Decolonizing Gender Through Combining Ethnographic and Historical Research With Discovery-Based Pedagogies in Post–Civil War Northern Uganda

Harris, Colette

Abstract

This case study is based on a project from northern Uganda’s Acholiland, starting in 2007. Its initial research phase was implemented in two villages in Gulu District after the civil war against the Lord’s Resistance Army, followed by a grass-roots education phase aimed at supporting post-conflict psycho-social rehabilitation, and finally post-project evaluations. The study demonstrates the importance of understanding context, including by examining historical antecedents, and of using discovery-based rather than didactic pedagogies to encourage participants to gain self-determination by devising their own solutions to their problems. The project data consists of the historical material, reports on the two project phases, and the evaluation findings.

We particularly addressed the impact of participatory gender analysis in shifting the rigid norms of masculinity and femininity resulting from (neo)colonialism and Christianization and found that encouraging men to renounce some of their masculine prerogatives produced a far greater benefit for women than supporting them to press for their rights. This went some way to decolonize gender, enhanced by the overall focus on rejecting a narrow materialistic view of development in favor of placing human beings above economics. However, it is clearly impossible and indeed undesirable in today’s capitalist-based world to return to the pre-colonial.

The case study further provides guidance for future research by explaining the importance of moving beyond western gender theory that views women’s disadvantages as universal and of focusing on the unarticulated practices that heighten women’s power in southern societies rather than assuming that public discourse accurately reflects women’s real-life status.

Citation

Harris, C. (2024). Decolonizing Gender Through Combining Ethnographic and Historical Research With Discovery-Based Pedagogies in Post–Civil War Northern Uganda. London

• Other Type: Other
• Publication Date: Apr 1, 2024
• Deposit Date: Apr 30, 2025
• Publicly Available Date: Apr 2, 2124
• Publisher: SAGE Publications
• Book Title: Sage Research Methods: Diversifying and Decolonizing Research
• Keywords: pedagogy, Uganda, villages, war
• Publisher URL: https://doi.org/10.4135/9781529684414
• Related Public URLs: https://methods.sagepub.com/case/decolonizing-gender-through-combining-ethnographic?token=ba19a390-1650-414d-8a25-25ad40d8bd22177f9786e3e2c70ae0e73b59868ba003e2bec7104ec3a85dab659e1686c1ba5e