"The shame of men is at their backs ..." The gender implications of discrepency between proverbial wisdom and the law
A culture's proverbs point to the matrix of beliefs and values in which its people's lives are embedded. Interventions to empower women can backfire when this matrix is not sufficiently factored in. The wisdom and legal traditions of the Ancient Near East were aligned in the boundaries the...
| Authors: | ; |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2006
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| In: |
Journal for semitics
Year: 2006, Volume: 15, Issue: 2, Pages: 385-405 |
| Further subjects: | B
Cultural proverbs
B Beliefs B Values B Gender B Woman B Empowerment |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (kostenfrei) |
| Summary: | A culture's proverbs point to the matrix of beliefs and values in which its people's lives are embedded. Interventions to empower women can backfire when this matrix is not sufficiently factored in. The wisdom and legal traditions of the Ancient Near East were aligned in the boundaries they drew around women's place and power in society. This could be regarded as a double oppression, but ironically the alignment of these two traditions has positive implications too. In modern Africa, however, legal context and traditional wisdom are not necessarily as unanimous in the position they assign to women. Using a micro-finance scheme in central Kenya as a case study, we explore how traditional beliefs around gender relations as reflected in Kikuyu proverbs can sabotage an attempt to empower women. Proverbs, however, both reflect and shape a world view. While their power to perpetuate the oppression of women is clear, they can also be seen as a potential tool to change people's thinking and values. |
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| Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal for semitics
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| Persistent identifiers: | HDL: 10520/AJA10318471_25 |