Premium
Mosadi Tshwene: the construction of gender and the consumption of alcohol in Botswana
Author(s) -
SUGGS DAVID N.
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
american ethnologist
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.875
H-Index - 78
eISSN - 1548-1425
pISSN - 0094-0496
DOI - 10.1525/ae.1996.23.3.02a00080
Subject(s) - symbol (formal) , consumption (sociology) , masculinity , cash , alcohol consumption , sociology , gender studies , privilege (computing) , meaning (existential) , acculturation , economics , political science , psychology , social science , law , alcohol , immigration , biochemistry , chemistry , computer science , psychotherapist , macroeconomics , programming language
The capitalist economy of Botswana has made alcohol a commodity and thereby altered the cultural meaning of its consumption. Where it was formerly a key symbol of cooperative and familial agricultural production, as well as of the patriarchal and gerontocratic control of labor, today it is more symbolic of competition and individual success in a cash economy. Within the changed economic context, however, both men and women connect current drinking behaviors to “traditional” gender roles, even if they sometimes do so in different ways. Men continue to view drinking as an ascribed right associated with their gender. Women continue to see it as a privilege earned by demonstrated competence. That the BaTswana present today's drinking as continuous with that of the past underscores the malleability of “tradition” as a symbol. [Botswana, alcohol, gender roles, acculturation, aging]