You have full access to this open access article. The article investigates the way unmarried Muslim girls in contemporary Dakar construct their sexuality.
It explores in what way and to what extent female sexuality is being silenced, and if any, in what way pleasure and sexual agency are present in the narratives of those girls about their intimate lives. This article shows the silencing in a male-centered construction of pre-marital sexuality in Dakar, but also reveals female pleasure and sexual agency.
This multi-dimensional understanding of female sexuality of Muslim girls in Senegal provides a more dynamic insight of the power processes surrounding safe sex practices. Islamic expansion in Senegal began in the nineteenth century, at the same time that the French presence in the region grew. I conducted fieldwork in Dakar, the capital of Senegal, in order to gain insight into how young people protect themselves against unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections STIs , including HIV.
In many countries, unmarried young people find themselves in a paradoxical situation where they are not supposed to be sexually active, but at the same time are exposed to unwanted pregnancies and STIs. I was interested in investigating how safe sex practices, or the lack thereof, are embedded in the way the gendered sexualities of unmarried girls and boys are constructed. This article deals with a part of this study: the construction of female pre-marital sexuality in the lived experiences of unmarried girls in Dakar.
With respect to the sexuality of girls and women in Africa, it is common to read statements that women have a disadvantaged status and position and lack control compared to men e.
