In Idi Amin's Shadow

Alicia C. Decker is an associate professor of women's studies and African studies at Pennsylvania State University. She is the coauthor, with Andrea Arrington, of Africanizing Democracies: 1980 to the Present. Her scholarly articles have appeared in the International Journal of African Historical Studies, Women's History Review, and the Journal of Eastern African Studies, among others.

"In eight engaging chapters … Alicia Decker traces the complex relationship between Amin's regime and Uganda's women, from the early years when women hailed Amin as a liberator to the darkest period when they hoped and prayed for a Tanzanian army invasion. … The question of how Idi Amin's regime reorganized gender norms is a crucial one for the book. Decker explores the innovations in gender performance that followed Idi Amin's rise to power. …This is of course just one of the many rich discussion points that the book gifts the reader with. The book makes a substantial addition to the field of African History. It would work well for courses or discussions on military history, military rule in Africa, women and gender courses, feminist history, postcolonial studies, and Cold War studies." (Canadian Journal of History) "Alicia Decker uses an array of evidence from oral, visual, and written sources. The result is an impressive compilation of case studies that illustrate the different aspects of women's experiences and the intricate world they navigated." "Focusing on the lives of women who survived his rule, Alicia Decker's meticulously researched and crisply written study explains not only why but how Amin's brutality reached the level it did. This is a particularly important contribution, because Ugandan women have been considered marginal to this sociopolitical history. … Throughout the book she demonstrates the methodological and ethical challenges of conducting historical research on a period that still engenders fearful memories, and the book's appendix and the section titled 'Methods and Sources' provide valuable guidelines for future research." (African Studies Review) "Decker's study is a fine contribution to histories of militarism in Africa, African gender studies, the study of the state in Africa, and scholarship on Uganda in the 1970s in particular. …[she] provides an excellent example of the possibilities of feminist history writing by placing gender and militarism side-by-side in her study; she also offers a lucid and highly sought-after account of everyday lived experience during an era that continues to be characterized by an architecture of silence in Uganda today." (Journal of African History) "Unlike most previous publications on Amin that mainly focus on political aspects, this work is a sociopolitical history highlighting the experiences of ordinary Ugandans in general and women in particular. … [It] is an excellent, pioneering masterpiece and Decker [should be] commended for producing such an insightful, readable book." (International Journal of African Historical Studies) "[In Idi Amin's Shadow] should appeal to historians of postcolonial Africa as well as those who study military dictatorships and those interested in gender studies. It is clearly written and although Decker doesnot shy away from describing the violence inflicted on Ugandans and others, she does not eitherindulge in gratuitous detail. The combination of a narrative history of Amin's regime alongsidethe focus on gender and violence and the many illustrations should make it useful forundergraduate teaching."(Journal of African Military History) "A subtle, important, theoretically innovative, and elegantly written study that centralizes feminist thinking and shows why it matters." (Feminist Africa) "In Idi Amin's Shadow is the first book to extensively explore women's lives in the 'shadows' of military rule in 1970s Uganda. Decker's book presents an engaging, accessible and welcome examination of women's 'complex and sometimes paradoxical relationship to Amin's military state,' showing how the state's use of violence offered opportunities as well as threats for women." (Africa at LSE) "A riveting historical masterpiece." (Nation)