antropologi.info - anthropology in the news blog

    Nordisk | Auf Deutsch | Anthropology Newspaper | Anthropology Journal Ticker | Journals | Contact

On African Island: Only women are allowed to propose marriage

by lorenz on Feb 8, 2007 in culture traditions, Africa, gender

"Now the world is upside down," complaines 90-year-old Cesar Okrane. "Men are running after women, instead of waiting for them to come to them." Christian missionaries challenge a unique tradition on Orango Island (Guinea-Bissau). Here it's women who choose their spouses and men are not allowed to propose marriage, according to AP-writer Rukmini Callimachi.

Women make their proposals public by offering their grooms-to-be a dish of distinctively prepared fish, marinated in red palm oil. Once they have asked, men are powerless to say no, we read.

Okrane explains:

"The choice of a woman is much more stable. "Rarely were there divorces before. Now, with men choosing, divorce has become common."

65-year-old Carvadju Jose Nananghe says:

"Love comes first into the heart of the woman. Once it's in the woman, only then can it jump into the man."

He was married when he was 14. A girl entered his grass-covered hut and placed a plate of steaming fish in front of him. "I had no feelings for her", he says. "Then when I ate this meal, it was like lightning. I wanted only her."

There are matrilineal cultures in numerous pockets of the world. But according to anthropologist Christine Henry the unquestioned authority given to women in matters of the heart on Orango island is unique. "I don't know of it happening anywhere else", she says.

Christian missionaries, who have established churches on this island, have started to challenge this tradition. 19-year-old Marisa de Pina says the Protestant church has taught her that it is men, not women, who should make the first move and so she plans to wait for a man to approach her.

>> read the whole story in USA Today

ON MATRILINEAL SOCIETIES SEE ALSO:

SW China: Where women rule the world and don't marry (antropologi.info 9.7.2006)

What are matriarchies, and where are they now? (The Independent 8.3.2018)

Matriarchal societies ( a padlet by Hailey Norman)

Peggy Reeves Sanday: Matriarchy as a Sociocultural Form: An Old Debate in a New Light (Department of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania)

LINKS UPDATED 8.8.2020

This entry was posted by admin and filed under culture traditions, Africa, gender.
  • « A subculture of hefty, hirsute gay men is attracting the attention of academics
  • No longer access to "Anthropology Today" »

2 comments

Comment from: schn

schn

I find the arcticle very interesting. But the US and Europe are starting to come that way. If there is a religious revial of Some hard-cord culturial Protestents. Western Culture may only go so far. Womenkind of the Western World may not want that either.
I was an Anthrology Major. Then became a Religion/Theology Major. Graduated with Behavioral Science Major. But Living Society always surprises everyone!

24/02/07 @ 23:12

Comment from: Salima

Salima

This is working for this region of the world. These Christian missionaries are always coming into another country and trying to indoctrinate people. If it’s working and the people are getting along, Leave them alone.

24/04/17 @ 22:53


Form is loading...

Search

Recent blog posts

  • antropologi.info is 20 years old - some (unfinished) notes and thoughts
  • More dangerous research: Anthropologist detained, beaten, forcibly disappeared in Egypt
  • When research becomes dangerous: Anthropologist facing jail smuggles himself out over snowy mountains
  • In Europe, more than two thirds of all academic anthropologists are living in precarity
  • Globalisation and climate change in the High Arctic: Fieldwork in Svalbard, the fastest-heating place on earth

Recent comments

  • mace on Hmong: An Endangered People
  • Joe Patterson on Anthropologists condemn the use of terms of "stone age" and "primitive"
  • lorenz on Anthropologists condemn the use of terms of "stone age" and "primitive"
  • Chris Healy on Anthropologists condemn the use of terms of "stone age" and "primitive"
  • lorenz on Businesses, advertising firms turn to commercial ethnography

Categories

  • All

Retain only results that match:

XML Feeds

  • RSS 2.0: Posts, Comments
  • Atom: Posts, Comments
What is RSS?

User tools

  • Admin

©2025 by Lorenz Khazaleh • Contact • Help • Open-Source CMS