Harmful cultural practices: a critical analysis of cross-cultural discourses and moral understandings of gender, sexuality and embodiment. (FWOAL779)

The concept of ‘harmful cultural practices’ has been increasingly used in development and human rights discourse to refer to practices such as female genital cutting, honour related violence or forced marriages. However, this concept has not been interrogated for its scholarly viability nor has there been a systematic attempt to apply a critical and cross-cultural comparative approach to normative issues concerning gender, sexuality and embodiment. The aim of this project is (1) to critically question the analytical viability and the strategic potential of the notion of harmful cultural practices; (2) to gain a better insight into the way in which women in a migration context experience and negotiate moral and cultural understandings concerning gender, sexuality and embodiment, and (3) to develop an alternative framework that incorporates different cultural perspectives and epistemologies and that allows to question, explain and challenge gender inequalities and discriminatory practices. The project is situated at the crossroads of ethics and anthropology and draws on theoretical insights from feminist ethics and epistemology, the anthropology of moralities and contemporary theories of religion and secularism. It involves a conceptual an empirical inquiry applying discourse, narrative and intersectional analysis. The project includes different case studies on moral and cultural understandings of gender, sexuality and embodiment in a migration context.

Keywords:gender, sexuality, embodiment

Disciplines:Philosophy of humanities