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Periodical article Periodical article Leiden University catalogue Leiden University catalogue WorldCat catalogue WorldCat
Title:Levirate, widows, and types of marriage among the Dukawa of northern Nigeria
Author:Salamone, Frank A.ISNI
Year:1981
Periodical:Afrika und Übersee: Sprachen, Kulturen
Volume:64
Issue:1
Pages:129-136
Language:English
Geographic term:Northern Nigeria
Subjects:Dukawa
marriage
widows
Abstract:Dukawa perceive the family as the institution that best defines themselves and protects their cultural identity. Any attack on the family is a danger to Dukawa culture itself, for the Dukawa are a group of siblings whose strength lies in their maintenance of family ties and whose weakness lies in any forces working against those ties. The cultural position of widows underscores that point, for widows are treated as part of the family, not as anomalies. Their choices regarding remarriage and subsequent residential affiliation are controlled by cultural considerations. Significantly, an investigation of a widow's universe of choices demonstrates the manner in which the essentials of Dukawa culture refract in a specific cultural situation, suggesting the profitability of investigating a set of values in various cultural scenes. Dukawa widows form and represent alliances, past, present, and potential. In their position is found the warp and woof of Dukawa culture, namely, independence and alliance, centripetal and centrifugal tendencies bound in dynamic tension. Ref.
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