Full Text Available
Note: Clicking the button above will open the full text document at the original institutional repository in a new window.
Gugule-tois, it's the place to be! : on bodies, sex respectability and social reproduction : women' s experiences of youth on Cape Town's periphery
Initiating this research project I reflected on the subject of popular and youth culture, gender and sexuality; which then drove me to consider an analysis of dress codes and fashion in regards to notions of female respectability. Through my research process, I have often thought that I had digresse...
Saved in:
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Gender Studies
2016
|
| Subjects: | |
| Tags: |
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1867613276874997760 |
|---|---|
| access_status_str | Open Access |
| author | Mupotsa, Danai S |
| author2 | Salo, Elaine |
| author_browse | Mupotsa, Danai S Salo, Elaine |
| author_facet | Salo, Elaine Mupotsa, Danai S |
| author_sort | Mupotsa, Danai S |
| collection | Thesis |
| description | Initiating this research project I reflected on the subject of popular and youth culture, gender and sexuality; which then drove me to consider an analysis of dress codes and fashion in regards to notions of female respectability. Through my research process, I have often thought that I had digressed considerably; yet as I begin to narrate this story I am both surprised and amazed to find that this is in fact what I have done and thankfully, I believe I have done more. This "full circle," in thinking, doing and now presenting new knowledge was initiated in part due to a personal interest in the gendered socio-political, economic and historical meanings attached to the body surface as a whole, which I soon changed to a consideration of both the bodily surface and its interior. As stated in my research proposal, it was my contention that the female body, as opposed to the normative (or rather socially normalized) male body, has been discursively constructed as defiled, unclean and as reeking with sickness according to dominant paradigms of knowledge and social practice. Through the processes of conquest, colonialism, imperialism, racism and apartheid; black people and especially black women's bodies have suffered this violence. I have an interest in dissecting the manner by which such discourses then translate into common-sense understandings about how we both dress and perform our bodies in various social spaces; about how we begin to construct the discourse of "our culture," of good girls and social misfits, who wear the labels of "prostitute," "lesbian," or "rural," (despite their true actions or conditions) within urban spaces in contemporary Southern Africa; considering the impact of the history of a geographical apartheid, a migrant labour system, the production and re/production of notions of femininity closely associated with domesticity and the very dominant narrative of female respectability. |
| format | Thesis |
| id | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/19133 |
| institution | University of Cape Town (South Africa) |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2026-06-10T12:33:33.643Z |
| license_str | Not specified — see source repository |
| provenance_str_mv | Harvested via OAI-PMH from UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| publishDate | 2016 |
| publishDateRange | 2016 |
| publishDateSort | 2016 |
| publisher | Gender Studies |
| publisherStr | Gender Studies |
| record_format | dspace |
| source_str | UCTD — University of Cape Town Open Access Repository |
| spelling | oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/19133 Gugule-tois, it's the place to be! : on bodies, sex respectability and social reproduction : women' s experiences of youth on Cape Town's periphery Mupotsa, Danai S Salo, Elaine Gender Studies Initiating this research project I reflected on the subject of popular and youth culture, gender and sexuality; which then drove me to consider an analysis of dress codes and fashion in regards to notions of female respectability. Through my research process, I have often thought that I had digressed considerably; yet as I begin to narrate this story I am both surprised and amazed to find that this is in fact what I have done and thankfully, I believe I have done more. This "full circle," in thinking, doing and now presenting new knowledge was initiated in part due to a personal interest in the gendered socio-political, economic and historical meanings attached to the body surface as a whole, which I soon changed to a consideration of both the bodily surface and its interior. As stated in my research proposal, it was my contention that the female body, as opposed to the normative (or rather socially normalized) male body, has been discursively constructed as defiled, unclean and as reeking with sickness according to dominant paradigms of knowledge and social practice. Through the processes of conquest, colonialism, imperialism, racism and apartheid; black people and especially black women's bodies have suffered this violence. I have an interest in dissecting the manner by which such discourses then translate into common-sense understandings about how we both dress and perform our bodies in various social spaces; about how we begin to construct the discourse of "our culture," of good girls and social misfits, who wear the labels of "prostitute," "lesbian," or "rural," (despite their true actions or conditions) within urban spaces in contemporary Southern Africa; considering the impact of the history of a geographical apartheid, a migrant labour system, the production and re/production of notions of femininity closely associated with domesticity and the very dominant narrative of female respectability. 2016-04-22T13:34:40Z 2016-04-22T13:34:40Z 2007 Master Thesis Masters MSocSc http://hdl.handle.net/11427/19133 eng application/pdf Gender Studies Faculty of Humanities University of Cape Town |
| spellingShingle | Gender Studies Mupotsa, Danai S Gugule-tois, it's the place to be! : on bodies, sex respectability and social reproduction : women' s experiences of youth on Cape Town's periphery |
| thesis_degree_str | Master's |
| title | Gugule-tois, it's the place to be! : on bodies, sex respectability and social reproduction : women' s experiences of youth on Cape Town's periphery |
| title_full | Gugule-tois, it's the place to be! : on bodies, sex respectability and social reproduction : women' s experiences of youth on Cape Town's periphery |
| title_fullStr | Gugule-tois, it's the place to be! : on bodies, sex respectability and social reproduction : women' s experiences of youth on Cape Town's periphery |
| title_full_unstemmed | Gugule-tois, it's the place to be! : on bodies, sex respectability and social reproduction : women' s experiences of youth on Cape Town's periphery |
| title_short | Gugule-tois, it's the place to be! : on bodies, sex respectability and social reproduction : women' s experiences of youth on Cape Town's periphery |
| title_sort | gugule tois it s the place to be on bodies sex respectability and social reproduction women s experiences of youth on cape town s periphery |
| topic | Gender Studies |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/11427/19133 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT mupotsadanais guguletoisitstheplacetobeonbodiessexrespectabilityandsocialreproductionwomensexperiencesofyouthoncapetownsperiphery |