RT Article
T1 Taking "the sex thing" back in South Africa: worthy women bargaining for a place in Utopia
JF Journal of theology for Southern Africa
VO 164
SP 4
OP 22
A1 Stander, Sunelle
A1 Forster, Dion
LA English
YR 2019
UL https://ixtheo.de/Record/1691731307
AB Intersections between race, class and gender, can lead to a range of complex, and even perplexing, relationships between individuals within a given society. This is true in South Africa where a group of women are willingly subjecting their bodies, and a measure of their agency, to their husbands because of their theological convictions. South Africa is a country that is undergoing social, political and economic change. This article argues that a group of white Afrikaner women are making choices about sex, their standing in society, and their roles in their families, for the sake of spiritual, social, and economic security. The Worthy Women movement, a Christian social movement promoting female subordination and male headship amongst mainly white, middle-class, South African women, is considered as a case study to explore the impact of these intersections on the theology and lives of these white Afrikaner women. The article explicates and considers notions of whiteness, internalized oppression, and patriarchal bargaining in order to gain a better understanding of why the Worthy Women movement is so popular despite its oppressive theology and practices.