I found the Akan society to be an interesting matriarchal society in Ghana. The social organisation is built around the woman who controls a family's identity, inheritance, and wealth. Men hold traditional leadership roles, however, it is mostly the women running this society. This is a society that is divided into clans and business is equally divided between men and woman. For example both men and women can be seen at farms doing equally labour intensive tasks. Elder women known as the 'queen mother' assume control over the younger ones and control finances over people within their clan.
https://www.morehouse.edu/facstaff/chewitt/Women%20in%20Society/Farrar%20Queen%20Mother.pdf
https://www.morehouse.edu/facstaff/chewitt/Women%20in%20Society/Farrar%20Queen%20Mother.pdf
The question here then for you Maheen is how does this relate to any of the module's topics and frameworks?
ReplyDeleteHello,
ReplyDeleteSo this particular paper talks about a matriarchal society. From what I see this is not a matriarchy because the female does not have complete control of the society because the male does have forms of political control. But what I like about this particular culture is both the male and the female have responsibilities that are recognized within the society. Its nice to see here that the queen mother can summon male and female members in her community and receive respect from even her male counterparts. This is a society where there is a ‘dual- sex political system’ as opposed to the patriarchal Pabir culture where the woman does not have exclusive authority. Anyways I see that in this particular community men and women are acknowledged to have a differing roles within society but the woman’s role is also considered one of great respect as opposed to the article you posted regarding the Uturu women where they clearly dominate the agricultural and weaving industry but receive no acknowledgement for it. Furthermore, in the article you posted regarding the Uturu women the authors say there needs to a balance of male and female duties where females are acknowledged of their hard work and not insulted with derogatory terms. I think this balance can be witnessed in the Akan tribe and the role of the queen mother.
Now how does this relate to any of our module topics? Succession duh! In this society women pass on the role of queen mother to other females within their lineage. It’s nice to see a community where women are considered and expected to hold a role of authority. In fact this idea of women and succession was even missing in the Levy case. Roger did not even want Sabrina to enter his particular line of work because it was male dominated despite her being the obvious choice. Furthermore, I think we sometimes give Western societies and their culture too much credit in regards to their beliefs and ways of doing business, however, from what I saw even the westernized Roger was reluctant to have his daughter enter a business which Guy was clearly not qualified enough for.