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ID:
185366
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| Summary/Abstract |
Relating to academic debates on the emergence of moral panics over homosexuality in several parts of Africa, this article examines rumours on homosexuality as a political issue that connects colonial pasts and postcolonial struggles in Cameroon. We link current struggles over homosexuality to broader debates about the question of Cameroon’s decolonization from France. The article focuses on the figure of Dr Louis Paul Aujoulat, a French colonial official in Cameroon who played a crucial role in the country’s decolonization in the 1950s. Aujoulat died in 1972, but recently, he made a ‘return’ in rumours and public debates in a new role: he is now accused of having ‘sodomized’ the emergent new elite of Cameroon, thus introducing homosexuality; moreover, he is linked to Freemasonry and occult initiation rites. Our aim was to show how a particular decolonization trajectory—very rocky in the case of Cameroon—is related to the present-day moral panic about a supposed proliferation of homosexuality. Freemasonry and its special history on the African continent—notably its role in maintaining the coherence of Françafrique between France and its former colonies—is a severely understudied topic. Its linkages to same-sex practices and illicit enrichment give the Cameroonian case a wider relevance. We argue that the new rumours on Dr Aujoulat define him as a key figure in linking Freemasonry, homosexuality and illicit enrichment to present-day issues of state governance, citizenship and elite misrule in Cameroon.
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| 2 |
ID:
190110
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| Summary/Abstract |
Freemasonic activity in the Ottoman lands saw an unprecedented growth and dynamism in the final phase of Ottoman history particularly benefitting from its close association with the Young Turk movement and its political apparatus, the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP). Ottoman freemasonry was led to a new level of popularity with a great deal of public visibility, a consequence of which was the formation of the Ottoman Grand Orient as a national organization for the first time in the Ottoman lands. Despite the ensuing controversial accusations and conspiracy theories against the freemasonic institution which became commonplace during the period in question, it occupied a place within the Ottoman state and society which it had never attained before. This made it possible for the Ottoman freemasons to integrate themselves to the universal fraternal discourse of the freemasonic philosophy during a last attempt of the Ottoman administration to keep its remaining lands intact. The intention of this article is to create a window within the broader picture of the socio-political environment of the time with a view to the position and involvement of freemasonry in which its association with the CUP often stands out as a major factor.
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