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Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, 1974. / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 323-324).

Inaugural lecture delivered at Rhodes University / Rhodes University Libraries (Digitisation)

Student Number : 0407524W - MA research report - School of Social Sciences - Faculty of Humanities / Sex differentials in infant and child mortality have been reported in many studies. These studies posit that generally the male child has better survival advantage over than the female child. However, none of these studies have examined the role of ethnicity in understanding these differentials. The question then is, to which extent does sex differences in child mortality exist in a society with patrilineal and matrilineal structures. Using Ghana Demographic and Health Survey of 2003 (GDHS, 2003), the study examines the intensity of these differentials by employing indirect method of estimation, and bivariate and multiple regression models, while giving detailed consideration to the differences in biological and behavioural/environmental perspectives as regards child health and nutritional care. It is found that among all the four major ethnic groups in the country, including the matrilineal societies, the male child has higher survival advantage than the female counterpart. The study therefore concludes that ethnicity, be it matrilineal or patrilineal, does not make any difference in sex differentials in child mortality.

Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This research explored the role of men in efforts by the Malawi Ministry of Health to promote women’s reproductive and maternal health in accordance with Millennium Development Goal (MDG) number five, i.e. to reduce the maternal mortality ratio by three quarters between 1990 and 2015. The study was conceptualised in 2011 in an effort to contribute to the national strategy to reduce maternal mortality in Malawi, and it was done in the particular cultural context of a matrilineal marriage and kinship system in Ntchisi district, Malawi. At the inception of this study, the highest prevalence of maternal deaths in the country was reported in seven districts, including Ntchisi. A common understanding in public health circles worldwide is that male involvement in reproductive and maternal health activities is an important factor in achieving the above MDG goal. But historically, research on maternal health in Malawi has focused mostly on women and children. Consequently there are only a small number of relevant previous studies or extant literature to draw on for the current investigation. Malawi’s reproductive and maternal health policies largely lack locally-informed research on men and masculinities. My study aimed to explore the relationship between local constructions of masculinity, fatherhood and reproductive health in Malawi among Chichewa speakers who live in Ntchisi. It was guided by the social constructionist theory which recognises the role of the impersonal features of the social world like cultural, personal and group influences in the construction of ideas, knowledge and facts. In this study I adopted an inductive approach to learning in which the participants were the main players in describing and explaining social phenomena as they are constructed and experienced in the research site. I conducted multiple in-depth interviews and focus group discussions with 53 married men, key informant interviews with eight local leaders and traditional birth attendants, as well as focus group discussions with 12 married women who had given birth multiple times. Data analysis involved intensive scrutiny of transcripts to determine prevailing themes. Listening to the tapes and re-reading these transcripts enabled me to detect patterns and categorise different practices and constructions, to find associations between these practices and constructions of concepts. Malawi’s men are considered to be the traditional gatekeepers of maternal and social ideals. Therefore, as elders in a clan or as husbands, their prompt decisions can facilitate the access of their spouses to maternal and reproductive health services. Men as heads of households and decision makers can also support and enable their wives to follow the recommended maternal health counsel. However, men’s “lack of involvement” is not the principal reason why there is increasing maternal challenges among child-bearing women in Ntchisi. Although men are not entirely free of the blame for contributing to the status quo, they already work hard towards ensuring positive pregnancy outcomes for their spouses. The study found that husbands in Ntchisi have long been involved in pregnancy and child care. The study shows that pregnancy is regarded as a liminal state or as a kind of “sickness”. Male involvement in pregnancy means the man should take over the routine household chores of drawing water, fetching firewood and cooking, among other things. However, men construct their involvement in reproductive and maternal health matters in the framework of masculinity and femininity as dictated by the commonly held beliefs of a matrilineal Chewa grouping. The study showed that masculinities are constructed within the context of a matrilineal system, which has nonetheless been changing largely due to the colonial impact of the United Kingdom, the related influences of Christian and westernised social ideals and an education system based on the British model. Men’s gendered practices in reproduction and parenting have foundations in the initiation rites of the secret Nyau societies where the masculine ideals of sexuality and secrecy are inculcated. This research cannot be generally extrapolated to the wider population in Malawi but it is a starting point for understanding the responses of matrilineal Chichewa speaking men to reproductive and maternal health matters. Further and broader research on the construction of fatherhood and masculinity is needed in Malawi to make it possible for public health policy on reproductive and maternal health to be more culturally informed.

This inquiry explores matrilineal autobiographical narratives in the contexts of family stories and memories. This self-study traces the stories of a collective of five women of a common Armenian heritage, who represent various generational, homeland and diasporic portraits and experiences. Carrying the burden of being descendants of genocide survivors, the memories we reconstruct and interpret deal with issues of inherited exile, dispossession, loss, trauma, survival and healing. In exploring these narratives, I engage in self-reflexivity as we construct, re-construct, re-present our narratives and their impact on our constructions and negotiations of self and identity. / I use the family album metaphor as a foundation for my narrative framework and weave together the participants' and my autobiographical reconstructions through the intertwined stories of memory, trauma and displacement. The self-reflexive nature of our multilayered autobiographical narratives reconnects our selves with our pasts. Within a diasporic frame, I use the narratives as interpretive tools to explore the effects of multigenerational diasporic experiences on constructions of identity and agency. / The relationships we develop using face-to-face group conversations, virtual discussions through a Web forum and emails, personal reflexive journals, photo props and collaged images, highlight a dialogic process of imagined possibilities for the transformative power of storying. The autobiographical inquiry bridges voice to self and self to voice. This authoring process is an essential medium to writing ourselves as women. The process also allows us to reclaim our vulnerabilities as sources of inner strength and to embrace this understanding as the locus of writing.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1969. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

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<p> A number of anthropological studies have been published on societies on the West New Britain mainland but little information is available about Vitu culture and society. The intention of this dissertation is to provide an account of Vitu social structure and particularly to describe and analyse the processes of group formation in the society. Specifically, the study attempts to elucidate the Vitus' claim that while they belong to matrilineal clans, they "follow both sides", inheriting rights from both parents.</p> <p> Anthropologists working in various parts of Melanesia have studied accommodation between two apparently incompatible cultural principles and have published studies of societies where patrilineal and cognatic descent are both organizing principles. This dissertation provides comparative data for these studies but it differs from them because it seeks to explain the relationships between roatrilineal and cognatic descent.</p> <p> After an historical introduction, the study describes matrilineal and cognatic ideologies in Vitu. Matrilineal descent divides Vitus into discrete categories and provides a conceptual frame-work, in terms of which people orient themselves in time and space, calculate social relationships and assess rights to claim membership in particular groups. Cognatic descent allows individuals considerable freedom in joining groups and gaining access to land. Vitus assert rights in matrilineal corporations by stressing cognatic descent from matrilineage·men. </p> <p> Cognatic inheritance of land-rights means that lineage members and lineage descendants share land. Membersof the two categories compete for resources, and tensions are exacerbated by a cultural preference that "the woman follows the man". This preference results in virilocal residence and a pattern of economic cooperation that allows women limited control over their land. These factors weaken the matrilineage and strengthen bonds among cognates. Lineage members cannot expel lineage descendants from their land. Instead they retain land for their lineages through strategic marriages. Each lineage becomes the centre of a limited marriage universe consisting of closely allied lineages exchanging women and land. </p> <p> The traditional political organization of Vitu was related to the patterns of descent and alliance in the society. The islands were divided into hostile, largely endogamous territories, each containing two or more relatively endogamous groups composed of members of closely allied lineages. Local communities consisted of cognaticallyrelated kinsmen who were members of intermarrying lineages. The symbolism of ceremonial exchange in Vitu continues to reflect values of balanced exchange of property and personnel between allied lineages. In the contemporary society, marriage patterns still include clan exogamy and reciprocal exchange of women. But some young people arrange their own marriages, and lineage leaders and elders worry about the future of the matrilineage as a land-holding corporation. </p> <p> The interaction of matrilineal and cognatic descent in the processes of group formation in Vitu contrasts with that in other areas of Melanesia. In the New Guinea Highlands, recruitment to local groups is bilateral, but Highlanders conceptualize local groups as patrilineal clans. In the Highlands, descent and residence patterns tend to be harmonic. So acconunodation between patrilineal and cognatic ideologies occurs in ascendant generations where the distinction between residence and clan membership becomes blurred. In Vitu, the disharmonic descent and residence rules require the distinction between local group, and lineage membership to be preserved. Adjustment between matrilineal and cognatic descent in Vitu occurs only through marriage. </p> <p> The aissertation concludes by stressing the considerable choice available to Vitus in joining social groups. Opportunities for joining a variety of groups may beas great in societies where unilineal descent is a significant factor as in societies where cognatic descent is a major organizing principle.</p> / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Among the few matrilineal communities from around the world were the Nairs of the south-western coast, also known as the Malabar coast, of India. The system of matrilineal consanguinity and descent practiced by the Nairs was remarkable for its complex kinship organization and joint family set up, and the unique status---social and economic---it afforded to the women of the community. / These factors were reflected in the spatial morphology of the traditional Nair house, an assemblage of four blocks, called the nalukettu. The different structural identities of the tarawad institution; the comparative latitude and the bias of inheritance that women enjoyed; the codes of marriage, interaction and avoidance; and the observation of rituals, an integral part of the cosmology and temporal cycle of the system, all find expression in the layout and spatial organization. On the whole, the geometry of the Nair nalukettu was a graphic metaphor of the social and behavioral patterns of the Nair community overlaid on the Hindu way of life, as interpreted by the community. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)