A Place to Live: Gender Research on Housing in Africa

THIS EDITED VOLUME of academic papers includes an introductory chapter and ten papers covering a wide range of gender research, primarily in Eastern and Southern Africa. The papers were all presented at a seminar that took place to re-examine "…work within the field of gender and housing in the light of recent developments within gender research." The papers have been brought together in order to explore a number of critical and timely issues rather than to provide an overview of housing policies and programmes from a gender perspective. However, the authors were all asked to focus on the theme of the seminar, namely "gendered power relations". The introduction defines some of the concepts that form a basis for the seminar. It also critically explores the meaning of gender roles and gender-related needs, and researchers' perspectives on women and household form.

The ten papers cover a wide range of perspectives. In dealing with issues of power, law and legally defined rights are a strong sectoral focus. Housing and different forms of tenure, in part related to women in different situations, are also a major sectoral theme. The papers also touch on the importance of livelihood to the poor. The case studies are drawn from Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mali, Swaziland and Zambia, and two of the papers have a regional focus. The collection also includes some papers which focus on methodological and conceptual issues.