Table Of ContentFemale Child Soldiering,
Gender Violence,
and Feminist Theologies
Edited by Susan Willhauck
Female Child Soldiering, Gender Violence,
and Feminist Theologies
“This courageous and interdisciplinary book disturbs and provokes the readers by
putting the plight of female child soldiers at the center of theological, ethical, and
pastoral inquires. The atrocities inflicted on girls because of war, violence, rape,
poverty, and global racism are discussed with cultural sensitivity and astute moral
insights. This book issues a clarion call for action, commitment, and solidarity. I
highly recommend it.”
—Kwok Pui-lan, author of Postcolonial Imagination
and Feminist Theology (2005)
“This unusual volume helps us understand the way that child soldiers who are girls
and young women are exploited in war, on one hand, and resist and exercise
agency through their soldiering, on the other. These well-written essays will leave
the reader both sobered and surprised—and with much to ponder! I commend
this book to anyone concerned about the role of children in violence and peace.”
—Pamela D. Couture, Jane and Geoffrey Martin Chair in Church and
Community, Emmanuel College of Victoria University
in the University of Toronto
“An excellent showcase of transnational feminist collaborative scholarship!
Through multilayered, multidisciplinary and multi-context-based analyses of
female child soldiering, the book educates readers on the complexity of the issue
which requires transnational feminist interrogation and hidden militarization poli-
cies of the US, a critical blind spot in many North American feminist theologies.
The book advances current feminist theories of power and resistance to an embod-
ied ethical and moral engagement of solidarity.”
—Boyung Lee, Professor of Practical Theology,
Iliff School of Theology, USA
“This collection of essays is a timely and urgent wakeup call. It draws attention to
a neglected moral outrage and scandal of our times: the militarization and even
weaponization of children. The essays call all of us to identify and address root
causes, such as hegemonic toxic sexualities. They are also a call to action for soul
searching to discern and acknowledge how we may be complicit in our denial,
hypocrisy and misplaced justification of the violence through our actions of omis-
sion and of commission. They summon us to pull the enduring scandal of violence
against women from the margins to the center of our ethical discernment and
action. The book is a must read for all who care about children’s rights, the duty
to protect those rights and the duty to ensure an environment where children,
both male and female, can flourish with dignity.”
—Teresia Hinga, Associate Professor of Religious Studies/African
Christianity, Santa Clara University and founding member of the Circle
of Concerned African Women Theologians
“This book challenges the reader to not only listen to the horrors of what being a
child soldier entails, but it also opens one’s eyes to the resistance and resilience
inbuilt in each story. Furthermore, the authors challenge the reader to be part of a
strong definitive voice that elevates these girls’/women’s resistance, healing and
their peace-building approaches to take a stand in contributing to the process of
unpacking moral, religious and political commitments which help to dismantle the
ongoing recruitment and deployment of child soldiers. For persons committed to
ensuring that all live life in abundance with gender justice and peace without sex-
ual, gender-based violence, this book is a must read.”
—Fulata Lusungu Moyo, World Council of Churches
Susan Willhauck
Editor
Female Child
Soldiering, Gender
Violence, and Feminist
Theologies
Editor
Susan Willhauck
Atlantic School of Theology
Halifax, NS, Canada
ISBN 978-3-030-21981-9 ISBN 978-3-030-21982-6 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21982-6
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A
cknowledgments
This book would not exist without the encouragement and support of
friends, family, colleagues, and editors. Many thanks to Amy Invernizzi at
Palgrave Macmillan for recognizing its worth and for her guidance
throughout the project. I have valued her wisdom, expertise, and gra-
ciousness. I am grateful to the Women and Religion Unit of the American
Academy of Religion for first giving space to this topic and generating
critical review. With all my heart and soul, I thank the contributors to this
volume for stepping up to the challenge to write on this topic, and for
their bold and provocative ideas. My hope is that these chapters will
expand knowledge, discussion, and action toward restoring the lives and
well-being of children everywhere and further the resistance and resilience
of girls and women in the wake of violence.
I deeply appreciate the administration, faculty, and students of the
Atlantic School of Theology (AST), where I teach. I have great respect for
my colleagues there—quintessential dialogue partners and superb schol-
ars. Thank you to the administration for supporting and promoting fac-
ulty scholarship. Robert Martel and Brad Murray in the AST library were
an enormous help. I also wish to acknowledge the Pine Hill Foundation
at AST (and Brenda Munro) for providing me with the Leni Groeneveld
Research Grant. And a special thank you to Cynthia O’Connell, my
research assistant at AST, candidate for ministry in the United Church of
Canada and “citation machine,” for her intensive labor and dedication to
this project.
v
vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I have felt the weight of this material as those who read it likely will as
well. Until that time when violence is heard in the land no more, may we
lay our trust in the bosom of God.
Susan Willhauck
c
ontents
1 Violence, Power, Resistance and Resilience: An
Introduction 1
Susan Willhauck
2 Human Rights, Dignity, and Female Child Soldiers: A
Theological Approach 13
Beverly Eileen Mitchell
3 Sexual Violence in Conflict: Understanding the
Experience of Child Soldiers 27
Shelly Whitman
4 Confronting US Moral Hypocrisy on Child Soldiers,
Inventing Antiracist Solidarity 43
Traci C. West
5 “I’d Rather Die than Wrestle”: Gender, Spirituality, and
Agency Amongst the Luba Mai-Mai 59
Georgette I. Mulunda Ledgister
6 Education in Resistance to Child Soldiering: A Latina
Liberation Theology Perspective 75
Débora B. A. Junker
vii
viii CONTENTS
7 “Some Girls Are So Vicious that Even the Boys Fear
Them”: Girls and Gangs in Jamaica 93
Marjorie Lewis, Dianne McIntosh, and Anna Kasafi Perkins
8 Factory Girls and ‘Comfort’ Girls: A Feminist Theo-
Ethical Reflection on Korean Girl Soldiers in Japanese
Empire 109
Keun-Joo Christine Pae
9 Battling a ‘War within a War’: Challenges of Being
Female in Africa 123
Mary Nyangweso
10 Pastoral Care in the Trauma of Gender Violence 145
Mazvita Machinga
11 Divine Fortitude: A Reflection on the Incarnation of the
Black Female Child Soldier 163
Evelyn L. Parker
Appendix 179
Index 181
n c
otes on ontributors
Débora B. A. Junker, PhD, is Assistant Professor of Christian Education
at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, IL, where she
directs the Hispanic-Latinx Center. She is the founder and director of the
Cátedra Paulo Freire and the author of several books in Portuguese and
the forthcoming Religious Education for Global Citizenship: Embracing
Compassion and Solidarity.
Georgette I. Mulunda Ledgister, PhD, is a scholar of social ethics,
whose research interests focus on the intersection of religion, conflict, and
gender. Ledgister is the executive director of Fearless Dialogues, a non-
profit organization based in Atlanta, Georgia, and is a visiting instructor at
Agnes Scott College.
Marjorie Lewis, PhD, was the first woman to be appointed President of
the United Theological College of the West Indies. She is a minister of the
United Church in Jamaica and the Cayman Islands and a member of
the Caribbean Women Theologians for Transformation.
Mazvita Machinga, PhD, is a psychotherapist with Pastoral Care and
Counselling Services, Mutare, Zimbabwe, and dean of student affairs at
Africa University.
Dianne McIntosh, M.Phil, is Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of
National Security, Kingston, Jamaica. Her work experiences have evolved
around areas such as human security, sociology, project management, and
public administration within international, public, and private organizations.
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