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438 pages, Hardcover
First published September 1, 2020
‘My grandmothers called it kweluma. That is when oppressed people turn on each other or on themselves and bite. It is as a form of relief. If you cannot bite your oppressor, you bite yourself.’
‘Any mwenkanonkano is radical. Talk about equality and men fall in epileptic fits.’
…. our Original State ….. was wonderful for us. We were not squeezed inside, we were huge, strong, bold, loud, proud, brave, independent. But it was too much for the world and they got rid of it. However occasionally the state is reborn in a girl like you. But in all cases it is suppressed
But the Bible says that God created Adam and Eve in his own image.’ ‘If he created them in his own image,’ Nsuuta snapped, ‘then afterwards Adam re-created Eve in his own image, one that suited him
“They claimed that the very first woman rose out of the sea while the first man emerged from earth...both women and the sea were baffling...water has no shape...is inconsistent...cannot be tamed...you cannot draw borders on the ocean...land belonged with men".
‘Kirabo, have you seen God come down from heaven to make humans behave?’ ‘No.’ ‘That is because some people have appointed themselves his police. And I tell you, child, the police are far worse than God himself. That is why the day you catch your man with another woman, you will go for the woman and not him. My grandmothers called it kweluma. That is when oppressed people turn on each other or on themselves and bite. It is as a form of relief. If you cannot bite your oppressor, you bite yourself.”
I wanted to explore two things. One was the idea that feminism comes from the West, and therefore, feminism is destroying our culture. So I needed to locate feminism in my culture. For me, I had to start from the beginning. When did women start to get oppressed? I needed to look at my people, my culture, from the moment it happened: Why did it happen, and how did it happen?
All of that is geared towards showing my culture that we had feminist thought before the Western feminism came. If you think Western feminism is wrong, OK, let's get rid of it, but let's look at what we have here. In the end, you're going to find that they intersect.