Degree Type
Dissertation
Date of Award
2002
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy
Department
Curriculum and Instruction
First Advisor
Leslie Rebecca Bloom
Abstract
This study uses feminist life-history narrative methodology to explore the experiences of three African women, who have pursued or are pursuing higher education in the United States, leaving their families in Africa. Contextualized within the socio-historical cultural, colonial, and post-colonial discourses on domesticity and education, this study not only illuminates the pain, ambivalence and struggles women experienced in pursuit of higher education, but also reveals the tension between domesticity and education and how this tension inhibits African women's access to education. The conceptual and methodological framework of this study is grounded in feminist perspective, which allows for a critical approach to issues and concerns in the African women respondents' lives. However, after identifying certain gaps during the interpretation process, the study reveals that the unproblematic use of feminist concepts developed from the Western feminist perspective to study African women fails to adequately reflect different and contextualized reality of African women's experiences. This study, therefore, argues for a more inclusive and contextualized approach by advancing a feminist frameless/framework characterized by "fluidity" of dimensions and strategies in order to reflect, capture, and validate specific contextual lived experiences of African women.;This study culminates into a form of activism by addressing elements of change through letters addressed to the African heads of state, the Vice Chancellors (Presidents) of universities in Africa, and the young generation of women in Africa. The letters offer strategies and suggestions for social, cultural, and policy changes relevant to women and women's education in Africa.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.31274/rtd-180813-13177
Publisher
Digital Repository @ Iowa State University, http://lib.dr.iastate.edu
Copyright Owner
Mumbi Mwangi
Copyright Date
2002
Language
en
Proquest ID
AAI3061849
File Format
application/pdf
File Size
204 pages
Recommended Citation
Mwangi, Mumbi, ""We will have gained ourselves": narrative experiences of African women pursuing higher education in the United States of America " (2002). Retrospective Theses and Dissertations. 1014.
https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/rtd/1014
Included in
African American Studies Commons, Bilingual, Multilingual, and Multicultural Education Commons, Higher Education and Teaching Commons, Women's History Commons, Women's Studies Commons
