University of Groningen
Aging and gender in Tanzania Rutagumirwa, Sylivia Karen
IMPORTANT NOTE: You are advised to consult the publisher's version (publisher's PDF) if you wish to cite from it. Please check the document version below.
Document Version
Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record
Publication date: 2018
Link to publication in University of Groningen/UMCG research database
Citation for published version (APA):
Rutagumirwa, S. K. (2018). Aging and gender in Tanzania: Uncovering the cultural schemas, nexus of identities and the Aging Body. University of Groningen.
Copyright
Other than for strictly personal use, it is not permitted to download or to forward/distribute the text or part of it without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), unless the work is under an open content license (like Creative Commons).
Take-down policy
If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.
Downloaded from the University of Groningen/UMCG research database (Pure): http://www.rug.nl/research/portal. For technical reasons the number of authors shown on this cover page is limited to 10 maximum.
Aging and Gender in Tanzania
Uncovering the cultural schemas, nexus of identities and the Aging Body
Sylivia Karen Rutagumirwa
1. The cultural scripts and “habitus” older people acquired and internalised in their early cultural socialisation actively functions in later life; moulding their perceptions and thoughts and shaping their behaviours (this thesis).
2. Gender performances are altered by the age-related decline in the body, given that the body is a vital capital for ‘doing gender (this thesis).
3. Engaging in gender-typed roles is important to older women and men in order to retain their gendered “symbolic capital” in the form of status, respect, and power (this thesis).
4. An individual’s experiences of aging are shaped not only by whether the person is a man or a woman, but by the person’s intersecting identities (this thesis).
5. In many African cultures, including in Tanzania, the subject of sexuality among older people remains largely taboo (Okiria 2014).
6. Although majority of older women in Tanzania share a specific ‘subordinated,’ ‘silenced’ and ‘ignored’ experience, each of these women’s lives tells an own unique story which should not be re-essentialized and categorized (Githinji, 2015).
7. Understanding how cultural norms and gender work is the first step towards encouraging meaningful behavioral changes (this thesis).
8. Older people have the capacity to modify their perspectives, schemata, outlooks, and behaviors (Roth, 2007) if they are able to see that such a change has a definite benefit, and if they are involved in collective evaluations and decisions (this thesis).
9. There is no one perfect theory for a thesis---as an architect must select the type of house to build, the researcher must select the appropriate theory that align with the question at hand (Personal reflection).
