ABSTRACT
Burkina Faso is one African country that offers reconstructive surgery for circumcised women. 1 Burkinabe government officials, ‘Afropolitan’ health professionals and activists opposing ‘female genital mutilation’ portray these practices as inevitably causing grave problems for women. This message has been largely accepted and is reproduced in urban Burkina Faso. Based on fieldwork in Burkina Faso by the first author, we argue that as currently conceptualized, this official discourse re-victimizes circumcised women by redefining what is natural, healthy, desirable, sexually attractive and marriageable. Yet, as we shall suggest, reconstructive surgery is not readily accessible, successful or, indeed, endorsed. Nonetheless, some Burkinabe women seem to have found a space of fulfilment in their adoption of a worldview which combines Raëlian values, traditional Burkinabe ideals, feminist and other discourses.
