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| Title: | The Changing Value of Children among the Kikuyu of Central Province, Kenya |
| Author: | Price, Neil |
| Year: | 1996 |
| Periodical: | Africa: Journal of the International African Institute |
| Volume: | 66 |
| Issue: | 3 |
| Pages: | 411-436 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Kenya |
| Subjects: | Kikuyu fertility Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Women's Issues Economics and Trade Fertility and Infertility Cultural Roles economics Women and Their Children |
| External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/1160960 |
| Abstract: | High fertility in sub-Saharan Africa was considered until recently to reflect a demand for children firmly rooted in indigenous cultural and sociopolitical systems, which were resistant to external forces of change. This article considers the extent to which social institutions and cultural practices, which have traditionally supported high fertility, have persisted amongst the Kikuyu of Central Province, Kenya. The material and symbolic value of children for the Kikuyu is examined using methods and concepts derived from social anthropology. Fieldwork was undertaken in two communities - in 1990 in a rural sublocation in Murang'a District, and in 1991 in a periurban setting in a sublocation of Kiambu District on the outskirts of Nairobi - which have markedly contrasting access to health and family planning services. The article is organized around three themes which correspond to the key social institutions which shape fertility motives: marriage, kinship, and belief in spirits, witchcraft and sorcery. A fourth theme which runs through the article is the changing strategic role played by the same institutions in regulating or enhancing fertility. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in English and French. |
