This book examines how and why Portugal and Spain increasingly engaged with women in their African colonies in the crucial period from the 1950s to the 1970s. It explores the rhetoric of benevolent Iberian colonialism, gendered Westernization, and development for African women as well as actual imperial practices from forced resettlement to sexual exploitation to promoting domestic skills. Focusing on Angola, Mozambique, Western Sahara, and Equatorial Guinea, the author mines newly available and neglected documents, including sources from Portuguese and Spanish women's organizations overseas. They offer insights into how African women perceived and responded to their assigned roles within an elite that was meant to preserve the empires and stabilize Afro-Iberian ties. The book also retraces parallels and differences between imperial strategies regarding women and the notions of African anticolonial movements about what women should contribute to the struggle for independence and the creation of new nation-states.

Focuses on lesser-studied Iberian colonies in Africa as an example of late and reluctant decolonization Shows how the education and indoctrination of African women was perceived as essential in maintaining Portuguese and Spanish rule Draws on newly available primary materials in archives in Portugal, Spain and the United States, as well as accounts from African women themselves

Autorentext

Andreas Stucki is Lecturer and Associate Researcher at the University of Bern, Switzerland, where he specializes in Iberian and Caribbean history. He was a visiting scholar at the University of Sydney (2017-18) and at Stanford University (2015-16). Andreas' recent publications include Las Guerras de Cuba: Violencia y campos de concentraciön (2017) and several articles published in the Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, the Journal of Genocide Research, and the Journal of Spanish Cultural Studies.

Inhalt
1 Introduction: Feminizing Empire.- 2 Soft Power: Uplifting Native Women.- 3 Violence: Authoritarian Transformations.- 4 African Skin and a Hispanic Heart? Racism, Ethnic Relations, Class, and Gender.- 5 The Bargains of African Women's Cooperation.- 6 Staging Iberian Domesticity in Africa.- 7 Empire and Nation States: Competing Projects.- 8 Epilog: The Presence of Imperial Pasts.-