Funding Source: Wellesley College, Kezfil Trust, IWI – This study uses the controlled comparison method to investigate the role of women and gender dynamics in the creation of communities of freedom that constitute the Returned African Diasporas in West Africa. Field and archival studies are conducted in Liberia, Nigeria, Ghana, the Gambia and Sierra Leone using anthropological methods. The establishment of Returned Diasporas in Africa was a result of the trans-Atlantic Slave Trade and its abolition. These Diasporas restructured and reversed concepts of ‘social death’ to one of ‘social rebirth’ in the rebuilding of new communities in the Motherland. The study shows the central role of women in social organization, cultural reproduction, identity reformulation, community building and the promotion of values of freedom, social justice and equality. It uses African feminism to illustrate some of the tensions and gender dynamics, while centralizing the major contributions of women in the construction and development of these communities of freedom.

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vt7EkRgHLcw