GENDER ISSUES IN AFRICAN CULTURE: AN EVALUATION

Abstract

Gender deals with the assigning of certain roles to a particular sex by the society. In some cultures, however, gender roles are permeated with religious undertones and up scaled to divine mandate in order to give them legitimacy and ensure they are adhered to. In this regard, African culture is not in isolation hence it is assumed that culture and religion is the most defining factors in gender issues. Based on the foregoing, this work is set to spotlight on gender in African culture, that is to say having an intrinsic understanding of how the Africans perceive gender and its roles in the African cultural setting. This work adopts a phenomenological method in its study and will be framed with Structural Functionalism theory. The paper observes that there are roles performed by the genders which are assigned to them by the culture. It concludes that gender roles are social constructs which go in synergy with the cultural norms of a particular society. The paper therefore recommends that in as much as the African culture apportions roles to sexes within the pre-colonial era which has helped in orchestrating inequality in the society, it will not be out of place in this present modernized society, if those roles can be readjusted in order to give way to equality and equilibrium in the society.