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Kikuyu women and the Harry Thuku disturbances: some uniformities of female militancy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 December 2011

Audrey Wipper
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Extract

African men, like men everywhere, have dominated the public sphere, holding the vast majority of official positions of power and authority. In pre-colonial African societies women were formally subordinate to male authority and male dominance was buttressed by an ideology of male superiority and a status system where women showed deference to men. But formal systems, ideologies and codes of etiquette are not realities. In some societies women wielded considerable influence and authority, so much in fact that these systems have been characterised as dual-sex political systems with each sex managing its own affairs (Okonjo, 1976). Women were not so much involved in hierarchical orders of relationships as in complementary, mutually dependent relationships.

Résumé

Les femmes Kikuyu et l'émeute de Harry Thuku: certaines uniformités de militantisme féminin

Cet article examine trois cas de militantisme féminin dirigé contre les régimes coloniaux en Afrique orientale et occidentale: les troubles de Harry Thuku au Kenya en 1922; la guerre des femmes ou les émeutes d'Aba au Nigéria en 1929; et le soulèvement Anlu au Cameroun britannique de 1958–59. Dans ces cas, les femmes, malgré leur subordination officielle envers les hommes, ont défié, parfois avec succès, non seulement l'autorité mâle mais égalemement l'autorité coloniale. L'article demande s'il Ton peut généraliser sur les caractéristiques du militantisme féminin ou sur la nature des sociétiés dont il émane. Il conclut en suggérant plusieurs uniformités qui semblent communes à ces cas.

Type
Women's responses to wrongs
Information
Africa , Volume 59 , Issue 3 , July 1989 , pp. 300 - 337
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 1989

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