ABSTRACT

In her groundbreaking text, Male Daughters, Female Husbands, Ifi Amadiume offers an ethnographic account which depicts, among others, gender in the making in Nnobi society in Nigeria. This paper, drawing from Amadiume’s work, looks at three related specific moments of understanding gender and sex categories in a South African context. Through empirical research based on a qualitative study; a literary text; as well as visual arts, the paper tracks the notion of nongayindoda, a Nguni term for (gender) fluidity to offer new insights that go beyond Western gender binaries. Nongayindoda has been used to refer to masculine women or men-like women. In some contexts, it has been assumed to relate only to women who have chosen not to have relations with men. Some have considered the term derogatory and thus shied away from using it. In this paper, the term is turned upside and interrogated to reveal broader meanings. In the end, I argue that nongayindoda offers an opportunity to move beyond gender.

摘要

Ifi Amadiume在她开创性的文本中，男性女儿，女性丈夫，提供了一个民族志描述，其中描绘了尼日利亚 Nnobi 社会中正在形成的性别。这篇论文取材于 Amadiume 的作品，着眼于在南非背景下理解性别和性别类别的三个相关特定时刻。通过基于定性研究的实证研究；文学作品；除了视觉艺术，这篇论文还追踪了nongayindoda的概念，这是一个 Nguni 术语，表示（性别）流动性，以提供超越西方性别二元论的新见解。农因多达已被用来指代男性化的女性或类似男性的女性。在某些情况下，它被假定仅与选择不与男性发生关系的女性有关。有些人认为这个词是贬义的，因此避免使用它。在本文中，该术语被颠倒并进行了审问，以揭示更广泛的含义。最后，我认为nongayindoda提供了超越性别的机会。