Who Should Teach our Boys How to Respect Life?–Theorising Volatile Gender Identities in Botswana

Abstract

On May 20, 2011, the University of Botswana community woke up to the murder of yet another female student by her boyfriend—another instalment of the so-called ‘passion killings’, a term used to refer to the murder of a person by his or her intimate partner. The notion of ‘passion killings’ is increasingly becoming a common phenomenon within the currents of gender inequality and feminist assertiveness in Botswana. While gender discourses articulate global gender issues about (in)equalities and gendered (mis)representations on rigid socio-cultural imaginaries and patriarchal ideologies, in contemporary Botswana society, passion murders elaborate the internal contradictions that haunt feminists and gender activists as they engage the discourse of Feminism. This article seeks to investigate how gender is conceptualised by ordinary denizens and to problematize strategies that have been employed in the fight against the femicide pandemic in Botswana. The issue of gender equality in Botswana requires the use of much more complex strategies, and should embrace the spirit of equality by bringing on board men and boys as important stakeholders (and part of the solution) to stop femicide. To interrogate this form of gendered violence, we use gender performativity theory and feminist discourse analysis as our conceptual frameworks.

Keywords: Botswana, passion killings, masculinities, femininities, gender ideologies, gender equality campaigns