Full Description
Decoding conspiracy thinking at the nexus of sexuality, Freemasonry, and the occult.
In this book, anthropologists Rogers Orock and Peter Geschiere examine the moral panic over a perceived rise in homosexuality that engulfed Cameroon and Gabon beginning in the early twenty-first century. As they uncover the origins of the conspiratorial narratives that fed this obsession, they argue that the public's fears were grounded in historically situated assumptions about the entanglement of same-sex practices, Freemasonry, and illicit enrichment.
This specific panic in postcolonial Central Africa fixated on high-ranking Masonic figures thought to lure younger men into sex in exchange for professional advancement. The authors' thorough account shows how attacks on elites as homosexual predators corrupting the nation became a powerful outlet for mounting populist anger against the excesses and corruption of the national regimes. Unraveling these tensions, Orock and Geschiere present a genealogy of Freemasonry, taking readers from London through Paris to francophone Africa and revealing along the way how the colonial past shapes present-day anxieties linking same-sex practices to enrichment.
Contents
Introduction
1. Anti-Masonism and Homophobia: Secrecy as Conspiracy
2. From London via Paris to Africa: Freemasonry, Rosicrucianism, and Postcolonial Dynamics
Interlude 1: Freemasonry in Present-Day Cameroon and Gabon
3. Anusocratie: The Anus as the Source of Illicit Enrichment
Interlude 2: Gender, Secrecy, and Access
4. The Return of Dr. Aujoulat: Decolonization and the Genealogy of a Homo-Masonic Complex
5. "Witchcraft," Wealth, and Same-Sex Intercourse: Tessmann and His Epigones
Conclusions
Acknowledgments
Notes
References
Index
