To date, the knowledge available about cisgender-trans* couples and their experiences is located in the global North. Research situated in the interest of trans*, transgender and transsexual people's lives most often furthers scholars' understanding of gender. In my research, I employed strategies to look at the experiences of the cisgender partners of masculine identifying trans* persons, in order to learn more about gender Post-apartheid South Africa is a country that is vibrant with discussions in mainstream platforms about contemporary political and socio-economic matters, regularly framed in sexist approaches with clear patriarchal messages. How and where does the trans* masculine person find role models and what is that impact on the cisgender-trans* relationship? Bringing together literature from the global North and South Africa, I formed a theoretical framework that served as the context to support my research. As a feminist, I employ both feminist theory and transgender theory in my qualitative study. I interviewed fourteen cisgender partners of masculine identifying trans* persons. From the rich data, five themes emerged and were analysed through a content analysis approach.

A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Arts in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in the Department of English at the University of Zululand, South Africa, 2013. / Polygamy is widely practised in African communities. The African social-realist novel, especially when it is woman-authored, shows female characters as having to play docile, subservient roles and accept demeaning positions in polygamous marriages. Although it has been claimed that traditional African marriage creates a satisfactory situation for women, mainly by means of the security it offers and the bonds that it forges between co-wives, the narrators of African realist novels almost always expose only evils associated with polygamy. In most of the texts, co-wives experience conflict with one another, not bonds. Men are portrayed as egocentric beings that greedily satisfy their sexual impulses at the expense of women. Encouraged by their families, they inflict irreparable emotional damage not only on their accumulated wives but often also on their offspring. While blinded by their desires, these men engender many unplanned children for whom they usually take little fatherly responsibility. Consequently, children too are objects of pity in many of the books. This dissertation, by means of close analysis of select African narratives, reveals that, despite all the struggles for liberation and democracy, values highly regarded in modern societies, polygamy is a prevailing sign of male dominance in African communities today. The dissertation shows that even such male-authored novels as Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart and Onuora Nzekwu’s High Life For Lizards fail to recommend a polygamous life to women, while Mariama Bâ ’s So Long a Letter and Scarlet Song, Buchi Emecheta’s The Joys of Motherhood and Kehinde, Es’kia Mphahlele’s Chirundu, Lazarus Miti’s The Prodigal Husband, Ama Ata Aidoo’s Changes, Sue Nyathi’s The Polygamist,SembeneOusmane’s Xala, Lola Shoneyin’s The Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives, Rebecca HourwichReyher’s Zulu Woman, Miriam KWere’s The Eighth Wife, T.M. Aluko’s One Man One Wife and Aminata Sow Fall’s The Beggars’Strike all use polygamy to highlight the incongruence between the ideals of democracy and the facts of life as experienced by African women. These texts reflect real social problems. They cast light on the inequalities that prevail in polygamous relationships and imply that the principle of equality cannot be achieved as long as polygamy exists.