What are the visions of gender identity that emerge in contemporary Swahili women`s writing? How are gender relations negotiated? How are the attendant notions of `femininity´ and `masculinity´ defined? How does gender identity implicate issues of power, agency and authority? These and other questions I intend to discuss for three plays by Tanzanian and Kenyan women authors: Heshima Yangu (1974) and Nguzo Mama (1982) by Penina Muhando and Mama Ee (1987) by Ari Katini Mwachofi. The theoretical focus of my analyses is stimulated by the interdisciplinary dialogue between feminist theory, cultural studies, and narrative poetics on narrative identity, in particular literary configurations of gender identities and relations. This collaboration proceeds from the premise that any verbal or performative expression of identity already intertwines narrative and identity by representing an individual subjectivity, a `life story´ (see for example Lieblich & Josselson 1984). Narratives are a way `of making sense´ out of seemingly incoherent experiences, and even the lived life is a `storied life´(Ochberg 1984), a telling or performance of a story.

What are the visions of gender identity that emerge in contemporary Swahili women`s writing? How are gender relations negotiated? How are the attendant notions of `femininity´ and `masculinity´ defined? How does gender identity implicate issues of power, agency and authority? These and other questions I intend to discuss for three plays by Tanzanian and Kenyan women authors: Heshima Yangu (1974) and Nguzo Mama (1982) by Penina Muhando and Mama Ee (1987) by Ari Katini Mwachofi. The theoretical focus of my analyses is stimulated by the interdisciplinary dialogue between feminist theory, cultural studies, and narrative poetics on narrative identity, in particular literary configurations of gender identities and relations. This collaboration proceeds from the premise that any verbal or performative expression of identity already intertwines narrative and identity by representing an individual subjectivity, a `life story´ (see for example Lieblich & Josselson 1984). Narratives are a way `of making sense´ out of seemingly incoherent experiences, and even the lived life is a `storied life´(Ochberg 1984), a telling or performance of a story.