This paper examines how gendered time burdens shape women’s economic outcomes in Kenya, using a gender economics lens that links unpaid care work to labour-market inequality and constrained asset accumulation. Drawing on secondary data from the 2021 Kenya Time Use Survey, the 2022 Kenya Demographic and Health Survey, and the World Bank Gender Data Portal, this study applies descriptive and comparative gender-gap analysis to assess disparities in unpaid care, labour-force participation, employment quality, land ownership, and financial inclusion. The results show persistent structural inequalities. Kenya’s time-use data indicate that unpaid domestic and care work remains heavily feminised, with women contributing far more unpaid care hours than men; the national household satellite account estimates 25.8 billion hours for women compared with 4.8 billion hours for men in 2021. Labour-market indicators similarly reveal disadvantages: in 2024, female labour-force participation stood at 62.2% versus 71.4% for males, and women were more concentrated in vulnerable employment (73.6% versus 56.4%) and less represented in wage and salaried work (25.6% versus 42.6%). Asset gaps persist as well, with 75.2% of women aged 15–49 reporting no land ownership compared with 66.4% of men, although financial inclusion has improved, with account ownership reaching 86.5% for women and 93.9% for men in 2024. These findings suggest that gender inequality in Kenya is reproduced not only through wages and employment status but also through unequal time allocation and weaker command over productive assets. This study concludes that care-sensitive macro and labour policies, expanded access to decent work, and stronger women’s property rights are central to inclusive growth and women’s economic empowerment in Kenya.

After September 11, 2001 and in more recent years (the Trump Era), Muslim people and communities have been subject to unique threats of discrimination, surveillance, and violence, as a result of stigmatization. Muslim women encounter gender-based violence at the axes of multiple marginalizations which informs contemporary notions of Islamophobia. Gender-based violence and harassment of Muslim women in public spaces continue to be linked to hypervisibility (veiling), yet ‘invisible’ (non-veiled) Muslim women are also susceptible to gendered anti-Muslim assaults in the public sphere. Drawing from an exploratory qualitative study that examined the perceptions of Muslim women (n= 27) across racial, ethnic, and immigrant identity during the first Trump Administration in the US, findings indicate that Muslim women in the US navigate public spaces from a unique intersectional position where they encounter a spectrum of interpersonal violence including social surveillance, physical violence, and verbal assaults. Because these experiences are shaped by racialized gender norms and perceptions of Muslims as perpetual foreigners (immigrants), findings center how Muslim women resist normalized violence by embracing protective measures and increased participation in civic engagement. Thus, Muslim women negotiating their existence in society highlights the double bind they face that shapes experiences of invisible victimization and informs understandings of intragender interpersonal harassment.

This article examines how gender is constructed, negotiated, and reproduced through local narratives in the thematic villages of Malang City, Indonesia. Drawing on qualitative research within the framework of feminist theory and gender studies, this study explores storytelling as a gendered social practice embedded in everyday community life and local cultural production. Using in-depth interviews, participant observation, and textual analysis of oral and visual narratives, this research investigates how stories told by community members articulate, legitimize, and sometimes contest gender roles, identities, and power relations within village spaces shaped by tourism and creative initiatives. The findings reveal that storytelling functions both as a site of gender reinforcement—where normative femininity and masculinity are reiterated and naturalized—and as a space of negotiation, particularly through women’s narratives that subtly or explicitly challenge dominant representations. Thematic villages, while frequently promoted as sites of cultural creativity, economic empowerment, and participatory development, also operate as gendered spaces in which narrative authority is unevenly distributed and certain voices are selectively amplified or marginalized. By foregrounding local narratives as analytical entry points, this study highlights the role of storytelling in shaping gendered meanings of place, labor, belonging, and community identity. This article contributes to gender studies by demonstrating how localized narrative practices provide critical insights into the everyday production, regulation, and transformation of gender beyond formal institutions, emphasizing the importance of narrative and place-based approaches in feminist qualitative research and community studies.

Achieving gender parity in global climate governance remains a crucial component of equitable and effective policymaking. Drawing on the Gender Composition Report 2025 (FCCC/CP/2025/4) prepared by the UNFCCC Secretariat, this paper analyses official data from COP 29 (CMP 19/CMA 6) and the subsidiary body sessions (SB 62) to assess progress toward gender balance in climate decision-making. The findings reveal incremental but measurable improvement: women accounted for 37.8 per cent of Party delegates at COP 29—an increase of 1.8 percentage points compared with 2024—and 32.3 per cent of heads and deputy heads of delegation, representing a 4.8-percentage-point gain. Notably, the SB 62 June sessions achieved full gender balance among Party delegates, with 53.2 per cent female representation. Across UNFCCC constituted bodies, 7 of 17 achieved gender balance, and overall female representation averaged 40 per cent—up from 39 per cent in 2024. Two case studies embedded in the report underscore a broader trend toward inclusivity: gender-balanced side-event panels rose from 20 per cent (COP 26) to 39 per cent (COP 29), while comparable subsidiary-body panels increased from 28 per cent (SB 56) to 53 per cent (SB 62). Together, these patterns indicate that institutional commitments—such as the enhanced Lima Work Programme on Gender and its Gender Action Plan—are translating into measurable gains. The paper situates these developments within social-science frameworks of gender equity, representation, and global policy learning, with particular emphasis on progress in the Global South.

Hegemonic masculinity is a form of masculinity that serves to legitimize and protect men's dominant position in society by establishing superiority over women and other masculinities (Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005). It is defined by being heterosexual, anti-effeminite and anti-gay (Özbay, 2013). Therefore, for a man to possess an acceptable form of masculinity in a culture where same-sex desire is equated with femininity, he must be anti-homosexual. This pressure leads some gay men to engage in femiphobia (anti-effeminacy) and de-feminize themselves to avoid being seen as “less of a man”, or “like a woman”. (Eslen-Ziya & Koç, 2016; Taywaditep, 2002). Hegemonic masculinity is not solely an individual or cultural concept; it is constructed on three levels which influence each other. Hofstede's cultural dimensions can be a valuable framework to understand how hegemonic masculinity is experienced and enforced in a culture. In Türkiye, specifically dimensions of power distance, motivation towards success, and uncertainty avoidance can be used to understand how hegemonic masculinity is experienced by queer men. This study examines the construction and maintenance of hegemonic masculinity on the primarily used gay dating app (Hornet) in Türkiye through qualitative discourse analysis on 193 user profiles from seven different cities. Emerging themes were “Ideal Masculinity”, “Sexual Role and Hierarchy" and “Secrecy and Respectability”, which are interpreted through the lens of Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions. The findings demonstrate that hegemonic masculinity survives within queer spaces not by denying homosexuality, but reshaping it into forms that remain compatible with patriarchal, heteronormative, and culturally sanctioned notions of masculinity.

“In Delhi, we pay extra for the privilege of not moldering.” This observation, offered by a transmasculine collaborator in my research, names what I theorize as the “sunlight tax”—a biopolitical calculus where access to light, air, and safe habitation is rationed by the intertwined logics of caste, capital, and cis-heteropatriarchy. Through this paper, I map how everyday spatial inequalities are not accidental by-products of a disorganized rental market, but are engineered outcomes of what I term Brahminical biopolitics. I use this framework to employ Foucault’s analysis of state power, along with Ambedkar’s indictment of caste spatiality, to reveal the colonial and Brahminical orders that converge to pathologize trans bodies. I argue that this renders trans lives perpetually on the margins of the habitable city.

Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork, life histories, and participatory research with 12 transmasculine individuals in South Delhi’s margins, this paper traces how everyday inequalities accumulate across scales: the body, the rental room, the street, and the city. State mechanisms of nominal inclusion, such as the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act (2019) and the Garima Greh shelter homes, are shown to function as carceral rather than caring spaces, enforcing discretion, selective penalization, and temporal tolerability over permanence. These are not failures of policy but its underlying logics: who is stopped, who is policed, whose informal dwelling is razed, and whose precarity is rendered invisible are all questions written by caste and produced through colonial continuities.

Yet, against this violent cartography, trans individuals engineer improvised sovereignties: forging kinship networks that function as urban infrastructure, reclaiming otherwise “unruly” spaces as heterotopias of compensation, and transforming their cramped rentals into nodes of community care. This paper contends that these acts of queer homemaking constitute a living counter-cartography, which is a practice of spatial abundance that maps a right to the city from its discarded fragments.

This study examines gender equality and sexual diversity in Thailand through an interdisciplinary framework that integrates mathematical modeling, social analysis, and gender studies. Focusing on male, female, and LGBTQ+ populations, the research explores how evolving social values, legal reforms, and educational practices shape gender relations from the past to the present, while projecting future trajectories.

The study employs analytical and conceptual modeling to represent relationships between key social variables, including gender norms, access to sex education, legal recognition of same-sex marriage, and public attitudes toward sexual diversity. Using Thailand as a case study, the model captures historical transitions from traditional family-centered and heteronormative values toward increasing recognition of gender equality and inclusivity. Particular attention is given to the social implications of marriage equality, changes in sex education policies, and shifting perceptions of masculinity, femininity, and non-binary identities.

Rather than relying solely on descriptive narratives, this research applies simplified mathematical structures—such as relational mappings and trend-based analytical models—to conceptualize how institutional reforms and cultural values interact over time. This approach allows for systematic comparison between past social configurations and emerging patterns, as well as scenario-based projections of future developments in gender equality.

The findings suggest that Thailand is undergoing a nonlinear transformation in gender norms, characterized by tensions between traditional social values and progressive legal and educational reforms. The study demonstrates that mathematical and analytical modeling can offer valuable insights into complex social processes, contributing to gender studies by providing a structured framework for understanding social change. The paper highlights the relevance of interdisciplinary approaches for analyzing gender equality and sexual diversity in contemporary societies, particularly in the Global South.

Introduction: Mukbang videos on TikTok have become a prominent form of digital food content, transforming eating into a public, mediated, and interactive practice. This paper examines how mukbangs function as a site for the performance of gendered norms related to appetite, bodily control, and visibility. Drawing on gender performativity theory and sociological studies of food consumption, the study explores how appetite itself is socially and gendered constructed within platform cultures. Methods: The research employs qualitative content analysis of a purposive sample of highly engaged TikTok mukbang videos produced by creators of different genders. In addition, an analysis of user comments was conducted to examine audience reactions and moral evaluations related to food consumption, body image, and self-discipline. Videos and comments were coded thematically with particular attention to gendered patterns of representation and interaction. Results: The findings indicate significant gender differences in both the performance and reception of mukbang content. Women and gender-diverse creators are more frequently subjected to moralizing, health-focused, and sexualized judgments, whereas male creators are more often associated with humor, excess, and spectacle. At the same time, some creators strategically use mukbangs to challenge dominant norms of restraint and thinness, framing visible appetite as pleasure and self-assertion. Conclusions: The study concludes that TikTok mukbangs simultaneously reproduce and contest gendered expectations surrounding eating and the body. By making appetite publicly visible, mukbangs reveal how digital consumption practices are deeply embedded in power relations shaped by gender and platform logics. This research contributes to gender studies and digital sociology by highlighting appetite as a key dimension of online identity performance.

This study explored the paradoxical role of the dera (communal household) in shaping the everyday lives of transgender individuals in Pakistan. Drawing on in-depth qualitative interviews with 31 transgender participants selected through purposive sampling, the study explores how the guru–chela system simultaneously provides protection, belonging, and material survival while reproducing dependency, surveillance, and constrained autonomy. Guided by structural injustice theory and Foucauldian governmentality, the study conceptualizes the dera as a form of protective marginalisation. This informal governance structure emerges in response to state absence but reproduces hierarchical control over marginalized bodies. Data were analysed using Braun and Clarke’s reflexive thematic analysis, allowing for a nuanced examination of how power, discipline, and care intersect in everyday life. Findings reveal that family rejection, educational exclusion, and labour market barriers channel transgender individuals into community-based living arrangements that provide safety yet limit long-term mobility and self-determination. While the dera mitigates extreme vulnerability, it also institutionalizes dependence through moral regulation and economic control. The study argues that legal recognition alone is insufficient to address transgender marginalisation and calls for structural interventions that confront the informal systems through which inequality is reproduced. By situating transgender experiences within broader governance and power structures, this study contributes to critical debates on gender, marginality, and social justice in the Global South.

Gender inequality remains one of the most persistent barriers to sustainable social development and community resilience in sub-Saharan Africa. In Nigeria, environmental degradation, economic disparities, and institutional fragility interact to deepen gender-based vulnerability. This study integrates geospatial techniques with participatory research to analyse how spatial factors influence gendered experiences of risk and resilience. Multi-temporal satellite imagery and census datasets were processed in ArcGIS and QGIS to map vulnerability hotspots across selected states, while interviews and focus group discussions with local leaders, women’s associations, and policy actors provided qualitative insights. Quantitative mapping revealed that areas undergoing rapid land-use change and weak environmental governance experience intensified gender disparities in access to resources and recovery capacity. Qualitative findings further highlighted the critical role of women’s networks, traditional institutions, and grassroots governance in sustaining resilience through mutual support and adaptive innovation. The integration of spatial data and social evidence provides a nuanced understanding of how geography, governance, and gender intersect to produce unequal resilience outcomes. The study concludes that embedding gender-sensitive spatial analysis into national policy planning can enhance social equity, strengthen local governance, and improve adaptive capacity to socio-environmental challenges. This interdisciplinary approach contributes to feminist geography, governance studies, and resilience research by offering a replicable model for integrating spatial evidence into gender-responsive policy frameworks.