Book Release Party: Mirka Prazak's 'Making the Mark'

OPEN TO THE PUBLIC | Set in the rolling hills of southwestern Kenya, Making the Mark examines the influences that shape and change female genital cutting over time, presenting a rich mosaic of the voices contributing to the debate. In an ethnography twenty years in the making, Prazak weaves multiple Kuria perspectives—those of girls, boys, family members, circumcisers, political and religious leaders—into a riveting account. Though many books have been published on the topic of genital cutting, this is one of the few ethnographies to give voice to evolving perspectives of practitioners, especially through a period of intense anti-cutting campaigning on the part of international NGOs, local activists, and donor organizations. Prazak also examines the cultural challenges that complicate the human-rights anti-FGM stance. 

 Copies of the book will be available for discounted purchase and light desserts will be served.

Mirka Prazak is a Faculty Member in Anthropology at Bennington College. As a scholar of economic development and cultural change in East Africa, Mirka’s work addresses structural forms of inequality and social forms of well-being, cultural ways of knowing, and the politics of the body. She has contributed chapters to African Families at the Turn of the 21st Century and Africa Today, and published in academic journals including African Studies Review, Journal of African Cultural Studies, The Anthropology of Work Review, and the Journal of African Studies.