Women have played diverse and critical roles in Kenya’s social, cultural, economic, and political history. Archaeological and ethnographic sources suggest how gender shaped culture, social interactions, production, and consumption in hunter-gatherer, early pastoralist, and Iron Age societies. Gender divisions of labor were flexible, with women engaging in gathering, hunting, care of livestock, domestic labor, and production of crafts and metalwork. During the 15th to 18th centuries, societies were organized by gendered and generational hierarchies, and women played a significant role in agriculture and trade. Rates of unfree labor increased significantly, and women and girls were particularly vulnerable to enslavement and pawning within the African slave systems of the interior and Islamic slave system of the coast. The 19th century brought change and upheaval, including the expansion of Islam and Christian missionary activity, ecological crises, and British occupation. The century also witnessed a dramatic increase in demand for female slaves for domestic and foreign markets. Under British colonial rule, women’s roles and status were circumscribed. Colonialism promoted a model of gender which relegated women to the domestic sphere and strengthened indigenous patriarchy. Women found their access to land and resources steadily eroded, even though their labor enabled the broader colonial capitalist system to function. They channeled their frustrations into labor protest, nationalist politics, and armed struggle. Independence brought change and continuity for Kenyan women and girls. There was a gradual expansion of women’s rights and opportunities in education and employment, alongside the endurance of widespread gender and socioeconomic inequality. Overall, there was no one experience for Kenyan women in any period: women’s experiences varied depending on their age, ethnicity, religion, culture, and status as free or enslaved persons; where some women found widening opportunities, others faced new and enduring constraints; and when some railed against gendered and generational authority structures, others enforced them.
