The women also get to share childcare and the children grow up in a larger social group where there is less likelihood of child abuse and neglect. I can see lots of advantages. Polygamy is practiced more around the world than monogamy and has been the case since modern humans evolved. The propensity to mate polygamously can be broadly described as a cultural preference but this is really due to many factors largely dependent on the type of environment when these practices came about and would have been genetically advantageous.
While polygamy is not as beneficial in evolutionary terms to women as it is men unless the woman is the first wife I would not say this is an example of the emancipation of women. It is too easy to be dismissive and overly moralistic when it comes to practices which we are not used to.
Whether President Zuma treats each wife equally or well is beside the point and is somewhat irrelevant to the fact that he practices polygamy. Why anyone would want more than one wife is beyond me, but that's the way of life in some countries and who are we to tell them they are wrong?
Funny as it may seem but we are not always right and have no right interfering in other people's traditions. We may be open to changing our whole way of life to accommodate every Tom Dick and Harry who complains about everything we do but that's because we are weak and pathetic. What we should do is stand our ground and look after our own traditions.
If foreigners don't like what we do, they'll just have to accept the way we are. Why is it we consider Western culture the moral barometer to which all other countries must adhere? The hegemony of Africa should have ceased with the death of colonialism. Apparently our press still believe themselves to be on a 'civilising' mission, akin to Victorian missionaries.
It is a debate that is set to continue, especially in a country with strong Christian bias. The "wrong" thing, as far as the law and bigamy is concerned, is that a person can be prosecuted and sent to jail for having more than one wife in the UK - even if the wives live together and are completely happy with their situation and lifestyle.
However, a married man can have many affairs with multiple women without his spouses' knowledge and, in the eyes of the law, he is doing nothing legally "wrong". What concerns the South African taxpayer is not so much that the president is polygamous - but who is paying for the 4 wives one divorced and 20 children? Given that the president has a track record of unfortunate financial mismanagement, it's doubtful that he can afford his lifestyle on his salary.
Where is the extra money coming from? The Aids issue is not due to lax moral standards per se in third world countries, but as a result of lack of sufficiently available medicines which are controlled by western pharmaceutical companies and distribution of financial aid which is consistently reneged upon by the wealthy west. Anyone in today's world who supports their own cultural identity and practices should be commended, not condemned.
But that would not make good press. It is an interesting point that the missionaries in the 19th century were encouraging people already in polygamous marriages to divorce their 'extra' wives Polygamy is only legal in South Africa under certain circumstances.
As a Christian I believe polygamy is a wrong choice to make, but I also have to recognise and respect that it is not my place to judge. As a republican I don't believe the royal family is justifiable, but I have to respect that it is firmly entrenched in British culture and would have to treat the royal family with respect as the constitutional Monarch. Why can't British people treat the South African Head of State with the same respect due him as the legitimate and duly elected President of a sovereign state?
What is all the fuss about? Nthabiseng F. You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar. LCS conceived the study and drafted the manuscript; MLHM performed the statistical analysis, interpretation of data and drafted the manuscript.
NFM interpretation of data and drafted the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript. Correspondence to Musawenkosi L. The research was approved by the Human Sciences Research Committee. Written informed consent was obtained from all study participants. Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Reprints and Permissions.
Mabaso, M. Socio-demographic and behavioural profile of women in polygamous relationships in South Africa: a retrospective analysis of the population-based household survey data. BMC Women's Health 18, Download citation. Received : 29 January Accepted : 25 July Published : 02 August Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:.
Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article. Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative. Skip to main content. Search all BMC articles Search. Download PDF. Research article Open Access Published: 02 August Socio-demographic and behavioural profile of women in polygamous relationships in South Africa: a retrospective analysis of the population-based household survey data Musawenkosi L.
Methods The survey data were collected using a multi-stage stratified cluster randomised sampling design. Results Of women who responded to the question on polygamy, 8. Conclusion The finding that polygamy is associated with uneducated and women of low economic means, who have relationships with older men and multiple sexual partners warrants further attention.
Background Polygamy, which is defined as the practice of having more than one spouse, is a common, and widespread, socially as well as culturally accepted phenomenon in many African countries [ 1 , 2 ]. Statistical analysis Descriptive statistics frequency distribution and percentages were used to characterize socio-demographic and behavioural profiles of women in polygamous marriages.
Results Polygamy and characteristics of the study participants Of self-reported married women who responded to the question on polygamy, 8. Full size image. Table 1 Polygamous marriage among women by socio-demographic profile Full size table. Table 2 Polygamous marriages among women by behavioural profile Full size table. Table 3 Bivariate models of factors associated with women in polygamous marriages Full size table.
Table 4 Multivariate model of factors independently associated with women in polygamous marriages Full size table. Discussion This analysis profiled factors associated with self-reported polygamy among women using data from the nationally representative household survey.
Limitations The results have several limitations and should be carefully interpreted. Conclusion Polygamy is a social phenomenon that has existed for millennia and continues to transform itself in sub-Saharan. References 1. Google Scholar 2. Article Google Scholar 4. Article Google Scholar 5. Article Google Scholar 6. Article PubMed Google Scholar 7.
Google Scholar 8. Article Google Scholar 9. Article PubMed Google Scholar Article Google Scholar Google Scholar Chapter Google Scholar Google Scholar Download references. Acknowledgements We would like to that all South African who participated in this study. Simbayi Authors Musawenkosi L. Mabaso View author publications. View author publications. Ethics declarations Ethics approval and consent to participate The research was approved by the Human Sciences Research Committee.
Consent for publication Not applicable, there are no personal details on individuals reported within the manuscript. Competing interests The authors declare that they have no competing interests. About this article. Cite this article Mabaso, M. Copy to clipboard. Contact us Submission enquiries: bmcwomenshealth biomedcentral. In others a man has many wives — up to 11 in the Arsi region of Ethiopia.
In many a widow is inherited by her dead husband's brothers, father or even a son by another wife. In the University of Wisconsin surveyed more than a thousand societies. Of these just were monogamous. Some had occasional polygyny and in more it was quite common.
Just four featured polyandry. Some anthropologists believe that polygamy has been the norm through human history. In , New Scientist magazine suggested that, until 10, years ago, most children had been sired by comparatively few men. Variations in DNA, it said, showed that the distribution of X chromosomes suggested that a few men seem to have had greater input into the gene pool than the rest.
By contrast most women seemed to get to pass on their genes. Humans, like their primate forefathers, it said, were at least "mildly polygynous". Polygamy is very common in the animist and Muslim communities of West Africa. In Senegal, for example, nearly 47 per cent of marriages are said to feature multiple women. It is relatively high still in many Arab nations; among the Bedouin population of Israel it stands at about 30 per cent.
According to The Salt Lake Tribune as many as 10, Mormon fundamentalists in lived in polygamous families. No one knows. But there are clues. It is most common in places where pre-colonial economic activity centred around subsistence farming which requires lots of manpower, Africa being a prime example.
High levels of infant mortality may be a factor; when many children do not survive past the age of five a family needs more than one child-bearer to be economically viable. Then there is war. When a lot of men die, having more than one wife boosts the population most swiftly. The more wives a man had the more military and political alliances he could forge. Wealth and status became wrapped up in the number of wives a man had.
A larger family became a source of pride, while a smaller one was a symbol of failure and shame.
0コメント