Digital Strategies and African LGBTI Organizing

Currier, Ashley; Moreau, Julie

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-40949-8_11

Cited by 26 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…Online social movements opposing oppression in countries including South Africa, Nigeria, Sudan, Malawi, and Botswana have also relied on hashtag activism (Sebeelo 2020, 96-97). But social media in Africa has its limitations and drawbacks, at times providing space for homophobic surveillance and homonationalist po liti cal vio lence incited by those in the Global North (Currier and Moreau 2016). Savinova was never subjected to the scrutiny Semenya faced, and her use of ste roids was discovered not through drug or gender testing.…”

Section: #Handsoffcastermentioning

confidence: 99%

Envisioning African Intersex

2023

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In 2009, South African Caster Semenya won the 800-meter event at the World Championships in Athletics in track and field. But instead of celebrating her victory, Semenya faced accusations that her body was "too masculine" for her to compete in women's sport. Sporting authorities, doctors, and the media claimed that Semenya was intersex. Over the following de cade, she was subjected to international scrutiny: her body was photographed, she endured explorations of her reproductive organs, and her chromosomes and hormones were evaluated to determine her eligibility to compete in women's sport. Decisions about the "truth" of her gender changed again and again over the following de cade, as supposed experts fought over the par ameters of womanhood and the course of her life. Now with two Olympic gold medals to her name, Semenya continues to contest regulations that currently bar her from her sport. The latest decisions of the International Olympic Organ izing Committee prohibit Semenya from competing in the 800-meter event unless she undertakes surgery or pharmaceutically alters her natu ral testosterone levels (an intervention that previously made her physically ill). Recent headlines indicate the global importance of these conversations, Introduction. Pathologizing Gender Binaries Intersex Images and Citational Chains

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Section: #Handsoffcastermentioning

confidence: 99%

Envisioning African Intersex

2023

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“…In fact, recent research on digital activism has been discussing the effects of digitalization in social and political activism, including that of LGBT* activism (Altay, 2022 ). However, rather than strategically developing and coordinating the digital space and using digital tools to supplement local activism supported by what has been called the transnational advocacy networks (Currier & Moreau, 2016 ; Keck & Sikkink, 1998 ), LGBT* organizations in Japan have only recently, if not only since the turn to the digital space in Covid‐19 times, reached out to the digital space. As the exploratory and interdisciplinary literature review of George and Leidner ( 2019 ) draws out, digital activism can be found in different forms, yet it is still a nascent field to be further explored.…”

Section: Covid‐19 Pandemic As a Game‐changer: Relocating To A Virtual...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Impact of Covid‐19 pandemic on the transnationalization of LGBT* activism in Japan and beyond

Yamamura¹

2022

Global Networks

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The global Covid-19 pandemic has strongly impacted social practices, relocating communications and social networks into the digital space. Contextualized in such impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the local LGBT* activism in Japan achieved a special momentum: both the acceleration of the socio-spatial relocation of LGBT* activism to the digital space and the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics 2020 by 1 year enabled activists to mobilize people domestically and globally. The pandemic was not the actual cause or driver of the local LGBT* activism, yet it has been an important catalyst for the transnationalization of the local movement in Japan, pushing evidently the spatial boundaries to achieve broader public outreach but in turn also receiving stronger support from the global community through transnational networks. This study explores novel dynamics of spatiality and temporality of social transformations through the Covid-19-induced increase in global digital connectedness as well as transnationalization of local actions.

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“…Such an image broadcasted by foreign media can stigmatize the society at large. Similarly, Currier and Moreau (2016) argue that "the rapid dissemination of movement information that digital media provide can render African LGBTI activist organizations vulnerable, as activists cannot control how others, such as Northern audiences concerned by anti-queer developments in African countries, will use and interpret their messages" (233). Indeed, right after news of Uganda's anti-homosexual bill went viral on the internet, the western media labeled all Ugandan society as "heterosexist" or "barbarian" (e.g., BBC 2012).…”

Section: Collateral Consequencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Kuchu Counterpublic on Facebook: Gay Men’s Challenge to Heterosexist Policies in Uganda

Amoedo

2021

Anthropology and Humanism

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How do queer counterpublics online function as spaces where stigmatized individuals can gather to advocate for their interests and share their needs? Based on an online ethnography of gay cisgender men in Uganda, I offer three main conclusions. First, the popular and widely accessible social medium Facebook allows space for a visible queer opposition to the anti-LGBTQ movement and for the realities of the Ugandan LGBTQ community-locally known as kuchu-to emerge through individuals' sexual self-expression and self-knowledge. Second, to avoid identification, arrests, and punishments through state surveillance, kuchus use Facebook to create a list of safe virtual friends. Finally, the rise of a virtual queer counterpublic and its global discourse has deepened transnational stereotypes and encouraged vigorous attacks by the Ugandan government, including indiscriminate arrests. Despite these risks and challenges, kuchus' use of Facebook demonstrates its value for creating a counterpublic.[Uganda, LGBTQ, Counterpublic, Digital Activism, Facebook] On October 22, 2019, the Ugandan police took into custody a man I refer to as Daniel and another fifteen kuchu activists at the office of the sexual health charity where they all worked, on suspicion of gay sex. Kuchu is the local slang word for LGBTQ Ugandans and is used emically with pride (Tamale 2003). The kuchus had called the police to receive protection from a heterosexist mob gathered in front of the charity. 1 Rather than offering Daniel and his coworkers protection, the police forced them to undergo anal examinations.The idea of writing Daniel's story was a driving factor in my research as I began to think about how he and others were creating a virtual kuchu counterpublic. When I first started conducting digital ethnography, digital activism had already become a critical factor in resistance efforts. The notion of kuchu counterpublic that undergirds my work is rooted in Fraser's (1990) conception of the "subaltern counterpublic," that is, "parallel discursive arenas where members of subordinated social groups invent and circulate counterdiscourses, which in turn permit them to formulate oppositional interpretations of their identities, interests, and needs" (67).Although I initially set out to study how Ugandan society condemned kuchu under anti-gay laws, my interactions with Daniel inspired my change of focus to resistance and activism in online spaces. At first, he seemed like a victim of heterosexism. As our conversations unfolded, however, I realized I

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Digital Strategies and African LGBTI Organizing

Cited by 26 publications

References 20 publications

Envisioning African Intersex

Envisioning African Intersex

Impact of Covid‐19 pandemic on the transnationalization of LGBT* activism in Japan and beyond

Kuchu Counterpublic on Facebook: Gay Men’s Challenge to Heterosexist Policies in Uganda

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