Widowhood Practices in Africa [Igbo] Traditional Society: Socio- Anthropological [Re] Interpretations (original) (raw)

Most African [Igbo] traditional practices have been misconstrued, misinterpreted or interpreted out of context. The consequence of this hermeneutical error is thedissemination of blurred knowledge and this affects not only modern scholarship adversely but also disfigures the people " s worldview and undermines their personality definitions.These overly results to revolt, libelling and avid rejection of the culture and values of the people. The worst hit of this hermeneutical error in modern scholarship is the Igbo traditional widowhood practices. Thus, the feminists scholarly slant has staked their neck in an avid condemnation of the practices as they consider them obnoxious, de-humanizing, de-womanizing and complete vitiation on the rights and personality of the women. Against this backdrop, this paper is designed to reconsider these practices within their contextual framework and historical milieu. It adopted a socio-anthropological method as its main tool. Here, the work discovers that these widowhood ritual practices among the Igbo people aim at social stability, metaphysical integration of both the physical and spiritual worlds apart. It also notes that the practices were designed for the protection and preservation of the entire community and especially the widow, who through the loss of her husband was exposed to the cross-current traffic of the spiritual and physical worlds. The paper therefore concludes that those practices serve its metaphysical needs of the traditional society as it gave sound philosophical base for the definition of their reality.

Sign up for access to the world's latest research.

checkGet notified about relevant papers

checkSave papers to use in your research

checkJoin the discussion with peers

checkTrack your impact