Among the Maasai: A Memoir

by Juliet Cutler

Overview

In 1999, Juliet Cutler leaves the United States to teach at the first school for Maasai girls in East Africa. Captivated by the stories of young Maasai women determined to get an education in the midst of a culture caught between the past and the future, she seeks to empower and support her students as they struggle to define their own fates.

Cutler soon learns that behind their shy smiles and timid facades, her Maasai students are much stronger than they appear. For them, adolescence requires navigating a risky world of forced marriages, rape, and genital cutting, all in the midst of a culture grappling with globalization. In the face of these challenges, these young women believe education offers hope, and so, against all odds, they set off alone―traveling hundreds of miles and even forsaking their families―simply to go to school.

Twenty years of involvement with this school and its students reveal to Cutler the important impacts of education across time, as well as the challenges inherent in tackling issues of human rights and extreme poverty across vastly different cultures. Working alongside local educators, Cutler emerges transformed by the community she finds in Tanzania and by witnessing the life-changing impact of education on her students.

Proceeds from the sale of this book support education for at-risk Maasai girls.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781631526725
Publisher:	She Writes Press
Publication date:	09/10/2019
Pages:	312
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Juliet Cutler regularly returns to Tanzania and serves as an advocate for girls’ education worldwide. As a writer, her literary and professional publications number more than two dozen, and she has taught writing in many settings. She holds an MA in English from Colorado State Universityand a BS in education from the University of North Dakota. When she’s not writing, Juliet consults as an education and exhibition specialist for museums, parks, and cultural centers throughout the world.

Preface

Prologue: A School for Maasai Girls It took Neng’ida, Miriam, and many of their classmates more than a decade to tell me their full stories. By then they were in their midtwenties, and I was in my midthirties. Though we were still young, we’d been tested, and through this, we’d come to trust one another. We understood that though we came from vastly different places, our lives had intersected for a brief, seminal period in time. We’d shared something—we’d all been transformed by a school in the heart of Maasailand. Within a few months, at the end of 1998 and the beginning of 1999, we all left our respective homes to follow the pull of some- thing we felt was greater than our individual existences—perhaps it was a desire to help others, or a belief that our lives should be lived on the edge of what was possible, or maybe we simply sought knowledge or a better life. In some cases, including mine, the allure of adventure held sway. My students’ motives certainly fell into much more immediate and pressing categories than my fanciful and high-minded reasons. At the age of fourteen, Neng’ida ran away from her father and a marriage he’d arranged for her. Half a world away, at the age of twenty-four, I thought I could help. In some ways, I was right, but in many ways, I would learn, I was wrong. Helping others and empowering others are not always the same thing. Neither are sim- ple matters, particularly for outsiders, but I didn’t know this yet. If I had, I might never have gone. That said, Neng’ida, her fellow students, and I all guilelessly stumbled our way toward each other and the Maasai Secondary School for Girls, and today I believe we would say that we are the better for it. Here’s why.

Editorial Reviews

2020 Best Book Awards Finalist in Narrative: Non-Fiction
2020 IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award, Best New Voice in Nonfiction (Gold Medal Winner)
2020 Independent Publisher Book Award, Multicultural Nonfiction (Gold Medal Winner)
2020 National Indie Excellence Award, Multicultural Nonfiction (Gold Medal Winner)
2020 International Book Awards, Best New Non-Fiction (Finalist)
2020 International Book Awards, Narrative Non-Fiction (Finalist)
2020 Eric Hoffer Award (Finalist)
2020 American Book Fest: Best Book Award, Narrative Non-Fiction (Finalist)
2019 Living Now Book Award, Inspirational Memoir by a Woman (Bronze Medal Winner)
2019 Sarton Women’s Book Award, Memoir (Finalist)
2019 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year, Women’s Studies (Finalist)
2019 Chanticleer Journey Book Award for Narrative Nonfiction (Semi-Finalist)

“The book is a valuable record, showing both the successes and limitations of education . . . [an] enlightening account of teaching in East Africa.”
—Kirkus Reviews

“A thoroughly engaging and meaningful look into the struggles confronted by many indigenous societies today and the challenges faced by the educators who are at the forefront during these rapidly changing times.”
—Kenneth Cushner, EdD, Professor Emeritus, International Education, Kent State University, and author of Teacher as Traveler and Beyond Tourism

“Few writers are gifted with Cutler’s graceful ability to step back when necessary, balancing between her roles as narrator, observer, and participant. Among the Maasai is a must-read for anyone dedicated to the uplifting of women by women, the gender-education gap, and the beauty of perseverance.”
—Camille Griep, editor of Easy Street: A Magazine of Words and Culture, communications director for Prison Renaissance, and author of New Charity Blues and Letters to Zell

“This is a credible, brave work that reflects the stark realities faced by girls from the majority of Maasai society and the hurdles they face on the way to achieving educational liberation.”
—Nengai Lazaro Benton, English teacher, graduate of Maasai Girls Secondary School

“With courage, Juliet Cutler confronts the complexities of privilege, race, culture, and self-doubt, as well as the paradox of helping others. She emerges transformed by lifelong friendships and with the conviction that empowering local leaders makes a profound difference. Among the Maasai is a compelling must-read for anyone working in developing countries.”
—Deborah Griffin, LCSW, former chair of La Gonave Haiti Partners

“Juliet Cutler observes complex juxtapositions—intersections of wealth and poverty, modern and traditional, insider and outsider. She asks herself difficult questions—about her place in the business of helping, her motives, and the limits of her role as a teacher from a different culture. But there is powerful sophistication in her questions and in this beautiful account of transformation.”
—Daudi Msseemmaa, Senior Adviser, Mwangaza Education for Partnership

“Juliet Cutler’s insights into the lives and challenges of the Maasai people make for a compelling read and honest look behind the veneer of village life often seen by tourists.”
—Lisa Brochu and Tim Merriman, PhD, coauthors of The Leopard Tree

"This brave and heartfelt account of Juliet Cutler’s journey in Tanzania is an inspiring and important work. Through the intersection of her story with the extraordinary experiences of her young Maasai students, Juliet reveals the transformative power of education.”
—Herta Feely, author of Saving Phoebe Murrow

“In a world where white saviors in Africa tend to reign supreme, Among the Maasai is a breath of fresh air . . . this exceptional narrative is compelling, honest, and real. Cutler’s writing cuts through preconceived notions of what it means to cross borders and build relationships. A must-read for anyone who cares about educating girls in developing countries.”
—Daniel Ruth, Executive Director, Lutheran Partners in Global Ministry

“Cutler deftly conveys how her work with the Maasai people transformed her life in deep and significant ways with empathy, grace, honesty, respect, and sensitivity to the Maasai people and their culture. This book is a must read for anyone in development practice, girls’ education, women and gender empowerment, and cultural studies.”
—Damaris Parsitau, PhD, Associate Professor, Religion and Gender Studies, Harvard University, and Echidna Global Scholar 2017, Brookings Institution

“This book is beautifully written and should be on the prescribed reading list for all schools. . . . It made me laugh and cry as I feverishly turned the pages. I loved it.”
—Lucinda E. Clarke, Readers’ Favorite

“This fascinating memoir chronicles the courage and tenacity of a young couple teaching in the heart of Africa. Juliet Cutler presents a frank account of the moral dilemmas she encounters as she plunges into a tribal society where young girls face many challenges, yet generosity thrives. Prepare to be inspired by the true stories of girls who struggle against repressive traditions to become educated young women making a difference in the world.”
—Gayle Woodson, author of After Kilimanjaro

“Written with passion and self-awareness, Juliet Cutler's Among the Maasai offers a clear-eyed account of a white woman's quest to be helpful in an African nation. Imparting the stories of girls and women she comes to know through her teaching, Cutler educates readers about the cultural intelligence of the Maasai and their dedication to family and community, as well as the particular costs to girls of traditional life in a changing world. At once memoir, spiritual odyssey, and cultural analysis, Among the Maasai is a gorgeous, honest book.”
—Elaine Neil Orr, author of Swimming Between Worlds

From the Publisher

2019-06-18
A woman recounts her two decades dedicated to educating Massai girls in Tanzania in this debut memoir.

Many teachers have said that they learned as much from their students as their students learned from them. When the pupils are the girls of Maasailand, the lessons learned are a bit different than those gleaned by other teachers. When the 24-year-old native of Billings, Montana, arrived in the country in the late 1990s to teach at the Maasai Secondary School for Girls, Cutler met teenagers whose experiences had already included the threat of arranged marriages, early motherhood, polygamy, and genital mutilation in addition to rampant gender discrimination and severe poverty. "Helping others and empowering others are not always the same thing," writes the author in her introduction, recalling her idealistic motivations. "Neither are simple matters, particularly for outsiders, but I didn't know this yet. If I had, I might never have gone." Using her own experiences as well as those of some of her students—including a teen whose father was ordered by village elders to educate one of his 23 children and a pupil who, at the age of 13, escaped an arranged marriage to a 30-year-old—Cutler presents a picture of the joys and challenges faced by this first generation of educated Maasai girls. Following her two-year stint in Tanzania, the author continued to support the school from afar for 20 years. Cutler's prose is considered and often lyrical, as when she describes the physical conditions of the Great Rift Valley: "During the dry season, it is a dusty, radiating cauldron of cracked earth. In the wet season, it is a verdant miracle rising from the very brink of despair." The author is sensitive to the traditions of Maasai culture but is unafraid to criticize those aspects that she feels are damaging for girls. The book is a valuable record, showing both the successes and limitations of education and Western assimilation of native cultures. At its heart, though, it is an education memoir—alternatingly moving and tedious, as they frequently are—to which anyone who has spent time in a classroom will likely relate.

A sometimes-slow but often enlightening account of teaching in East Africa.

Kirkus Reviews