Islam, Women, and Sports in Sub-Saharan Africa

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Islam, Women, and Sports in Sub-Saharan Africa

• Martha Saavedra
• Center for African Studies, UC Berkeley
• October 2006

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Q Islams impact on womens sport?

• Islam is not an obstacle to the participation
  of women in sport.
• Islam can shape the sporting experience of people
  as gendered subjects.
• Impact varies widely, depending on
• Interpretation
• Practice
• Politicization by individuals, organizations
  states

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Outline

• Three issues
• Clarifying Question
• Elements involved?
• Transnational and global nature of contemporary
  sport
• Theology and Practice
• Islam and Sport
• Abuja 2003

Continued
4
Outline -continued

• Examples from
• Senegal
• Sudan
• Nigeria
• Zanzibar and South Africa

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Clarifying the QuestionIntersections?

• Islam

Gender
Sport
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Clarifying the QuestionIntersections?
Islam
Gender
Sport
Emphasis on lived experience, not on theological
understandings Need for spatial and historical
grounding anticipating variation across space and
time Generalizations - tentative
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Clarifying the QuestionElements?
Islam
Gender
Sport
Distinguish influence of Islam from other factors
educational opportunities general
availability of facilities living
standards leisure time, etc
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Clarifying the QuestionElements?
Islam
Gender
Sport
Distinguish influence of Islam from other factors
effect of colonialism different colonial
practices institutions traditions
customs varied mutable
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Clarifying the QuestionElements?
Islam
Gender
Sport
Distinguish influence of Islam from other factors
Political Economy Debt burdens Declining
terms of trade Dependency Structural
Adjustment Poverty
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Clarifying the QuestionElements?
Islam
Gender
Sport
Not interchangeable with women, even if women
are main concern Ask question carefully - Does
a particular articulation of Islam prevent
females from pursuing sport in ways that do not
prevent men from pursuing sport?
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Clarifying the QuestionElements?
Islam
Gender
Sport
Address gender more broadly for increased
understanding How does nexus of sport and
Islam shapes masculinity? can lend insight
into how sport shapes femininity.
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Nature of Sport itself

• Implicated in fabric of political and social
  life.
• Definition
• competitive physical activity guided by rules
• with some reference to an institutional framework

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• Most organized sport influenced or structured by
  Western practice.

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• Most organized sport influenced or structured by
  Western practice.
• Hence, carries historical and cultural baggage.

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• Most organized sport influenced or structured by
  Western practice.
• Hence, carries historical and cultural baggage.
• Weberian rationalization (Guttman 1978)

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• Most organized sport influenced or structured by
  Western practice.
• Hence, carries historical and cultural baggage.
• Weberian rationalization (Guttman 1978)
• Particular Western values
• Democratic equality
• Corporate capitalist exploitation

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• More Western baggage
• Gendered systems of sport
• Hegemonic heterosexual hyper-masculinity

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• More Western baggage
• Gendered systems of sport
• Hegemonic heterosexual hyper-masculinity
• Posited against any homosexual visibility

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• More Western baggage
• Gendered systems of sport
• Hegemonic heterosexual hyper-masculinity
• Posited against any homosexual visibility
• Rules out muscular femininity
• For binary and exclusive definition of sexuality

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• More Western baggage
• Gendered systems of sport
• Hegemonic heterosexual hyper-masculinity
• Posited against any homosexual visibility
• Rules out muscular femininity
• In a binary and exclusive definition of sexuality
• Womens pursuit of sport
• Always problematic
• Challenge to hegemonic norms of sexuality

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• Sport, gender Islam in Africa
• Marked by Western trajectories
• As much as by local practices of Islam
• Which also have transnational influences

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• Interaction of local global
• Variable outcomes in African settings
• Western outcomes not a teleological paradigm that
  is desirable or inevitable

23
Nature of Sport in Africa

• Interaction of local global
• Variable outcomes in African settings
• Western outcomes not a teleological paradigm that
  is desirable or inevitable
• Yes, Western hegemony is formidible
• But local is also powerful
• Can also influence global

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Nature of Sport in Africa

• Multiple Trajectories!

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Islam and Sport

• Sport
• Body is Central
• Physical manipulation
• Physicality
• Mapped with forces
• Political
• Economic
• Social
• Cultural
• Psychological
• Spiritual

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Islam and Sport

• Sport
• Body is Central
• Physical manipulation
• Physicality
• Mapped with forces
• Magnifies beliefs about physical possibilities
• Including, sexual difference

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Islam and Sport

• Sport
• Body is Central
• Physical manipulation
• Physicality
• Mapped with forces
• Magnifies beliefs about physical possibilities
• Including, sexual difference

• Islam
• Concern for body
• Piety Modesty
• Health Hygiene
• Defensive preparation
• Intellectual and moral education

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Islam and Sport

• Sport
• Body is Central
• Physical manipulation
• Physicality
• Mapped with forces
• Magnifies beliefs about physical possibilities
• Including, sexual difference

• Islam
• Concern for body
• Piety Modesty
• Health Hygiene
• Defensive preparation
• Intellectual and moral education
• For some
• Regulation of clothing for women AND men while
  engaged in physical activity

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Clothing
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Islam and Sport

• Goal of sport critical

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Islam and Sport

• Goal of sport critical
• e.g. Seeking fame and glory takes away from
  worshiping Allah

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Islam and Sport

• Goal of sport critical
• e.g. Seeking fame and glory takes away from
  worshiping Allah
• Avoid deviations
• Commercialism
• Gambling
• Doping
• The occult
• Mixing of sexes

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Islam and Sport

• For some, problem of global (Western) forms of
  sport
• Commercialized
• Glory and fame central
• Media public exposure
• Especially problematic for females
• Not a problem for all

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Abuja, All Africa Games 2003
Female Representation on National Teams at
October 2003 All-Africa Games, Abuja, Nigeria
African countries with predominantly Muslim
populations do send female athletes, who often
make up significant portions of the national
teams. AND countries with predominantly Muslim
populations often do better then countries with
smaller Muslim populations.
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Senegal

• Sport primarily masculine venture
• Significant room for women
• Dakar
• Womens Basketball
• Third most popular spectator sport
• Other sports
• Multiple levels of participation

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Senegal

• Obstacles
• Gender neutral
• Individual infrastructural poverty
• Pas des moyens

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Senegal

• Obstacles
• Gender neutral
• Individual infrastructural poverty
• Pas des moyens
• Gendered
• Broad socio-cultural perspective

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Senegal

• Obstacles
• Gender neutral
• Individual infrastructural poverty
• Pas des moyens
• Gendered
• Broad socio-cultural perspective
• Islam not primary factor
• Though may be used to justify
• Relatively tolerant form of Islam (Callaway
  Creevey)

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Senegal

• Obstacles
• Gender neutral
• Gendered
• Broad socio-cultural perspective
• Not particularly Islamic
• Found across Africa and beyond (even in US)

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Senegal

• Obstacles
• Gender neutral
• Gendered
• Broad socio-cultural perspective
• Femininity
• Fertility
• Ideal body-type

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Senegal

• Ideal Body Type
• Womens form representing substance of
• Herself
• Her family
• Especially her husband

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Senegal

• Ideal Body Type
• Womens form representing substance of
• Herself
• Her family
• Especially her husband
• Muscles
• Indicate physical labor

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Senegal

• Ideal Body Type
• With urbanization emerges
• Drianke

Pharmaceutical misused to increase appetite so as
to gain weight and appear more substantial.
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Senegal

• Ideal Body Type
• With urbanization emerges
• Drianke
• Disquette

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Senegal

• Ideal Body Type
• Avoid physical education
• Doctors note
• Counter forces supporting Athletic body
• Headmistress
• Role Models
• Adama Diop
• Mame Maty Mbengue
• Remunerative careers

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Senegal

• Role of Islam in sport?
• Surveys indicate not a big concern for female
  athletes
• Tolerant
• Not dismissed
• Studies, seminars
• Sent team to 3rd Muslim Womens Games in Tehran,
  October 2001 post-9/11 solidarity.

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Senegal

• Ahmadu Bambaat the World Cup 2002

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Sudan

• Islam
• More restrictive practice for women in North

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Sudan

• Islam
• More restrictive practice for women in North
• Mitigated by class

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Sudan

• Outside Central Region and North
• War, drought, poverty inhibit all

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Sudan

• Orthodox Islam
• Dampened female participation in sport
• Like Senegal, avoid physical labor, e.g. wives
  and daughters in fields, if upwardly mobile

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Sudan

• Orthodox Islam
• Dampened female participation in sport
• Like Senegal, avoid physical labor, e.g. wives
  and daughters in fields, if upwardly mobile
• Physical labor for men also looked down on if
  upwardly mobile
• Making even mens participation in sport
  potentially suspect.

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Sudan

• Orthodox Islam
• Dampened female participation in sport
• Like Senegal, avoid physical labor, e.g. wives
  and daughters in fields, if upwardly mobile
• Being elite tied to being good Sudanese Muslim
  (Doornbus 1988)

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Sudan

• Effect of class
• Among educated and confident elite
• Muslim girls active in sport

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Sudan

• Effect of class
• Among educated and confident elite
• Muslim girls active in sport
• PE in British educational system
• Volleyball, basketball, swimming
• University of Khartoum
• Pool reserved days for female students

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Sudan

• Effect of class
• Among educated and confident elite
• Muslim girls active in sport
• PE in British educational system
• Volleyball, basketball, swimming
• University of Khartoum
• Pool reserved days for female students
• But usually not beyond post-secondary education

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Sudan

• Most do not have access to education
• Quotas on girls
• Parents reluctance

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Sudan

• Most do not have access to education
• Physical activity not avoided
• Intense chores household, farm, childcare,
  etc
• Ali Mazruis suggestion
• More sports that draw on daily laboring skills
  (1987)

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Sudan

• More restrictions
• September Laws 1983
• Islamicization after 1989 coup
• Martial training for boys
• Declining economy and civil war
• Fewer elites internationally

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Sudan

• More restrictions
• September Laws 1983
• Islamicization after 1989 coup
• Martial training for boys
• Declining economy and civil war
• Fewer elite athletes internationally
• Still, very elite still active
• 2003 Abuja one female athlete tennis player

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Sudan

• January 2004, in 2 days, passport for Yamile
  Aldama
• Cuban born triple jumper.

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Sudan

• January 2004, in 2 days, passport for Yamile
  Aldama
• Cuban born triple jumper.
• Olympic hopeful
• Sudan internationalstature
• Hijab?

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2004 Triple Jump Gold

• Francoise Mbango Etone of Cameroon

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New Sudanese Athlete

• Nawal el Jack
• Set the girls record (and a personal best at
  51.83) in the 400 meters at the World Youth
  Championships in July 2005 in Morocco. Competed
  at the World Championships in Helsinki in 2005,
  though did not place.
• Where does she train? - I dont know

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Nigeria

• February 2003
• Northern State, Niger, bans womens football
• not in conformity with our culture.Abdul-Khadir
  Kure, Governor

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Nigeria

• Zamfara in 2000
• Declared sharia law
• Immediately womens football banned
• the sport is against the teachings of
  Islamstate director of sports

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Nigeria

• Moot?
• Many parents in Northern Nigeria would not let
  daughters play anyway.

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Nigeria

• Complex, diverse, multifaceted country
• Colonial period
• Strong, centralized Islamic states continued
  unlike in Senegal
• Islam less tolerant of secular
• In North, female seclusion

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Nigeria

• Current national and international climate has
  lead to
• Hardening of identities
• Influence from Islamicists from Saudi and
  elsewhere
• Wahabism

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Nigeria

• Why focus on womens football?
• Success of national womens football team
• Challenge to gender norms
• Connection to practices in the South
• Mercy Akide

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Nigeria

• Miss World Pageant
• Two weeks later Africa Cup for Women in South
  with no problems.
• Part of larger struggle within Nigeria
• Amina Lawal case
• Why football was singled out?

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Nigeria

• Why football was singled out?
• Marked as masculine sport in much of football
  loving world (not the US so much)
• Because mens so globally popular?
• Male hegemony reinforced
• British FAs ban on womens football
• 1921 1971

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Nigeria

• Why football was singled out?
• Marked as masculine sport in much of football
  loving world (not the US so much)
• Because mens so globally popular?
• Male hegemony reinforced
• British FAs ban on womens football
• 1921 1971
• Issue of masculinity and football

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Sport and Masculinity

• Muscular Christianity
• British colonial influence
• Zanzibar (Fair 1997)
• Local Islamic elite collaborate with British
  colonial administration
• Elevate mens football
• Stamp out Ngoma dancing
• Within Ngoma men dress as women

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Sport and Masculinity

• Zanzibar (Fair 1997)
• Within Ngoma men dress as women
• Vulgar and obscence by elite
• Effeminate Colonial administration
• Football
• Masculine!

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Sport and Masculinity

• Cape Town, South Africa (Nauright 1998)
• Muslim Coloured working class community
• Promoted rugby
• Discipline
• Social cohesion
• Manliness
• Character formation
• Muscular Islam
• Physical intimidation

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Sport and Masculinity

• Cape Town, South Africa (Nauright 1998)
• Muslim Coloured working class community
• Promoted rugby
• Muscular Islam
• Physical intimidation
• Required by setting
• Apartheid
• Class politics

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Sport and Masculinity

• Cape Town, South Africa (Nauright 1998)
• Muslim Coloured working class community
• Rugby and Muslim Coloured Identity
• Even girls played when they were young
• As matured, steered to other sports
• Netball, softball

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Sport and Masculinity

• Cape Town, South Africa (Nauright 1998)
• Muslim Coloured working class community
• Rugby and Muslim Coloured Identity
• Even girls played when they were young
• As matured, steered to other sports
• Netball, softball
• Women as supporters
• Knit scarves
• Sew uniforms

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Conclusions

• Islam part of set of factors
• Local trajectories
• Masculinity as well as femininity
• More research needed!