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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | Divorce in Abutia |
Author: | Verdon, Michel |
Year: | 1982 |
Periodical: | Africa: Journal of the International African Institute |
Volume: | 52 |
Issue: | 4 |
Pages: | 48-66 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Ghana |
Subjects: | Ewe marriage divorce Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Law, Human Rights and Violence Women's Issues |
External links: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/1160094 https://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&res_dat=xri:pao:&rft_dat=xri:pao:article:4011-1982-052-00-000027 |
Abstract: | The Abutia Ewe (southern Ghana) have experienced far-reaching transformations in the last century, and nowhere more radically than in their matrimonial practices, namely the definition of marriage and the incidence of divorce. To decide whether particular couples are married or not, is extremely difficult in the case of Abutia, because of the changes in their definition of marriage. In the first part, the author briefly surveys these changes and discusses the definitional problems they raise and, in the second, presents the main findings of a quantitative survey which helps to measure the impact of the changes discussed. It also reveals that divorce was in fact common before 1890, when German colonial rule was imposed. In the last part the author explains this marital instability in 'pre-colonial' Abutia. Notes, ref., tab., French sum. |