Browsing by Author "Frost, A.E."
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Item Gender in African population research: The fertility/ reproductive health example(Annual Review of Sociology, 2008-08) Dodoo, F.N.A.; Frost, A.E.We survey the literature on sub-Saharan Africa to identify how gender has factored into explaining fertility levels and behavior. Tracing the development of male role theory, we argue that despite increasing awareness of men's authority, fertility research continues to focus almost exclusively on women and treats gender as a property of individuals instead of as a system of inequality. The mainstream fertility literature generally overlooks the decision-making nexus wherein men's authority seemingly overrides women's preferences. Positing that male authority in the reproductive and sexual arenas is predicated on cultural rights negotiated at marriage - and undergirded by bridewealth payments - we contend that attempts to understand (and change) reproductive behavior will hardly be sustainable without attention to this contextual realm. In that vein, we speculate that efforts to empower women (via increased education, occupational opportunities, microcredit schemes, etc.) may hardly yield sustainable outcomes without concurrent efforts to alter cultural distributions of gendered power. Copyright © 2008 by Annual Reviews.Item "The man comes to marry the woman": Exploring adolescent boys' gendered expectations for bridewealth and marriage among the akwapim of Southern Ghana(Marriage and Family Review, 2010-02) Frost, A.E.; Dodoo, F.N.A.A qualitative analysis of 28 in-depth interviews with adolescent boys aged between 12 and 15 years in the Akwapim highlands of Ghana reveals that the traditional practice of bridewealth exchange-called the customary rites among the Akwapim-fuels adolescent boys' expectations of increased male authority in marriage. Although the available literature on bridewealth argues that the traditional marriage practice of bridewealth exchange in sub-Saharan Africa gives men rights over women's sexual and reproductive capacities, as well as their household labor (Fortes, 1962), the findings of this article suggest that bridewealth payments influence not only these areas but male expectations for broader control over, and obedience from, their wives. © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.