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Title:Lifelines: exchange marriage among the Gumuz
Author:James, W.ISNI
Book title:The Southern marches of imperial Ethiopia: essays in history and social anthropology
Year:1986
Pages:119-147
Language:English
Geographic term:Ethiopia
Subjects:Gumuz
political action
internal migration
marriage
Abstract:In the period from the 1880s to World War II, relationships between rulers and ruled in Ethiopia, previously contained within a framework of 'traditional' chieftainship, were ruthlessly transformed into those of exploitation. In response, the indigenous population of the new western periphery frequently moved into remoter areas of greater safety. In such 'reception areas', newly defensive social systems developed. The south bank of the Blue Nile in Wellegga is such a 'reception area', and within it the immigrant Gumuz have created, partly through the repeated making of exchange marriages among themselves, a distinctive society marked off by defensive political hostility, endogamy, and various barriers to economic penetration by the Oromo highlanders of this province. The evidence offered here counters the notion that exchange marriage is a passive survival from an ancient cultural tradition. Notes, ref. (p. 269-273).
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