New Directions in Gender and Religion

Brigid M. Sackey’s book is a comprehensive analysis of gender relations in religion in Ghana, using gendered anthropological tools of rare insight and originality. The book chronicles the efforts of men and women who bring a repackaged and customized Christianity and health delivery to meet with the specific cultural needs. Sackey disabuses notions of the helplessness of women in Ghana specifically (and Africa in general) as it highlights women’s initiatives and assertiveness as healers and leaders of the churches they have founded, in addition to their increased involvement and participation in gender discourses and social change. Sackey also addresses the question of HIV and the AIDS epidemic, detailing how the churches, through the specific leadership of women, are supporting a national campaign on the disease. Basing her research on an exhaustive library of oral history, ethnography, theory, and case studies, Sackey has brilliantly chronicled the relentless proliferation of and innovations in African Independent Churches, and their impact on the national health delivery system and its development.