Africa - Matrimoni tradizionale - English

["Nadia & Giovanni" <nadia.joe@tiscalinet.it>]

from WAJIBU

AFRICAN MARRIAGE, PAST AND PRESENT
by G.J.Wanjohi
I
NTRODUCTION
Some people tend to think that all that is past or ancient is good, while
others think that all that is new or modern is good. These are extreme
viewpoints where truth is not likely to reside. As African proverbs have
taught us, it is possible to make a synthesis of the two extremes and arrive
at a mean or moderate position where truth is more likely to be found. It is
from this perspective that I want to study African marriage.

MARRIAGE IN AFRICAN TRADITION
An African proverb says that children are the adornment of the home. This,
therefore, is one of the reasons why Africans marry. It is an aesthetic
reason. Another reason is that children are an investment, especially in old
age; so there is an economic reason for marriage. Then there is a
metaphysical reason according to which man (male and female) is called upon
by the ancestors to be a chain in the transmission of life.
It is especially the latter which makes African marriage an unavoidable
duty, as we learn from the following proverbs of the Ankole and Kigezi:
The need for marriage made the dove fly and fly until it lay exhausted.
Sweating and marrying go hand in hand.
No one is too little for a cow, i.e., to obtain dowry and to marry.
When ripe, a banana is eaten and a girl is married 1
The view of African marriage expressed in these proverbs could lead one to
make a hasty conclusion that African marriage is dictated only by necessity,
depriving it of any freedom of choice. This is not at all the case, as we
once again learn from the following Ankole-Kigezi proverbs
Before marrying, be informed; before arranging a marriage, consult a
diviner. 2
Do not boast to your parents about your hasty marriage.
In African marriage, therefore, there is both necessity and freedom;
necessity as to the fact, and freedom as to how to go about it.
THE INSTITUTION OF BRIDEPRICE IN AFRICA
A very well known characteristic of African marriage is the payment of
brideprice or dowry. Unlike in other cultures where dowry is paid by the
parents of the girl, in non-Muslim Black Africa it is always the parents of
the boy or man who pay dowry to the parents of the girl. This practice has
been misunderstood by outsiders, especially Westerners. They equate the
payment of brideprice to buying a human being. They are led to this view by
taking African languages too literally. Among the Gîkûyû of Kenya, for
example, to marry a wife is rendered by kûgûra mûtimia (to buy a wife), and
to give your daughter in marriage is kwendia mwarîguo (to sell your
daughter).
These Gîkûyû terms must not be taken too literally, for they do not
represent the true reality. The allegation in Africa that marrying a wife is
tantamount to buying a wife is disproved by the following
considerations: -Africans are well aware that a girl is not a commodity to
be disposed of, for she remains the daughter of her parents and sister to
her brothers and sisters as much after marriage as before. Among the Gîkûyû,
a married woman is referred to either as the wife of so-and- so, or the
daughter of so-and-so. These people value their daughters so much they
consider their being taken away by young men as an act of plunder, and
brideprice as being just a small consolation for this plunder. Hence the
proverb: Igîtuunywo mwana nîikagîrio mûngû. (One throws a small green gourd
to the monkey when taking away its baby.). Also, these days when, on account
of rapid social change, quite a number of women remain single, some parents
are apportioning their land and other property to both sons and daughters,
showing that they love both equally.
-There is no end to paying dowry. Though at first it may be fixed at so many
goats or cows, the parents of the girl always had (and still have) a right
to demand a gift from the family of the boy at any time during their
lifetime. From this, two reasons for brideprice emerge:
1) It is a way of assuring that the girl is properly treated; in case of
mistreatment, she can always return home and be accepted by her parents and
other relatives.
2) It is a means of keeping the relations between the two families alive and
strong. (On the hypothesis that in Africa one buys a wife, there would be no
need to perpetuate this relationship. But since it is the latter which
prevails, the claim of wife buying among Africans is disproved.)
AFRICAN MARRIAGE TODAY
Here we shall try to follow very closely the outline established for the
traditional marriage in order to see to what extent the current African
marriage remains the same as traditional marriage, and to what extent it
deviates from it.
The Necessity to Marry/Get Married
Like in the past, the need to marry, to get married, and to have children
among Africans, remains as widespread and strong as ever. It is this
imperative which is partly to blame for the ever rising single-parent
phenomenon, especially as regards women. This is how this comes about. A lot
of men--even educated ones--loathe marrying educated women, thus forcing
them to get children outside of marriage. At the same time some educated
women feel secure and independent enough not to want to live under the
domination of a husband. And yet they want children whom they get out of
wedlock, thus deliberately creating a single-parent situation.
African marriage today is still characterised by freedom except in certain
cases where selfish parents force their daughters to get married against
their will, even at the expense of leaving school.
Brideprice
With few exceptions, African peoples still believe in and demand the paying
of brideprice. Due to modernity, however, the mode of discharging this duty
has changed. Today almost invariably, brideprice is paid in cash, not in the
form of livestock. The main reason for this is the scarcity or lack of
grazing land due to the rise in population and the use of land for cash
crops. The other reason is that young boys whose traditional responsibility
was to look after animals are now in school. As for the town dweller, the
question of paying the brideprice in the form of livestock is totally
inconceivable!
Due to the individualism and selfishness which have accompanied modern life,
some parents ask too much money as brideprice. One very serious result of
this is to make nonsense of the original aim of the institution of
brideprice; instead it is being subverted and has degenerated into a
commodity-exchange, a wife-buying activity. In quite a number of cases, this
overpricing of the bride ends in elopement. The latter can also be brought
about by the high cost of weddings these days. Although elopement and
common-law marriages are beginning to gain ground among Africans nowadays,
in the past they were hardly tolerated.
CHRISTIANITY AND AFRICAN MARRIAGE
When Christianity was brought to Africa, it was well received by many ethnic
groups. This was due, surely, to the rich cultural soil it found there. But
when it comes to marriage, African culture and Christianity clashed almost
at the outset. The reasons for this are quite obvious.
The African believes that each individual, male or female is a channel for
the transmission of life, and that its is wrong to interrupt that
transmission. The punishment could be a curse. It is for this reason that
the retired archbishop of Nairobi, His Eminence Michael Maurice Cardinal
Otunga, had first to seek approval and obtain the blessing of his mother
before he could proceed to study for the priesthood.3 Additionally, among
Africans, not only must one get married, but one must have children, and as
many of them as possible. From this, two important implications follow: For
an African, a childless marriage is ruled out as no marriage.
In order to get as many children as possible, Africans are forced to become
polygamous. (In this context, it can be observed that childlessness is only
one cause for being polygamous among Africans; that is, it is a necessary
but not a sufficient condition for polygamy in Africa.) These two
implications or problems give the church in Africa (especially the Catholic
Church) a real pastoral headache. Theologians have offered a number of
solutions to these problems, one of which is trial marriage. Professor
Bénézet Bujo of Zaire rejects this solution for three reasons:
Trial marriages were not universally practised in Africa: Christian marriage
thrives well among the groups which did not practise trial marriage. The
question is to investigate such cultures in order to discover what made them
disapprove of it. The ultimate aim is to come up with a universal policy for
African Christian marriage. This can be derived from an African ancestor
theology.
It is against human dignity to see the worth of a woman (or of a man--for
the matter of that) as merely consisting in procreation. The latter is only
a small part of what it means to be human.
It is against Christian love--and even against the wish of the ancestors--to
reject a childless woman.4
I fully endorse this analysis.
CONCLUSION
As is apparent by now, we need both the past: our traditions, values,
practices, etc., and the present: the impact of other cultures on our own,
in order to arrive at a more satisfactory type of African marriage. It is
not a question of either the past or the present.
NOTES
1. Fr. Marius Cisternino. The proverbs of Kigezi and Ankole (Uganda).
Kampala: Comboni Missionaries, 1987, p. 348.
2. Cisternino, pp. 348, 351.
3. Margaret Ogola and Margaret Roche. Cardinal Otunga: a gift of grace.
Nairobi: Pauline Publications Africa, 1999, p. 67. 4. See Bénézet Bujo.
African theology in its social context. Nairobi: St Paul
Publications-Africa, 1992, pp. 120-121.
N.B.: APPEAL TO THE READER
The author would appreciate hearing from people in whose culture there was
no practice of trial marriage and how successful Christian marriage has been
in these cultures.




A JOURNAL OF SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS CONCERN
Published Quarterly by DR. GERALD J. WANJOHI
Likoni Lane - P .O. Box 32440 - Nairobi - Kenya



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"Call to me
    and I will answer you and will tell you great and hidden things
       which you
           have not known." - Jeremiah 33:3