studies, Peace Studies/WORLD