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natethegreat's review
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Civilizing Women is “a book about efforts to stop female circumcision in Sudan” during British occupation from approximately 1880 to the 1950s. (14.) Boddy spends a great deal of time on the men who made up the British occupation, treating both the men’s attitudes toward the Sudanese – held backward, primitive, particularly the women – as well as their own masculinity – ostensibly, celibate, reserved, with homosocial bonds expressed and formed in sports and other group activities. Remembrance of General Gordon, held to be a martyr by the British establishment in the Sudan, was particularly important for helping the British think of themselves as working not only for British interests but as helping protect the Sudanese from “an evil fate” which awaited them without British tutelage. (17.)
Boddy also spends a good deal of time discussing Sudanese culture, including zar, a term referring to beliefs linking illness to possession by spirits as well ceremonies based on these beliefs. Boddy treats zar, primarily present among women, as another text to draw upon in order to get at Sudanese culture and memory. Boddy also provides a detailed discussion of the cultural meaning of female blood among the Sudanese and the importance of circumcision as providing girls as well as boys with a place Sudanese society. While these passages make for interesting reading, they often do not advance her argument.
Boddy’s argument appears to be as follows. British occupiers opposed female circumcision because of the need for a stable and growing labor force. The British had to balance this opposition, which came with particularly force from women reformers and missionaries, with the strategy of ruling indirectly via local elites. Indirect rule made the British hesitant about giving offense to Sudanese religious values. Insofar as the British did attempt (and succeed in) curbing female circumcision, they did so through enlisting Sudanese women in the effort, primarily as midwives. These efforts strengthened British rule.
Boddy’s criticism of British colonialism sometimes overshadows her argument. Boddy frequently sounds as if efforts to end female circumcision were either motivated solely by colonialism or as if the implication of these efforts with British occupation vitiates any other possible outcomes of the project. Anti-circumcision efforts appear complicated in their implementation, due to disagreements among the people who administered British occupation as well as changing views on which tactics would be best, but the cultural meaning of the efforts among the British and among the Sudanese appear as relatively uncomplicated.
Boddy writes repeatedly of the role played by Sudanese in opposition to circumcision, but these Sudanese do not appear as agents of ends other than advancing the interests of the British. She repeatedly mentions Sudanese opponents of but does not seriously study them. Boddy does not devote any significant attention to the possibility that for some Sudanese eradicating female circumcision could be compatible with their sense of individual and collective identity.
Boddy’s tone is problematic as well. She frequently criticizes the British, but does not extend anything like the same level of critical scrutiny to Sudanese views. For example, Boddy attacks the British for “the idea of a socially unmediated body” linked to “the tendency in Western culture to map gender onto presocial sex.” This is a reasonable criticism, especially from a scholar writing after the attack on essentialist notions of sex and gender. On the very same page, however, Boddy details how for some Sudanese the clitoral hood and inner labia form “male body parts in female form” and foreskin “a female body part in male form.” (112.) Regardless of one’s opinion of this understanding of genitalia or of circumcision, it is hard to see this as anything but an idea of a presocial gendered meaning of the body, on the part of Boddy’s native informants. This belief is part of the justification by practitioners of circumcision: bodies must be cut in order to allow them to fit better into the social norms of sex and gender.
Boddy appears to have two different implied criteria by which she treats her subjects. Early twentieth century British occupiers may be faulted for their failure to conform to early twenty-first century beliefs about social construction, but Sudanese should only be judged by standards internal to what is held to be their culture. This results from Boddy’s understandable sympathies for the Sudanese. Yet, she borders on implying that the Sudanese are not intellectual equals worth critical engagement. It as if Sudanese views are merely worth cataloging and affirming, while only British attitudes are worth criticizing.
Boddy also spends a good deal of time discussing Sudanese culture, including zar, a term referring to beliefs linking illness to possession by spirits as well ceremonies based on these beliefs. Boddy treats zar, primarily present among women, as another text to draw upon in order to get at Sudanese culture and memory. Boddy also provides a detailed discussion of the cultural meaning of female blood among the Sudanese and the importance of circumcision as providing girls as well as boys with a place Sudanese society. While these passages make for interesting reading, they often do not advance her argument.
Boddy’s argument appears to be as follows. British occupiers opposed female circumcision because of the need for a stable and growing labor force. The British had to balance this opposition, which came with particularly force from women reformers and missionaries, with the strategy of ruling indirectly via local elites. Indirect rule made the British hesitant about giving offense to Sudanese religious values. Insofar as the British did attempt (and succeed in) curbing female circumcision, they did so through enlisting Sudanese women in the effort, primarily as midwives. These efforts strengthened British rule.
Boddy’s criticism of British colonialism sometimes overshadows her argument. Boddy frequently sounds as if efforts to end female circumcision were either motivated solely by colonialism or as if the implication of these efforts with British occupation vitiates any other possible outcomes of the project. Anti-circumcision efforts appear complicated in their implementation, due to disagreements among the people who administered British occupation as well as changing views on which tactics would be best, but the cultural meaning of the efforts among the British and among the Sudanese appear as relatively uncomplicated.
Boddy writes repeatedly of the role played by Sudanese in opposition to circumcision, but these Sudanese do not appear as agents of ends other than advancing the interests of the British. She repeatedly mentions Sudanese opponents of but does not seriously study them. Boddy does not devote any significant attention to the possibility that for some Sudanese eradicating female circumcision could be compatible with their sense of individual and collective identity.
Boddy’s tone is problematic as well. She frequently criticizes the British, but does not extend anything like the same level of critical scrutiny to Sudanese views. For example, Boddy attacks the British for “the idea of a socially unmediated body” linked to “the tendency in Western culture to map gender onto presocial sex.” This is a reasonable criticism, especially from a scholar writing after the attack on essentialist notions of sex and gender. On the very same page, however, Boddy details how for some Sudanese the clitoral hood and inner labia form “male body parts in female form” and foreskin “a female body part in male form.” (112.) Regardless of one’s opinion of this understanding of genitalia or of circumcision, it is hard to see this as anything but an idea of a presocial gendered meaning of the body, on the part of Boddy’s native informants. This belief is part of the justification by practitioners of circumcision: bodies must be cut in order to allow them to fit better into the social norms of sex and gender.
Boddy appears to have two different implied criteria by which she treats her subjects. Early twentieth century British occupiers may be faulted for their failure to conform to early twenty-first century beliefs about social construction, but Sudanese should only be judged by standards internal to what is held to be their culture. This results from Boddy’s understandable sympathies for the Sudanese. Yet, she borders on implying that the Sudanese are not intellectual equals worth critical engagement. It as if Sudanese views are merely worth cataloging and affirming, while only British attitudes are worth criticizing.
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