Re-Inventing Africa: Matriarchy, Religion and Culture

by Ifi Amadiume

Book Overview

This extraordinary book issues a clarion call for a new understanding of Africa. The author of the best-selling Male Daughters/Female Husbands here issues a challenge to western anthropologists to recognize their own complicity in producing a version of Africa that is often little more than a reflection of their own class-based, patriarchal thought.

Professor Amadiume calls instead for a new history of Africa, made and written by Africans...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1856495345
• ISBN13: 9781856495349
• Release Date: December 1997
• Publisher: Zed Books
• Length: 224 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

3.5 Stars: Parts of the Book a Must-Read, Other Parts Omissions or Repetitions of Previous Books

I read the 2001 edition of the 1997 book. This is a compilation book of essays by the author written as responses to lectures, keynote addresses and discussions with her friends between 1989 and 1995. The content is mostly about the 1980s. To a large extent, she is concerned with other authors' work (most of all Cheikh Anta Diop) than her own original thoughts in this essay collection. The title mentioning Africa is a bit misleading as well. It is actually about the Igbo within Nigeria. There is more about the African diaspora in the West, most of all Canada and the UK, than about any other society WITHIN Africa. Which doesn't necessarily mean bad. On the contrary, her analysis of racism in Western feminist groups of varying skin colors is very true and one of the best I have read. My point is, don't expect a book about generally Africa. Another criticism is the repetitiveness. Of both, within this book among some of the essays as well as with the previous book, Male Daughters, Female Husbands: Gender and Sex in an African Society which itself is an elaboration of the yet previous Afrikan Matriarchal Foundations: The Igbo Case. I am also flabbergasted reading all those racist vocabulary such as "race", "mulatto" and the n-word, coming from THIS author. In her recurring lists of society's struggles such as class and gender, "sexuality" gets included a lot, yet it remains the only one in these lists, which she does NOT elaborate on. To the point that I am not even sure, what exactly SHE is really referring to. So much for the subtractions, which prevent me from giving this book all five stars. Taking that into account, this book is well worth to be read, if you haven't read one of the other of her books mentioned. Even if you have, the chapters on racism within the Western feminist scene and sexism within African state systems is worth the book alone. (How to control women in traditional Africa? Provide them with official organisations and give them posts therein, which have to answer to the government.) Also Africa's subjugation under the European state system of dominance and power gets tackled here. You may also be interested in Daughters of Anowa: African Women and Patriarchy and Return to the African Mother Principle of Male and Female Equality.

Goes beyond the matriarchy/patriarchy divide

She also describes " 'dual-sex' systems, 'each sex manages its own affairs and women's interests are represented at all levels" which I found much more eye opening than what you would expect from the title. The book is well written and gets its point across clearly, without suffering too badly from the repetition inherent in a collection of reprinted essays. I only give it four stars since there were a number of places in which I felt that she reached conclusions too quickly or that the conclusions themselves reached beyond the evidence presented, which is likely a result of the short essay format. That said, I've already ordered one of her other books, since the ideas presented here were interesting enough for me to want to know more.

If you only read one African studies book, ever...

Read this! Amadiume teaches about ancient matriarchal cultures in Africa, and the diverse and well-respected roles of women in Africa before colonialism.Traditional African religions were often woman-centered or non-preferential with regard to gender. Amadiume chronciles the "masculinization" of religion, dating from the intriduction of Christianity and Islam.I had the privilege of taking a class with Professor Amadiume at Dartmouth where we used this book. It is absolutely fascinating reading, even for someone like myself who had no background in African studies.