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Mother is gold, father is glass : gender and colonialism in a Yoruba town / Lorelle D. Semley.
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Semley, Lorelle D., 1969-
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Mothers--Political activity--Africa, West--History.
- Mothers.
- Sex role--Africa, West--History.
- Sex role.
- Women--Benin--Ketou--History.
- Women.
- Women, Yoruba--Political activity--History.
- Women, Yoruba.
- Africa, West--History--1884-1960.
- Africa, West.
- Kétou (Benin)--History.
- Kétou (Benin).
- Kétou (Benin)--Social life and customs.
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (257 p.)
- Edition:
- 1st ed.
- Place of Publication:
- Bloomington : Indiana University Press, 2010.
- Language Note:
- English
- Summary:
- Lorelle D. Semley explores the historical and political meanings of motherhood in West Africa and beyond, showing that the roles of women were far more complicated than previously thought. While in Kétu, Bénin, Semley discovered that women were treasurers, advisors, ritual specialists, and colonial agents in addition to their more familiar roles as queens, wives, and sisters. These women with special influence made it difficult for the French and others to enforce an ideal of subordinate women. As she traces how women gained prominence, Semley makes clear why powerful mother figures still exist in the symbols and rituals of everyday practices.
- Contents:
- Prologue. "Mother is gold, father is glass": power and vulnerability in Atlantic Africa
- Founding fathers and metaphorical mothers: history, myth, and the making of a kingdom
- How kings lost their mothers: politics of the Atlantic slave trade
- Giving away Ketu's secret: wives on the eve of war
- "Where women really matter": the "queens" of Ketu and the challenge to French imperialism
- "Without family
- there is no true colonization": perspectives on marriage
- "The opening of the eyes": the politics of manhood on the eve of independence
- Mothers and fathers of an Atlantic world
- Epilogue. A rebirth of "public mothers" and kings.
- Notes:
- Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph
- Includes bibliographical references and index.
- ISBN:
- 1-282-97582-X
- 9786612975820
- 0-253-00488-8
- OCLC:
- 695996375
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