Teaching Resources | Objectives of the Teaching Group Meeting

The broad goal of the TRG meetings was to identify ways to strengthen transformative teaching and research in the field of gender and women's studies (G/WS) in African Higher Educational Institutions (HEIs). Initial reviews of the literature and teaching profiles of the 30 surveyed university sites suggested that two key areas, sexuality, culture and identity and law and politics, would enable the project to address the most pressing needs of curriculum design.

Four objectives were identified by the group:

•  The teaching of more relevant and intellectually developed G/WS programmes in African HEIs.

•  Enhancing the uptake of African research in G/WS teaching.

•  Improving teaching methodologies.

• Identifying and strengthening core teaching areas for African gender studies programmes.

The first meeting of the Teaching Resources Group was hosted in Accra in May 2003 by the Institute for African Studies, University of Ghana. The second meeting was held in Cape Town in September 2003 and hosted by the African Gender Institute (AGI).

The broad objectives of the TRG process was translated into the following aims:

•  To identify sexuality, culture and identity and law and politics as strategic areas in strengthening G/WS teaching.

•  To deepen understandings of current debates and theorisations in these strategic areas.

•  To share and review African feminist pedagogic perspectives.

•  To develop suggestions for teaching G/WS in the areas identified.

•  To experiment with the demands of curriculum design.

•  To prepare an online resource.

•  To strengthen African G/WS teaching and build a base for future activities.

In order to meet these aims, the programme designers recognised that several different arenas required exploration and consideration. These included:

• The role of G/WS teaching as a transformational tool.
• The trajectories through which current models of G/WS teaching have been developed.
• Questions concerning African feminist pedagogies in general, and those applied within G/WS sites in particular.
• The location of sexuality, culture and identity and law and politics within current G/WS teaching and curriculum design models.
• Questions arising from issues of sexuality, culture and identity.
• The engagement with debates around law and politics.
• The colonial/historical legacy within sexuality, culture and identity discourses.
• Current and diverse debates over questions of sexuality, culture and identity, and law and politics, in connection with gender equality.
• The challenges of incorporating material on sexuality, culture and identity into G/WS curricula.