Uses the content analysis of publicly available information to explore the posture of key public-policy actors on homosexuals and homosexuality. Concludes that this discourse evinces a settled heteronormative value system, reflecting a consensus on either side of the political divide and applauded by popular culture and popular opinion.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
39 p., On 23 May 2010, the Governor-General of Jamaica declared a State of Public Emergency in the parishes of Kingston and St Andrew. Within two days, at least 74 people, including one member of the security forces, had been killed in Tivoli Gardens in West Kingston, and at least 54 others, more than half of them members of the security forces, were injured during police operations. Despite the loss of life and compelling testimonies of grave human rights violations -- including possible extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearances, and arbitrary arrests -- investigations into the violence have yet to establish the facts and the responsibilities conclusively.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
Index number: AMR 38/004/2011, 14 pp., Amnesty International is submitting this briefing to the Human Rights Committee ahead of its examination of Jamaica's third periodic report on the implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The document briefly highlights main aspects of Amnesty International's on-going human rights concerns in Jamaica as well as human rights violations which occurred in the context of the state of emergency between 23 May and 22 July 2010.
African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
10 p., In analyzing Jamaica's Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review, Amnesty International raises concerns about the new Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms, a series of "anti-crime" bills, the death penalty, the restrictive definition of "rape" in the new Sexual Offences Act, legislation which criminalizes sexual acts in private between consenting male adults, and outstanding ratifications. The organization also describes concerns in relation to human rights violations by the police; violence against women and girls; attacks against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons; children in custody; and violence in inner-city communities.
232 p., Calls attention to the renewed popularity of the epistolary novel among Africana contemporary women writers. This work investigates why, since the late nineteen-seventies, there has been a resurgence of this classic form among women writers across the Black Atlantic. The adoption of this genre among women writers in post-colonial contexts is especially significant because the classic epistolary novel was a medium that often endorsed notions of female submission and imperialist ambition. At the same time, the epistolary tradition connotes a revolutionary history. With this idea in mind, the author argues that an examination of how contemporary women revise the epistolary novel offers a crucial perspective regarding the struggles of women throughout various geographic locations and social strata in relation to nation, citizenship, and selfhood. This project focuses on how Sindiwe Magona, Nozipo Maraire, and Paulette Ramsay "reinvent epistolarity," using the epistolary genre to make interventions in the public sphere by depicting Africana women's experiences of education, marriage, inheritance, and health.
