Understanding Sexual Harassment and Girlhood in Institutions of Higher Learning: The Case of Uganda

Jackline Kirungi (), Maren Marie Hawkins (), Anne Dressel () and Lucy Mkandawire-Valhmu ()
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Jackline Kirungi: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Maren Marie Hawkins: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Anne Dressel: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Center for Global Health Equity
Lucy Mkandawire-Valhmu: University of Minnesota, School of Nursing

Chapter Chapter 10 in African Feminist Girlhood Studies and Development, 2025, pp 191-204 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract In this chapter, we examine a dialogue on sexual harassment, which underscores girls’ agency to hold institutions and perpetrators accountable and hence represents girls’ voices. We examine presentations, questions, and responses advanced by girls and their male interlocutors during a facilitated conversation on sexual harassment at a major university in Kampala, Uganda. Our qualitative analysis is a cross-sectional and descriptive inquiry which centers girls’ voices and identifies key themes generated from the dialogue to create meaning and shared understanding of girls’ experiences. The dialogue took place with university students in 2018 during a gender identity week. We also reconsider girlhood and capture a significant cohort of females in the Global South that are highly underrepresented. Neither children nor adult women, these girls are often ignored by common support structures in Africa, such as the family and the state and at worst surveilled and disciplined. Therefore, we also question the categories of children and adolescents that subscribe to standard definitions and are prioritized by most researchers on sexual harassment. Hence, in our research, the category of girls includes females still dependent on their parents for their basic needs, who are not children, but are not yet independent adults. We use a black feminist lens to center girls’ experiences of sexual harassment. We therefore draw attention to the institutionalization of feminism, and thus, the importance of gender forums that invoke gender activity and thought to express the desired and undesired gender relations.

Keywords: Empowerment; Makerere University; Self-esteem; Sexual harassment; Uganda (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:gdechp:978-3-031-91561-1_10

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-91561-1_10

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