1. Images and narratives of African sexuality have a long origin in stereotype. This volume aims to present a multidimensional view of sex and sexuality on the African continent.

2. Spronk and Hendriks are up-and-coming scholars with interests in anthropology, ethnography, and sexuality in Africa.

3. IUP has a long-standing relationship with the International African Institute to produce a series of textbooks comprised of previously published material about various topics of current interest to Africanist students and scholars. This book is a part of that series and will find an audience with Africanist scholars in humanities and social science disciplines interested in questions surrounding sex and sexuality.

Images and stories about African sexuality abound in today's globalized media. Frequently old stereotypes and popular opinion inform these stories, and sex in the media is predominately approached as a problem in need of solutions and intervention. The authors gathered here refuse an easy characterization of African sexuality and instead seek to understand the various erotic realities, sexual practices, and gendered changes taking place across the continent. They present a nuanced and comprehensive overview of the field of sex and sexuality in Africa to serve as a guide though the quickly expanding literature. This collection offers a set of texts that use sexuality as a prism for studying how communities coalesce against the canvas of larger political and economic contexts and how personal lives evolve therein. Scholars working in Africa, the U.S., and Europe reflect on issues of representation, health and bio-politics, same-sex relationships and identity, transactional economies of sex, religion and tradition, and the importance of pleasure and agency. This multidimensional reader provides a comprehensive view of sexuality from an African perspective.