Role of the Mother
Role of the Mother
Mother is gold, Father is glass. -Yoruba adage
The role of the mother is extremely important within African society. A woman's role, and even the construction of the female gender is based around the idea of the woman as a child bearer. The way they raise their children prove women to be patient, gentle, cool and enduring. They form extremely close relationships with their children and it is often said that ties with the mother are the strongest of all.
"The Ashanti consider the bond between mother and child as the keystone of all social relations. They consider it as a moral relationship which is absolutely binding. An Ashanti woman will not stint in the work she does or the sacrifices she makes for her children. It is specially to feed, clothe and educate them today, that she works so hard, annoys her husband and jealously watches her brother, to make sure that he carries out faithfully his duties as the child's legal guardian. No demand is too exaggerated for a mother to meet. Although she shrinks from inflicting punishment and never disowns her child, an Ashanti mother requires from her children both obedience and affectionate respect. To show disrespect to a mother is equivalent to committing a sacrilege (Diop 71)."
One of the reasons behind this strong connection can come from the breast-feeding period. During the first three years of life a child will be allowed to feed as much as it likes. During this time a woman's menstruation is suppressed and women practice sexual abstinence. "It is our belief that if you give birth to a child, and you don't breast-feed him or her, in the long run he may not like you, because he doesn't get served from your own breast. In our area here, if you give birth to a child and within the next year you give birth to another, we call you 'prostitute' because you never allowed the first child to be well fed (Drewal 188)." This time of nurturing allows for extremely strong physical and emotional bonds to form between the mother and child.
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Mother with child. Horniman Museum, London. Ht 27.5 in. (Willet 142) |
This bond will remain strong throughout the child’s life, giving the mother an extreme amount of power over her children and younger generations in general. In fact, women have sole rights to a child until it is weaned. These rights combined with the strong relationship that forms between mother and child means that once children have grown they often choose to remain with the mother (187).
This strong connection illustrates one of the problems Africa currently faces. AIDS has already orphaned more than 11 million African children under the age of 15. These children without the guidance of their parents, especially their mother are more likely to drop out of school and are at risk of malnutrition, physical and sexual abuse, and exposure to HIV (CBS). The mother is a critical aspect of a child's growth and an increasing number of African children are being forced to grow up without one.
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| Woman lying down with children in Ghana (Sheehan 62) |