Sex, culture, and myth / Bronislaw Malinowski.

  • Malinowski, Bronislaw, 1884-1942.
Date:
1962
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Sex, culture, and myth / Bronislaw Malinowski. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Bechuana, Madi of Africa; Toradjas, Bogos of Indonesia; Buin, Mekeo, Roro, Trobrianders of Melanesia), and are not all retained by the girl's parents but shared among her relatives and even clansmen (Achomawi, Delaware, Osage, Araucanians of America; S.E. Bantu, Swahili, Pokomo, Turkana, Bavili, Ewhe, Baganda, Masai, Lotuko of Africa; Ossetes, Samoyeds, Aleut, Yakut, Yukaghir of Siberia; Koita, Mekeo, S. Massim, Buin of Melanesia). The giving of presents is thus a transaction binding two groups rather than two individuals, a fact which is reflected in such institutions as the inheritance of wives, sororate, levitate, etc. A correct understanding of the initial marriage gift can be obtained only against the background of the wider economic mutuality of husband and wife, parents and children, maternal and paternal families and clans. Another type of marriage gift is the lobola found among the patrilineal and patrilocal communities of the S.E. Bantu, who live by combined agriculture and cattle-raising. The wife and children are here regarded as a definite economic and sociological asset. The wife is the main agricul- tural and domestic worker, while the children are valuable because the boys continue the line and the girls bring in wealth at marriage. Marriage is concluded by the payment of cattle, the amount varying greatly ac- cording to tribe, rank and other considerations from a couple of head to a few score. These cattle are known as lobola, or bride-price, as is the current but incorrect anthropological expression. The lobola in fact is not the motive for the transaction, nor is there any bidding on any market, nor can the cattle be disposed of at will by the receiver, i.e., the girl's father. Some of them have to be distributed by him according to fixed tribal custom among particular relatives of the girl; the rest he has to use for the provision of a wife for his son, i.e., the girl's brother, or else, if he has no male heir, he contracts another wife for himself, in order to obtain the desired male descendants. In case of divorce the marriage gift has to be returned as the identical cattle given and not merely in an equivalent form. The lobola is thus rather a symbolic equivalent repre- senting the wife's economic efficiency, and it has to be treated as a deposit to be spent on another marriage. In Melanesia the husband's initial gift at marriage is a ritual act, and is always reciprocated by the wife's family. This is the case also among certain American tribes (Tshimshian, Coast Salish, Bellacoola, Delaware, Ojibway, Navaho, Miwok); in Siberia (Mordwin, Ainu, Buryat, Samoyed, Koryak), and in Polynesia (Samoa). This return gift may take the form of a dowry given to the bride by her father or parents or other relatives but also directly or indirectly benefiting her husband (Greenlanders, Bra- zilian aborigines, Yahgans of America; Ibo, Ovambo, S.E. Bantu, Banyoro, Masai of Africa; Buryat, Yukaghir, Samoyed of Siberia; Toda of India; Banks Islanders, Buin, Maori of Oceania). In some communities the bal- ance of gifts is so much in favour of the husband that instead of wife pur-