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Woman's Place: A Critical Review of Anthropological Theory Author(s): Susan Carol Rogers Source: Comparative Studies in Society and

History, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Jan., 1978), pp. 123-162 Published by: Cambridge University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/178324 Accessed: 28/04/2009 21:18
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Woman's Place: A Critical Review of Anthropological Theory


SUSAN CAROL ROGERS
Northwestern University

Primitive societies and barbarous societies and the historical societies of Europe and the East exhibit almost every conceivable variety of institutions, but in all of them, regardless of the form of social structure, men are always in the ascendancy, and this is perhaps the more evident the higher the civilization ... so far as I can see, it is a plain matter of fact that it is so. Feminists have indeed said that this is because women have always been denied the opportunity of taking the lead; but we would still have to ask how it is that they have allowed the opportunity to be denied them....1 Evans-Pritchard, in his essay 'The position of women in primitive societies and our own', thus reiterates, in the first part of this passage, an assumption made in innumerable anthropological texts, monographs, and theoretical works.2 In fact, for the most part, this view of female status has been accepted as a given, hardly requiring substantiation, justification, or even explicit statement.3 In the body of his essay, Evans-Pritchard questions whether the subject of female status may even be considered a serious

research problem, at least in the social sciences. He maintains, for instance, that relations between the sexes are determined by 'imponderables ... rather than law and even custom',4 and 'ultimately the status of
This paper was originally written in 1974, as part of a qualifying examination presented to the Department of Anthropology at Northwestern University. I am greatly indebted to Dolores Koenig and Cathleen Weigley Schiller for on-going discussions and bibliographic leads out of which many of the ideas in this paper grew. I am also grateful to Professor Joan Scott for continuing encouragement and help in shaping and directing my thoughts to their present form. Finally, I thank Professors Ethel Albert and Roy Wagner for their stimulating criticism and provocative suggestions, many of which have been incorporated into this paper. 1 E. E. Evans-Pritchard,'The position of women in primitive societies and our own', in The Position of Womenin PrimitiveSocieties and Other Essays in Social Anthropology(New York, 1963), p. 54. 2 For example, Cara Richards, Man in Perspective: an Introduction to Cultural Anthropology (New York, 1971), p. 70 (standard textbook); Robin Fox, Kinship and Marriage (Baltimore, 1969), pp. 31-2 (basic reference work); Evalyn Michaelson and Walter Goldschmidt, 'Female roles and male dominance among peasants', SouthwesternJournal of Anthropology, 27 (1971), 330. 3 Evans-Pritchard points out in a footnote that his essay on women, delivered as a lecture in 1955, was not published until eight years later because, at the time of delivery, he did not deem it 'important enough to merit publication' (op. cit., 37). 4 Ibid., 42. I23

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women ... goes beyond the scope of sociological analysis[;]it is fundamentally a moral question'.5 The dearth of ethnographic or ethnological information on women produced during the period between the demise of nineteenth-century evolutionary anthropology and the recently revived interest in female status, suggests that Evans-Pritchard's sentiments, on this issue at least, were (and are) shared by a large number of his.colleagues. Largely because the revival of feminism has led to renewed interest in sex-defined roles and female status in Britain and the United States, 'the woman question' is being reestablished as a legitimate research problem in these disciplines. A growing number of social scientists have returned to the question posed by Evans-Pritchardat the end of the passage quoted above. Attempts have been made, on the one hand, to elucidate the means by which women have universally 'been denied the opportunity of taking the lead', while, on the other hand, others have tried to demonstrate that the initial assumption is invalid, that women (as a category) are not universally subordinated by men. These attempts have been influenced, to varying degrees, by assumptions about women made in the earliest anthropological literature dealing with the subject, as well as those found in twentieth-century anthropology, and twentieth-centuryAmerican and British feminism. They have also been influenced by the generally poor quality and paucity of cross-cultural data available on either women or relationships between the sexes. Work in this area is made both frustrating and stimulating by its lack of adequate analytical framework, and indeed by confusion about exactly how to articulate the 'problem'. As often happens in newly popular fields of research, a deluge of disparate studies has appeared, but little effort has been made to relate them to one another, to isolate recurrent issues and concerns for closer examination, or to make explicit the various assumptions informing them. In this paper, I will examine some of the ways in which sexual differentiation and the relative status of men and women have been treated in British and American ethnological literature. Most often, 'man', 'human' and 'male' are at least implicitly equated, and women are left out of the picture.6 I will therefore limit discussion to theories dealing specifically with women, beginning with a very brief summary of some of the approaches developed by anthropologists in the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century. The focal point of this paper, however, is current theory, especially the influence of particularintellectual and political stances on both problem definition and theoretical approach.
Ibid., 56. This point has been made a number of times elsewhere. See for instance, Sally Slocum, 'Woman the gatherer: male bias in anthropology', in Rayna Reiter (ed.), Toward an Anthropologyof Women(New York, 1975), pp. 36-50. For a more general discussion of this phenomenon as a characteristic of our culture, see Jessica Murray, 'Male perspective in language', in Women. A Journal of Liberation 3 (1972), 46-50.
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Representative work dealing primarily with sexual differentiation will be presented and criticized, followed by a similar examination of studies on female status. Out of this discussion, I will formulate a series of research problems and propose an analytical framework from which to approach them. My primary purpose is to make explicit some of the assumptions and major points of contention appearing in current work on sex-defined roles, to define and clarify some of the key issues as an aid and stimulus to further discussion and debate.
THEORETICAL ANTECEDENTS

Interest in the cross-cultural status of women dates from the beginnings of anthropological inquiry. To Victorian British anthropologists, 'the relation between the sexes was [a] favorite topic, in fact only religion competed with it for the interest of those puritanical unbelievers'.7 The theoretical orientation of these studies reflects that of the discipline as a whole at the time. Victorian anthropologists were committed to the notion of social evolution, and believed that by studying those societies at 'earlier stages of evolution' they could reconstruct the process of social evolution. They drew primarily on reports of missionaries or explorers, and, applying logic, deductive reasoning, and considerable imagination, isolated stages of the development of various social institutions and arranged them in plausible evolutionary sequence, with middle-class Victorian England as the culminating point, the model of ultimate civilization, the fittest to survive. This conception of the Study of Man was commensurate with both the predominant intellectual climate of nineteenth-century Britain and the politics of a colonial power. The interest in the status of women within this framework also stems from social and political concerns of the period. A highly visible and vocal feminist movement flourished at the time, making an issue of the status of women, 'challenging complacent assumptions about the timeless quality of women's roles, [and rejecting the notions that] marriage, the family, and sexual roles .. belong to the natural conditions of men'8 or are dictated by law of nature. Victorian anthropology, in examining the evolution of marriage and female status, sought to demonstrate that the Victorian solution was indeed only one of many and, far from being dictated by natural law, represented the triumph of civilization over man's natural propensities. Anthropologists therefore addressed themselves to an issue of general interest to the society of which they were a part, and provided justifications for the status quo which were amenable to the intellectual temperament of the day. The image of women emerging from the theories of such scholars as John
Evans-Pritchard, op. cit., 39. Elizabeth Fee, 'The sexual politics of Victorian social anthropology', Feminist Studies, 1 (1973), 23-4. See also Evans-Pritchard, op. cit., 39-0.
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McLennan, John Lubbock, and Herbert Spencer, reflects the ideal (from a male point of view at least) middle-class Victorian woman. It was assumed that males and females were fundamentally different from one another. Women were, and always had been, passive victims of various stages of social evolution, until, at its apex, they were passive receptors of its benefits. With few exceptions, it was assumed that they were incapable of playing active economic or productive roles: they contributed neither to the maintenance nor the evolution of society. Alternatively, economic activity was taken as a mark of harsh treatment and low female status. Likewise, it was for these British scholars inconceivable that women might ever hold positions of authority or power: men alone could and should be dominant. The status of women was measured in moral terms, and was believed to have risen with the rise of civilization: always modest, and horrified but defenseless in the face of male lust, their status improved as male 'natural' instincts were brought under control by civilization. As the weaker, gentle, timid sex ceased being the prey of males, and was instead placed on a pedestal and protected by their men, it reached the highest possible status.9 In the twentieth century, anthropologists have reacted strongly against their predecessors. 'Armchair anthropology' took on derogatory connotations, as fieldwork became the basis of anthropological research. Interest shifted from universal history, to ahistorical, particularistic studies of the ways in which specific societies operate. Where cross-cultural generalizations were attempted, explicit value judgments were assiduously avoided. Cultural relativism replaced social evolutionism. Interest in female status disappeared along with the theoretical framework and researchmethods of nineteenth-century anthropology. This is at least partly due to the decline of the feminist challenge in the societies of which anthropologists were a part. By the early twentieth century, British and American feminism had, for the most part, narrowed its focus to women's suffrage: female status and role definition were no longer such burning issues. With few exceptions, twentieth-century anthropology has treated women as at best peripheral members of society and at worst as nonexistent. Males continued to be viewed as the only social actors.10
9 For a more detailed description and critique of the work of these scholars, see Fee, op. cit., passim. 10The fieldwork method itself is partly to blame for this. Because most societies are strictly sex-segregated, and most anthropologists are men, access to information about women has largely been limited to what male informants know or are willing to tell. Women anthropologists, unlike their male colleagues, have an ambiguous social gender in many field situations, allowing them access to social domains and informants of either or both sexes. (See Mette Bovin, 'The significance of the sex of the field worker for insights into the male and female worlds', Ethnos 31 suppl. (1966), 24; Hannah Papanek, 'The woman fieldworker in a Purdah society', Human Organization 23 (1964), 162; Margaret Mead, 'Fieldwork in the Pacific Islands, 1925-1967', in Peggy Golde (ed.), Womenin the Field (Chicago, 1966), 322; Hortense Powdermaker, Stranger and Friend. The Way of an Anthropologist (New York,

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Just prior to mid-century, and perhaps related to apparently dramatic changes in middle-class female role definitions and attitudes of the period, 'the problem of women' reappeared briefly in the work of several American anthropologists. These studies focused on descriptions of cross-cultural sexual differentiation, and the functions or mechanisms of such differentiation, rather than on the evolution of the relative status of men and women. In fact, in contrast to most earlier and later anthropological work, 'status' here was most often taken to mean 'a collection of rights and duties'. Defined in this way, status may be described, but not measured or ranked.1 It was thus epistemologically impossible to address the kinds of problems of interest to nineteenth-century anthropology. The work of Ralph Linton stresses the fundamental importance of age and sex categorization to social organization. He demonstrates that age and sex differentiation are cultural universals, but that there is almost limitless cross-cultural variation in the content of sex roles. This indicates to him that societies cannot function without sex roles of some kind, but that there are few imperatives as to how a particular culture must define these roles.12 This variation also suggests that explanations of the function of sex roles must go beyond their content in any particular culture. He maintains that the fulfillment of individual needs in any society depends on the performance of certain activities, an exchange of services, and a division of the products of specialization. Essential tasks are distributed among different categories of individuals, who are trained for the skills and correlate personality, behavior patterns, and attitudes necessary to perform them. Sex is the most efficient classificatory device for this purpose, because it is ascertainable at birth, allowing individuals to be trained to fulfill their social functions from the beginning of their lives.13 Many societies further classify their members, but age and sex groupings remain the minimal, fundamental ones universally.14 Margaret Mead's work on sex roles during this period also stresses the wide cross-cultural variation of sex-role content, further demonstrating the inadequacy of biological explanations for sociocultural sexual differentia1966), 108-9, 113-4.) Women anthropologists, however, are few in absolute numbers, and the pressures upon themto conform to male procedures and standards have been considerable. At least until recently, therefore, they have tended not to take advantage of this role flexibility, preferring to do the same kind of male-oriented research and theory building as their male colleagues. (For example, see Mead, op. cit., 323; Nancy Tapper, 'Ethnographic review: Mary Douglas' The Lele of the Kasai', unpublished paper read at London Women's Anthropology Workshop, 1973.) 11 Ralph Linton, The Study of Man (New York, 1936), p. 113. 12 Ibid., 116. 13 Ibid., 129-30; Linton, Cultural Backgroundof Personality (New York, 1945), pp. 66-7. 14 Linton, 'Age and sex categories', AmericanSociological Review 7 (1942), 593; Linton, op. cit. (1945), 66-7.

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tion. Her explanations tend to be more psychological and particularistic than Linton's mechanical, universalistic theory.15 Unlike Linton or Mead, George Murdock limits his examination of sex roles to the division of labor by gender. Through systematic, cross-cultural comparison, he first confirms that there are virtually no universally 'feminine' occupations,16 but later rejects the notion of theoretically unlimited cross-cultural variations, and attempts to find explanations for why particular sex boundaries are drawn the way they are. He sees patterns of'female compatible' and 'male compatible' tasks, based on physiological differences between the sexes. He assumes that males are physically superior, and that females are 'handicapped by the physiological burdens of pregnancy and nursing'. Men, therefore, may 'range farther afield to hunt, to fish, to herd, and to trade', while women are 'at no disadvantage... in the lighter tasks which can be performed in or near the home'. 7 Anthropologists have shown some interest in similarly empirical aspects of sexual differentiation, and have accepted as a truism universal differentiation. With very few isolated exceptions, 8 however, sexual differentiation and female roles, either cross-culturally or within particular cultures, were not again a major focus of research until the revival of feminism in the United States and Britain in the late 1960s again made female status an issue of interest. At this time, there appeared a spate of work aimed at persuading the anthropological community that a strong male bias exists throughout the ethnographic record; that women have not been treated as ethnographic subjects, and that they ought to be.19 The research on women which followed has been influenced to varying degrees by the two types of approaches outlined above, both in terms of problem formulation and of analytic framework. Emphasis swings back and forth
in ThreePrimitive Societies (New 15 See especially, Margaret Mead, Sex and Temperament York, 1963; original publication, 1935); Mead, Male and Female (New York, 1949). 16 George P. Murdock, 'Comparative data on the division of labor by sex', Social Forces 15 (1937), 553. 17 Murdock, Social Structure (New York, 1949), p. 7. 8 Virtually the only anthropological studies of women published between 1950 and the late 1960s are Phyllis Kaberry, Women of the Grassfields (London, 1952); Denise Paulme, ed., Womenof Tropical Africa (London, 1963; original publication in French, Paris, 1960). 19 See for example, Beverly Chifias, 'Women as ethnographic subjects', in Sue-Ellen Jacobs, compiler, Women in Cross-Cultural Perspective. A Preliminary Sourcebook (Urbana, Ill., 1971), pp. 22-31; S. Jacobs, 'Preface', in Womenin Perspective. A Guidefor Cross Cultural Studies (Urbana, 1974), pp. vii-xiii; Ruby Leavitt, Barbara Sykes, and Elizabeth Weatherford, 'Aboriginal woman: male and female anthropological perspectives', in Reiter, op. cit., 110-26; Cynthia Nelson, 'Public and private politics: women in the Middle Eastern world', AmericanEthnologist 1 (1974), 551-3, 560; Denise Paulme, 'Introduction', in Paulme (ed.), op. cit., Michelle Rosaldo and Louise Lamphere, 'Introduction', in Rosaldo and Lamphere (eds.), Woman, Culture and Society (Stanford, 1974), 1-15; Slocum, op. cit. (Much of this literature was circulated in unpublished form several years prior to the publication dates listed here.)

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between, on the one hand, a focus on the mechanisms of sexual differentiation (with status differential assumed), and, on the other, a focus on measuring female status (with sexual differentiation assumed).
CURRENT WORK ON SEXUAL DIFFERENTIATION

Symbolic Analysis. One approach to the study of women, at present an unusual one, stems from structural analysis of symbolic systems, and is typified by the work of Edwin Ardener. As defined by Ardener, the 'problem of women' is the analytical and technical difficulties this half of human societies poses to anthropologists.20 Like his mid-century predecessors, he is concerned only with sexual differentiation and not with measurable female status. Unlike Linton or Mead, however, he is uninterested in behavioral or personality differences, and, spurning functionalist analysis, he does not consider the purposes or adaptive advantages of sexual differentiation. Ardener maintains that anthropologists have failed to understand women in the societies they study because, although they observe the behavior of women, they tend to talk only with men, deriving their models almost exclusively from the male portion of these societies,21 and considering women from a male point of view, if at all.22 Anthropologists interested in symbolic analysis, Ardener claims, have rediscovered women because they loom large in the myth and belief material with which symbolists work. Much of the symbolism of a given society may appear to enact a perception of the universe which conflicts with models of that society put forth by its male members. This suggests to Ardener that men and women may have two distinct models or conceptualizations of their universe.23 For him then, the problem is to explain why, and exactly how, female models differ from male, and why female models have been overlooked by anthropologists. Ardener discerns two fundamental differences between male and female conceptions of the universe. First, he assumes a universal and fundamental tension between 'culture' and 'nature' (the wild), claiming that all groups define these two concepts, at least implicitly, and place themselves somewhere in relationship with them.24 Men, he says, tend to bound their world such that it is differentiated from and opposed to 'nature', whereas women perceive their universe as including both 'nature' and 'culture'. Using data from the Bakweri (Cameroon), he demonstrates that the male definition of the 'wild' includes its attraction and danger to women. For Bakweri men, 'the problem of women' is that women insist on partly living in what is, for the men, the 'wild': e.g., female work frequently takes them
20 Edwin Ardener, 'Belief and the problem of women', in Jean LaFontaine, ed., The Interpretationof Ritual (London, 1972), p. 135. 21 Ibid., 136 22 Ibid., 139. 23 Ibid., 140-1. 24 Ibid., 141.

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into the 'wild' beyond the village fence, and their 'natural' reproductive powers are not under male control. These 'wild' aspects of the female world, on the other hand, are not threatening, marginal, or alien to women; they form an integral part of the universe as women perceive it.25 Women may, however, have a 'problem of men' to the extent that a part of the male universe may be perceived by women as part of the alien 'wild' from which they bound themselves off (e.g., arenas of hunting and warfare). Men's 'wild' may thus present similarkinds of threats to women as women's 'wild' does to men.26 Ardener also maintains that because males are generally more likely to come into contact with other cultures or social groups, they are more likely to bound themselves and their women off from other male/female units. Women, on the other hand, having less contact with the outside, are less likely to differentiate themselves from other social groups, and instead differentiate more sharply between male and female within their own group. They do not include men in their models of the universe. Women do tend to adopt the male perception when they encounter definitional problems vis-a-visother groups, but men are less likely to adopt the female
mode.27

Having established the contrasting nature of male and female conceptualizations, Ardener asks, first, why anthropologists have assumed that symbolism is necessarily generated by a society as a whole (i.e., that there is no sexual differentiation on the level of belief systems), and second, why the male view of the universe is taken by anthropologists as the society's view, while the contrasting female view is obscured or overlooked.28 He points out that in many field situations, it has been reported that men are more 'articulate' than women: women are not so easily reached and are more likely to 'giggle or snort', than to respond 'properly' to anthropologists' queries. He rejects the 'Hot Stove argument' often used to explain this phenomenon: that women, because they are so concerned with the realities of childbirth and childrearing, have less time and less propensity for making models of their society for each other, their men, or visiting ethnographers.29 Rather, he maintains, because anthropologists are either men, or women trained to think like men, anthropology orders the universe in a male fashion. That is, it defines culture as clearly opposed to nature, and society as a unit composed of both males and females, and opposed to other (bisexual) societies. Female models, because they do not conform to this conceptualization, are unacceptable or incomprehensible to anthropologists.30 Functionalists, Ardener says, have been using male models to explain male perceptions of societies. Only when anthropologists begin
25 Ibid., 143-4. 30 Ibid., 139, 142.
26

Ibid., 154.

27 Ibid., 142.

28 Ibid., 152-3.

29 Ibid., 137-8.

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to analyze belief systems can the other half of the population 'be restored to speech'.31 Ardener's demonstration of the possibility of sexual differentiation on an ideological or conceptual, as well as a behavioral, level is an extremely important contribution to the study of women. His attempt to explain anthropologists' professional negligence of women by universalizing the contrast between Bakweri male and female conceptual systems is, however, unconvincing. It seems more reasonable to suggest that this kind of differentiation is not universal. In particular, it is not present in the societies to which anthropologists belong. Anthropologists have overlooked it, not so much because they are all (at least intellectually) men, but because they are members of our society. Their cultural baggage includes our notion that males and females ultimately form one group which has, or should have, access to the same resources, share identical systems of values and beliefs, and so on. Given the behavioral differentiation reported in all societies, human is equated (by anthropologists) with man. Male activities, values and modes of expression are taken as the norm for the society as a whole. With this point of departure, it is perfectly legitimate research procedure to focus on male aspects of a society and to present results as representative of the society as a whole. Those anthropologists who are concerned with female status then assume that, insofar as women do not participate in the same activities, utilize the same modes of expression, or have access to the same resources as men, they may be considered, in some sense, to be left out of the really 'important' things. If one assumes an ideological unity of males and females, this behavioral differentiation may be explained in several ways, depending on one's underlying preconceptions. On one hand, it may be taken as evidence of the inferiority of women: they are too weak, incapable, or stupid to take a full place in the society. On the other hand, it may be interpreted as evidence of the subordination of women: they have consistently been kept down by their physiology, the ill-will of men, the structural arrangements of their societies, or whatever. In any case, given an assumed lack of ideological differentiation, together with demonstrable behavioral differentiation in most societies, male and female status, when considered, is usually portrayed in a hierarchical fashion, with women generally assumed to fill the lower ranks. The initial assumption of a fundamental unity of male and female values and beliefs in any given society-virtually unquestioned and generalized by anthropologists to all societies-thus has profound empirical and theoretical implications. Ardener's demonstration of its fallacy in at least one cultural context undermines the line of reasoning which follows it, raising a number of questions, to be further considered below.
31

Ibid., 153.

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Behavioral Analysis. Another kind of analysis of sexual differentiation stems more directly from the work of Linton and especially Murdock. That is, the 'problem of women' is defined as a search for cross-cultural regularities in sex-role definition, and explanation of those regularities. In contrast to Ardener's work, the interest here is in behavioral differences between the sexes, and the social functions each sex group performs for the maintenance of society. Also, for the first time since the evolutionists' work, a political motivation is clearly evident. Once again, as the position of women becomes an issue in societies producing anthropologists, it becomes a topic of anthropological research. This time, however, in contrast to the nineteenth-century work, most of the anthropological work on women is, to varying degrees, motivated by a 'wish to see genuine changecome about, the emergence of a social and cultural order in which as much of the range of human potential is open to women as to men'.32 Various aspects of feminist theory are brought to the fore in a number of different approaches to the study of women. One of the first tenets developed by the new wave of American feminism revolved around the concept that sex roles are culturally defined. That is, through the processes of child socialization, Madison Avenue advertising, pop-psychology, and so on, women have been brainwashed into believing that they are different from men, and that they are either obligated to conform to particular roles, or incapable of behaving otherwise. Once it is established that these roles are culturally, rather than naturally, determined, the possibility of changing them becomes feasible. A great deal of feminist rhetoric, particularly in the late 1960s, therefore focused on documenting both the arbitrariness of sex-defined roles and the extent to which female roles are constraining, and called for their redefinition or destruction. The problem, broached by several anthropologists, was to define exactly what ought to be changed and how. Both Judith K. Brown and Sherry Ortner,33 in attempting to suggest solutions to this problem, go back a step to further clarify exactly how and why the sexes are differentiated. Brown is primarily interested in the economic activities of women cross-culturally. She musters considerable ethnographic data to illustrate the diversity of female roles, and emphasizes the major contribution of women to primary subsistence activities in many cultures. She thus dispels the notion that women are necessarily economic drains. She does, however, see a universal constraint on female activities. That is, cross-culturally, women have primary responsibility for child care.
32 Sherry Ortner, 'Is female to male as nature is to culture?', Feminist Studies 1 (1972), 5 (reprinted in Rosaldo and Lamphere, op. cit.). 33 Judith K. Brown, 'A note on the division of labor by sex', AmericanAnthropologist 72 (1970); Ortner, op. cit.

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'If the economic role of women is to be maximized, their responsibilities in child care must be reduced or the economic activity must be such that it can be carried out concurrently with child care'.34 In those societies without alternative means of child care, women's work activities will be such that 'they do not require rapt concentration and are relatively dull and repetitive;they are easily interruptibleand easily resumed once interrupted; they do not place the child in potential danger and they do not require the participant to range very far from home'.35 In societies depending for subsistence upon activities with these characteristics (e.g. hoe agriculture), women will make major subsistence contributions; otherwise they will not, unless alternative means of child care are available. Brown's main point is that women do the kinds of work they do not because of inherent physiological constraints, but because of the pragmatic problem of child-care responsibility.36 The implications are obvious: women are capable of doing any work that men do, but they must be relieved of responsibility for child care to do it. Ortner, although still concerned with sexual differentiation, sees it as a far deeper and more complicated phenomenon involving not only 'social actuality', but also 'cultural view'. She begins with the assumption that women are universally given 'secondary status', and attempts to explain why they are viewed, and view themselves, in this way rather than simply why they do what they do. Superficially, her analysis resembles that of Ardener. She posits a universal tension between 'nature' and 'culture', and maintains that males are always associated with 'culture' while females are partly associated with both 'nature' and 'culture'. Unlike Ardener, however, she assumes that symbol and belief systems are generated by societies as a whole. She asserts that 'culture' is universally regarded as superior to, or transcendent of, 'nature'. If women are universally regarded as inferior, then, it is because they are associated more with 'nature' than are men. Ortner thus adds a sense of hierarchy which is missing in the analyses of both Ardener and Brown. She then poses the familiar question, which becomes the focal point of her analysis: why are males and females differentiated in this way? Here, she abandons all pretense of structural or symbolic analysis, and returns to the behavioral and functional explanations of Brown and Murdock, including the 'Hot Stove argument' rejected by Ardener. Women are associated with nature, she says, because of 'the natural procreative functions specific to women alone'.37 Woman's body and its functions involve her more with 'species life', giving her less time and energy than man to embark on 'the projects of culture'.38This in turn gives her a social role tied closely to the domestic sphere, which is considered to be closer to
34

Brown, op. cit., 1075. 38 Ibid., 12.

35

Ibid., 1075-6.

36

Ibid., 1077.

37 Ortner, op. cit., 12.

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nature than (and inferior to) the extrafamilial sphere in which men operate. Like Brown, Ortner emphasizes that female role definition is a product of culture, not the result of immutable natural laws: 'woman is not "in reality" any closer to (nor farther from) nature than man ... but there are certain reasons why she appears to be that way'.39 While Ortner is fully and explicitly committed to social change, she emphasizes the difficulties of such change, rejecting the simplistic view taken by Brown: a different viewcan growonlyout of a different a different cultural socialactuality, socialactuality can growonly out of a different view ... it seemsclearthat cultural [society must allow] women to participatein, and women [must] actively thefullestrangeof rolesandactivities available withintheculture.Men appropriate and women can, and must, be equally involved in projectsof creativityand transcendence. Only then will women easily be seen as alignedwith culture,in culture'songoingdialecticwith nature.40 Ortner's analysis can be criticized, first on the grounds that it is uncertain that a distinction between 'nature' and 'culture'is universallyrecognized or considered important. Ortner not only assumes the universality of this distinction, but reifies both particulardefinitions of the two concepts and a particular relationship between them. This is clearly unjustified. Even within Western thought, where a distinction is clearly drawn between nature and culture, the relationship between the two is conceived in a variety of ways. In the Rousseauan tradition, 'nature' is at least morally superior;in the tradition from which such literatureas The Lord of the Flies or The Old Man and the Sea arises, it is transcendent. In the school of thought represented by Levi-Strauss, the two are in a dialectical relationship of balanced opposition and interdependence. The hierarchical relationship perceived by Ortner, with 'culture' in a superior position is only one of several cultural perceptions, and certainly not universally accepted. Furthermore, even within American culture, women are by no means always associated with 'nature'. The ideology of the American western frontier includes the notion of women as 'culture'-bearing or civilizing agents, who eventually subdued those rowdy anti-social males who had tended to revert to nature before the arrival of the 'gentler sex'.41American sexual imagery portrays man with his 'natural' animal lust channeled by more responsible and civilized women. Other exceptions to Ortner's scheme could be found, clearly indicating that it is by no means a universal system. Central to both Brown's and Ortner's analyses is a preoccupation with
Ibid., 28. 40 Ibid., 28. In a personal communication (1974), Ethel Albert points out that this idea may be traced through Christian thought at least as far back as c. 1200.
39
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women's childrearing and childbearing functions. Both scholars see these as the defining and constraining features of female roles, psychic structure, or cultural valuation. Certainly institutions, social pressures, and values in our own society (and others) justify this position. In American society, women are often believed to be so preoccupied with their physiological functions that they can do little else. For instance, an editorial on the dangers of female encroachment on male domains appearing in the New York Herald in 1852 facetiously describes the disruption caused in a courtroom by a female lawyer giving birth in the midst of her defense of a client.42 More recently, female proclivity for, and the overwhelming constraints supposed to be ensuant from, pregnancy and menstrual emotional instability, have been considered persuasive arguments against the hiring or career training of women-or electing one President. This same preoccupation is evident in the American feminist movement in which a preponderant emphasis is placed on the control of female physiological functions: counseling, education, and reform of legislation relating to birth control and abortion constitute a large part of the current feminist effort. Related to this phenomenon is a preoccupation with childrearing. It is assumed in American middle-class culture that childrearing is a full-time occupation, with young children thought to be best cared for at home by their mothers, who must also give a great deal of guidance and attention even after school is begun. Juvenile delinquency, homosexuality, and other 'social disorders' have been attributed to mothers' failure to provide enough, or the proper kinds, of attention to their children. These attitudes are generally assumed to obtain in all societies. It is clear, however, that childbearing and rearing are not the defining features of women's lives universally. In fact, in some societies, they impinge relatively little on women's lives. French peasant women are expected to have several children, as a duty to their husbands, as validation of their own adult status, and as a means of insuring adequate help on the farm and heirs for the family property. However, women are defined primarily as farm workers. Traditionally, they continued their farm work through pregnancy and resumed it soon after childbirth. Small children are left with neighbors, elder siblings, or other kin, and older children are expected to fend largely for themselves.43 Historical evidence indicates that among European urban working classes, babies were sent to wetnurses in the country, often until the age of seven, so that their mothers' work would not be interrupted.
42 Cited in Eileen Kraditor, Upfrom the Pedestal. Selected Documentsfrom the History of American Feminism (Chicago, 1968), p. 190. 43 Susan Carol Rogers, 'Female forms of power and the myth of male dominance: a model of female/male interaction in peasant society', American Ethnologist 2 (1975), 741, 754.

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Older children received minimum attention, and at age seven or eight were sent to work and expected to pay their own way in the family.44 Furthermore, women may limit the size of their families and thus be directly concerned with childbearing and young children for only a few years of their lives. For generations, French peasant women have preferred to have only two or three children. Despite recent government campaigns in the form of bonuses and prizes for mothers of more than five children, it is still considered irresponsible to have a large family.45Peasant women say they 'put in the cork' after two or three children.46 Several interviews on contraceptives I conducted among French peasant women were disrupted by their uncontrollable laughter at the thought that a middle-aged (pre-menopausal) woman with several children might be concerned with birth control (other than abstinence). Clearly female sexuality and its consequences are controlled by the values and beliefs of these women. This point is reiterated in studies of quite different types of societies. For instance, in their survey of literature on Australian aboriginal women, Leavitt, Sykes, and Weatherford note that aboriginal women 'regard children as the consequence of marriage and not the reason for it'.47 Childbirths are deliberately spaced, and controlled through widespread use of abortion.48 In her study of Australian women, Kaberry asserts that 'where she does bear children, they do not anchor her the more securelyin a position of inferiority, nor circumscribe her activities'.49 In other societies, greater value is placed upon having a large number of children. However, even where women spend a large part of their adult lives pregnant or nursing, the extent to which this limits their other activities varies considerably. In many West African societies, for instance, where it is considered important to bear as many children as possible, women engage in a number of other occupations. Yoruba market women bring their children to market, which is their main locus of activity. Igbo market women leave them with co-wives, husband, or kin.50 Among the Mende, where women achieve high political positions, childbearing and rearing are regarded as advantages, rather than biological or social disabilities. Most
44 Olwen Hufton, 'Women and the family economy in eighteenth century France', paper read at French Historical Society Meetings (Baltimore, 1974), 13-14; see also Philippe Aries, Centuriesof Childhood(New York, 1962) for the (remarkably short) history of the notion of childhood in Western bourgeois society. 45 S. Rogers, 'The acceptance of female roles in rural France', unpublished honors thesis (Brown University, 1972), p. 39. 46 Laurence Wylie, Village in the Vaucluse(New York, 1964), p. 149. Wylie notes that he never discovered what 'the cork' is, except that it is not 'devices secured at the drugstore or from the doctor' (ibid.). 47 Leavitt et al., op. cit., 120. 48 Ibid., 120. See also Jane C. Goodale, Tiwi Wives (Seattle, 1971), 145; Phyllis Kaberry, Aboriginal Woman. Sacred and Profane (Philadelphia, 1939), 157-8. 49 Kaberry, op. cit. (1939), 156. 50 M. Green, Ibo Village Affairs (London, 1948), p. 171.

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of the women holding high office are of childbearing age. Because pregnant and lactating women are sexually taboo and thus have few or no responsibilities toward their husbands at this time, they are freer to travel, to campaign for and to fill public office. Weaned children may be left with kin, clients, or wards and thus represent no serious constraint. Female office-seekers, furthermore, turn maternity to their political advantage by asserting the image of themselves as 'mothers writ large', a powerful metaphor in this cultural context.51 Their ability to bear children is also taken as a demonstration that they 'are strong and active agents in society, capable of holding political office'.52 Any general theory of sexual differentiation based primarily on the constraints of woman's physiological functions and childrearing responsibilities is therefore a clear reflection of our cultural priorities. Our notions of the constraints imposed by menstruation or pregnancy, and of the personnel and amount of attention required for childrearing, are not generalizable to all societies. The universalization of these notions constitutes unwarranted ethnocentrism.
CURRENT WORK ON FEMALE STATUS: UNIVERSAL FEMALE

SUBORDINATION

By far the majority of work now being done on women centers on female forms of power and female status. Sexual differentiationper se either is not treated, or taken as one of several indications of low female status. There is considerable diversity within this body of work, both in regard to its rootedness in earlier research, and to the degree of political motivation evident. While some anthropologists explicitly state that their work is motivated by a desire to mobilize direct action to change the contemporary power structure in our own and other societies, others are more modestly attracted to the problem of rethinking the roles of women in society.53 Still others are simply interested in understanding the female experience in various societies, and in opening up a formerly neglected area of study. All of the scholars to be considered here have a feminist perspectivein the sense that they reject 'the view of women as passive victims of their sexual constitution... or as formless lumps shaped by their environment'.54 They assume instead that women are social actors, with goals of their own,
51 Carol Hoffer, 'Mende and Sherbo women in high office', Canadian Journal of African Studies 6 (1972), 163-4. 52 C. Hoffer, 'Madam Yoko: ruler of the Kpa Mende Confederacy', in Rosaldo and Lamphere, op. cit., 173. 53 Caroline Ifeka, 'The female factor in anthropology', paper read at London Women's Anthropology Workshop (1973), p. 2. 54 Ellen Lewin, J. Collier, M. Rosaldo, and J. Fjellman, 'Power strategies and sex roles', unpublished paper read at the 70th Annual Meeting, American Anthropological Association (New York, 1971), p. 12.

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and means to achieve them. To the extent that women have low status, this is considered the result of social or cultural arrangements, not of inherent female inferiority. Beyond this, however, the feminism of these scholars reflects the diversity of contemporary American and British feminists. For some, it is inextricably bound up with neo-Marxist thought. Others, rejecting this kind of doctrine, believe in integration: the breakdown of sexual differentiation. Still others may be termed segregationists, emphasizing the differences between men and women, and the superiority of women. This diversity of political orientation, together with variations in the extent to which it is incorporated into anthropological analysis, results in a number of different interpretations of data, and the subsequent development of varying theoretical or analytical schemes. The greatest dividing line between these scholars centers around the question of whether or not women may be assumed to be universally subordinated to men. Both views will be discussed here. One of the most important strategies of American feminism, particularly in the late 1960s, was 'consciousness-raising', an institutionalized process by which neophyte feminists learned first, that they are subordinated, and second, how and in what forms this subordination occurs. The development of this kind of awareness was seen as an essential first step to political awareness and to the mobilization of women to effect reasoned political, social, and personal change. A number of feminist anthropologists have continued this process by demonstrating that women are universally subordinated. To them, the notion that women in other societies may not be, or do not believe themselves to be, subordinated, is evidence of 'false-consciousness'.55They assume that the sex groups are universally related hierarchically,and focus, in their research, on the female group. They maintain that unless women can be demonstrated to be dominant, they must be subordinate. The criteria they choose for measuring female power and status are such that women may never be shown to be dominant. This is not, however, taken to indicate that women are submissive. On the contrary, it is held that women often have at their disposal important means of wielding power and influence. Because of the nature of all social or cultural systems, however, men simply have more power. The key to understanding and criticizing these scholars, then, is the criteria they use for measuring female status or power. It should be pointed out that they superficially resemble the
55 Many of the ideas in this section were expressed at the Conference on the Role of Women in the Preindustrial Family in Europe (Ann Arbor, 1974). A number of participants represented this point of view and, during the conference, made explicit many of the underlying assumptions in their work. Rayna Reiter, Harriet Rosenberg, and Miriam Cohen were most helpful in elucidating their ideas, and constructively criticizing mine. It is impossible, however, to attribute these ideas to any one individual, and I take responsibility for any distortions I may have inadvertently introduced in my interpretation of their point of view.

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nineteenth-century evolutionists mentioned above, in their attempt to demonstrate the cross-cultural subordination of women. They differ, however, in not assuming women to be passive or submissive, and in not taking the status of women in their own society as an ideal to be thrust upon other women. Our society is a model only in the sense that criteria applicable to female status here are assumed to be applicable elsewhere. These criteria used for measuring female status can be described as follows. Economic. Women's contribution to the economy of a society has been the focus of a great deal of attention. Reversing the assumption made by some nineteenth-century evolutionists, it has been argued that female status increases with women's contribution to the subsistence economy.56 This notion is implicit in Brown's analysis, and feminists have placed a great deal of emphasis on the importance of extradomestic economic activity as a means of raising women's status. This view is problematic, however, unless further qualified. In some societies, after all, slaves may perform most of the subsistence labor without enjoying especially high status. Dorothy Remy argues that the status of women should be measured by their capacity to obtain economic security or autonomy within the structural constraints of the total economy. Superior female status would result from a division of labor in which women contribute more than men to the subsistence economy, and a system whereby women have control over both their own labor and its fruits.57 She argues that a careful distinction must be made between the value or prestige assigned to economic activities and their actual importance. For instance, in hunting and gathering societies, (male) hunting is often the most highly valued activity, while (female) gathering provides up to 90 percent of the caloric intake. Women's status in this situation is higher than an exclusive focus on the ideological aspects of the economic system would suggest. However, the fact that male activities are given higher ideological value gives men an edge over women.58 Women's labor, moreover, is virtually always ultimately controlled by men. Remy cites two indications of this. First, marriageand bridewealth arrangementsare made independently of the desire of women, and second, women commonly develop close relationships with their sons and fight for the latters' economic success, because they are dependent upon their sons for economic security.59 Thus, although women may be politically or economically active in
56 Rae Blumberg, 'Toward a cross-society theory of factors determining female status', paper read at Northwestern University Department of Sociology Colloquium (1974). 57 Dorothy Remy, 'Towards an economic anthropology for women', paper read at London Women's Anthropology Workshop (1973), pp. 1, 3. 58 Ibid., 1-2. 59 Ibid., 3.

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traditional societies, they are still subordinated. With capitalist development, Remy argues, women's status further deteriorates, because the relative economic importance of subsistance activities decreases, and because women are systematically barredfrom, or discriminatedagainst, in wage employment.60 The status of women may therefore be raised only by restructuring the economy and adopting a socialist system. Also 'women must liberate themselves to gain control of their economic potential and therefore their autonomy'.61 Sanday also reacts to the notion that women's participation in subsistence activities may be used as a simple measure of their status. Unlike most of the others, she defines exactly what she means by 'status', making explicit the usually implicit equation of status and power.62 She specifies four measures of female status: I. Femalecontrolover produce II. External and internaldemandor valueplacedon femaleproduce in at least some politicalactivities III. Femaleparticipation IV. Femalesolidaritygroupsdevotedto femalepoliticalor economicinterests.63 She selects twelve societies from Murdock's Ethnographic Atlas, scores them on the basis of presence or absence of these four factors, and then compares these scores with the percentage of female contribution to subsistence in each society. Virtually no direct correlation was found between the two, indicating that access to resources does not necessarily result in control over them. Political. Female participation in political activities becomes a focal point in many studies of female status. In most of these, it is maintained that females virtually never have formal political power.64This assumption is commonly found in anthropological literature.65 In the work here considered, however, a distinction is drawn between power ('the ability to gain compliance') and culturally legitimated authority ('the recognition that [such ability] is right').66 It is demonstrated that women may have considerable amounts of informal power or influence, and that this has been underestimated in the ethnographic literature. This type of power is regarded by these scholars, however, as less important or desirable than legitimated authority. If men control political offices and other positions of
Ibid., 4. Ibid., 5. 62 Peggy Sanday, 'Toward a theory of the status of women', American Anthropologist 75 (1973), 1682. 63 Ibid., 1694. 64 See for example, Michelle Rosaldo, 'Women, culture and society: a theoretical overview', in Rosaldo and Lamphere, op. cit., 17-18; Susan Harding, 'Women and words in a Spanish village', in Reiter, op. cit., 306-8. 65 William Stephens, The Family in Cross-CulturalPerspective (New York, 1963), p. 289 is one example. 66 Rosaldo, op. cit., 21.
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authority, they ultimately dominate women. That women have only informal, manipulative power at their disposal, it is argued, is demeaning and indicative of low status. Although the importance of female informal power-and, as a result, female status-is assumed to vary from society to society, males are held to be universally dominant by virtue of their universal monopolization of formal or legitimized power. Social loci. This belief in the preeminence of formal political power is further underlined by those scholars who focus on the arenas in which men and women operate. Implicitly or explicitly, the definition of formal political power used in these analyses includes the specification that it be operative in a public sphere. A distinction is often drawn between the private 'domestic' or familial, on the one hand, and the public, social or political, on the other. The former are defined as the fundamental mother-child units of a society, while the latter includes those 'activities, institutions, and forms of association that link, rank, organize, or subsume' the former.67 It is held that women are always relatively more tied than men to the domestic because of their childbearing and rearing functions. The importance of the domestic unit may vary somewhat in different types of societies, with subsequent implications for women's status and power. It is always, however, molded by higher level arrangements in the extradomestic arenas, so that, although women may be dominant in the domestic unit, they are ultimately subordinated if men control extradomestic activities. For instance, Lamphere, like Sanday, sees female solidarity as an important indication of female power within a subordinated situation. Assuming that this female solidarity necessarily has a domestic base, she suggests that it will arise where male authority structures allow for it, or where male authority is weak or absent in relation to the domestic scene.68 Rosaldo suggests that female solidarity-whether informal or institutionalized-'add[s] social and moral value to an otherwise domestic role'69 (emphasis mine). The domestic role, however, even when thus 'enhanced', is still the domestic role: 'women will seem to be oppressed or lacking in value and status to the extent that they are confined to domestic activities, cut off from other women and the social world of men'.70 Female subordination will disappear only when women are no longer identified with domestic life. The sexual distinction between the domestic and extradomestic arenas must be blurred, so that women may participate equally in social and political activities, and men participate in the domestic
67 Ibid., 23. See also Louise Lamphere, 'Strategies,cooperation, and conflict among women in domestic groups', in Rosaldo and Lamphere, op. cit., 97; Ortner, op. cit., 17-18. 68 Lamphere, op. cit., passim. 69 Rosaldo, op. cit., 39. 70 Ibid., 41.

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life of the home.71 The domestic arena is thus seen as a kind of albatross, universally weighing women down, and preventing them from participation in valued male spheres.72 Autonomy. Another measure of female status, found for example in the work of Michaelson and Goldschmidt, is the degree of personal autonomy enjoyed by women. Marriages which are arranged, rather than based on personal choice and love, as well as difficulty of divorce, are seen as indications of male dominance: women are subordinated in a male system and unable to make their own life choices.73 It will be noted that Remy pointed to women's lack of control over marriage arrangements as indicative of low female status. Blumberg74also sees freedom to marry as an important criterion for measuring female status. She further generalizes the notion, however, when she adds the criterion of 'life choice freedom'; that is, the amount of personal choice a woman has in deciding what she will do, quite beyond marriage arrangements. The (unwarranted) assumption here is that men always have this kind of choice, and if women do not, it is because they are male dominated. The above are a number of ways of defining female status. Various characteristicsof female roles are taken as indicative of subordinate status. Although these indications are most often presented as criteria by which female status may be measured, the fact that women are assumed from the outset to be subordinated introduces considerable tautology. The first problem with these analyses, then, is that whether or not the notion of universal female subordination is justified, all of these analyses demonstrate its existence because the criteria for measuring female status are chosen and defined with this conclusion in mind. Furthermore, these 'criteria' are often only descriptive statements about female roles, improperly put forth as analytic tools appropriate for the measurement of female status. Secondly, because attempts are being made to find 'objective' criteria applicable to all societies, variations in the contextual meaning of particular institutions are often overlooked, and their value or function in our society tends to be reified and generalized. Finally, because these analyses are all based on cross-cultural data from a variety of sources, a great deal of the data base is biased. Sources of cultural valuationsof women. For example, let us examine the argument 'that male, as opposed to female activities are always recognized as predominantly important, and cultural systems give authority and value to the roles and activities of men'.75 It is almost always 'culture' which is portrayed as the actor in this argument: for example, as well as giving
Ibid., 42. See also Ortner, op. cit., 28. See Michaelson and Goldschmidt op. cit., 332-3 for a more general view of sexual segregation as a cause or indication of low female status. 73 Ibid., 335-7. 74 Blomberg, op. cit. 75 Rosaldo, op. cit., 19.
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authority and value, culture is said to devalue women,76 or assign dominance to males.77 I would argue that 'culture'cannot do anything; it is the members of a society or culture who may act. The question to be posed then, is who is devaluing, assigning, and so on. Leavitt, Sykes and Weatherford suggest that it is the androcentrism of anthropologists themselves, reflecting, often unconsciously, the male bias of their own personal and professional socialization, which leads to consistent assertions and assumptions of high cultural valuation of males and male activities throughout the ethnographic record.78 Although the cultural baggage of anthropologists is undoubtedly an important factor, we may assume that these assertions also have some empirical basis in the expressed values and beliefs of the members of societies studied by anthropologists. If Ardener is correct in arguing that ideological systems are not necessarily generated by a society as a whole, the question of which members express such beliefs and their values becomes a crucial one. That is, men might regard their activities as predominantly important, and their cultural systems might give superior value to the roles and activities of men. As Ardener points out, most ethnographic data focuses on male cultural perceptions, assuming them to be representative of the society as a whole. But might not women in some societies perceive their activities as predominantly important and more highly valued than those of men? Perhaps the best statement of such a dichotomy is found in the following comments made by female and male informants respectively, and quoted in Kaberry's study of the Nsaw (Cameroon): thingsare women.Men are little.The thingsof womenareimportant. Important What are the thingsof men?Men are indeedworthless.Womenare indeedGod. Men are nothing.Have you not seen? Yes a womanis like God, andlikeGod shecannotspeak.Shemustsit silently.It is good that she shouldonly accept.79 In a number of societies, it is reported that men and women perceive themselves as 'separate entities' or 'different breeds'.80 Undercurrents of mutual antagonism between the sexes, and verbal belittling of each other are by no means limited to the Nsaw.81 This antagonism is often reported,
76

Leavitt et al., op. cit., 110-12, 123-4. Kaberry, op. cit. (1952), 150, 152. 80 For instance, Green, et 6volution op. cit., 176; Marie-Paule de The, 'Evolution f&minine villageoise chez les Beti du Sud-Cameroun', Bulletin IFAN 30b (1968), 1537; Denise Paulme, 'The social condition of women in two West African societies', Man 48 (1948), 44; Rogers, op. cit. (1975), 738. 81 Some of the examples found in the literature include: Green, op. cit., 176; Sylvia Leith-Ross, African Women: A Study of the Ibo of Nigeria (London, 1939), p. 46; Robert Netting, 'Marital relations in the Jos Plateau of Nigeria', AmericanAnthropologist71 (1969), passim.
78 79

77 Michaelson and Goldschmidt, op. cit., 330-1.

Ortner, op. cit., 10.

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especially in West African societies, to erupt in collective action of one sex group against the other, by means of institutionalized mechanisms of a type which suggest that in these cases at least, the two sex groups may indeed be viewed as separate entities, with different interests and goals.82 In other cases, the expression of such differences takes less disruptive forms. Separate prestige systems, based on different criteria, by which each sex group ranks its own members, sex-based differences in ranking the value of resources or the attractiveness of various kinds of work are mentioned in diverse ethnographic studies, and may be indications of separate male and female ideologies.83 Oppositions between ideological systems and material reality, such as that pointed out by Remy, may in fact be completed or mediated in some cases by the existence of two ideological systems. Finally, in a number of situations in which the male role is largely defined or asserted by men in terms of its sacred or ritual content, women are reported to exhibit considerable skepticism, 'merely going along with the game'84Or 'remain[ing]regrettably profane in their attitudes toward the men'.85 Kaberry, in noting this phenomenon among Australian aborigines, questions whether male anthropologists are correct in reporting that Australian men and their rites represent the sacred element in the community, in view of her observation that Australian women do not seem to 'be cognizant of the fact and accept it'.86 I would argue that it is possible for quite different ideologies regarding the place or value of males and females in the social order to exist side by side in the same society. Furthermore, discovering or reporting only one or the other ideology will result in serious distortion of the social reality. The argument that males are universally dominant because their activities are universally more highly valued thus dissolves. More information is needed about female perceptions of themselves and their cultures. In the meantime, statements about low cultural valuation of women may be assumed to be, at least in some cases, only public male valuations of women. While important to consider, such valuations are rather lopsided grounds on which to base theories about women, if women in the same societies do not accept them, and have their own counter valuations. Sexual segregation. In view of this possibility, the equating of sexual
Specific examples in various West African societies are described in Janheinz Jahn, 'A Yoruba market woman's life', in Dundes, ed., Every Man his Way(Englewood Cliffs, 1968), p. 234; Judith Van Allen,' "Sitting on a man": colonialism and the lost political institutions of Igbo women', CanadianJournal of African Studies 6 (1972); Carol Hoffer, op. cit., (1972); R. Delaroziere, 'Les institutions politiques et sociales des populations dites Bamileke', Etudes Camerounaises25-6 (1949), 50; Robert Ritzenthaler, 'Anlu.a women's uprising in the British Cameroons', African Studies 19 (1960), 1591-2. 83 For example, see Kaberry, op. cit. (1952), 49 on separate prestige systems; Leith-Ross, op. cit., 164 on differentiated valuation of resources; Rogers, op. cit. (1975), 740 on differentiated attitudes toward male and female work. 84 86 Ibid. Netting, op. cit., 1044. 85 Kaberry, op. cit. (1939), 230.
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segregation with discrimination against women-an assumption found in older ethnographic sources, as well as in those under discussion-is particularly spurious. On the contrary, marked social and economic segregation is conducive to the development of separate ideological systems and of two contrasting valuations of the importance and attractiveness of each sex group and its activities. In this case, the barringof one sex group from the domain of the other does not necessarily have negative implications for the excluded group. Furthermore, it may not be legitimate to consider one group as more excluded than the other, if neither has access to the other's domains. Where sexual segregation exists without this kind of duality, so that the resources, activities and so on of one sex group are more valued by both, while members of the other sex group are consistently denied access to them, then sexual discrimination is present. In other words, sexual segregation per se is neither discriminatory, nor a sign of discrimination. Only in the presence of other factors may the two be associated. Because these factors are clearly present in our society, the tendency is to facilely associate all segregation with discrimination. A closer look at the evidence indicates that this is not justified in all cultural contexts. Distributionand meaning of social loci. Finally, data on the social loci of men and women are no less male-biased than are those on cultural valuations. Because anthropologists have tended to assume that women are primarily and narrowly involved in domestic and family activities,87 virtually all of the available data on female roles are analyses of marriage practices and descriptions of domestic life. In attempting to synthesize these data, and make cross-cultural generalizations about women, one is led to the conclusion that women everywhere do little but marry men and run (or get run by) households. It is unclear, however, how much information on nondomestic aspects of female roles has gone undiscovered or unreported because anthropologists have failed to ask the proper questions. For instance, expressing his surprise on learning of the role played by women in the formal state hierarchy of precolonial Ashanti, Rattray states: I haveaskedtheold menandwomenwhyI didnot knowall this.... Theansweris alwaysthe same:'Thewhiteman neveraskedus this;you have dealingswith and considered womenof no account, recognize only men,we supposedthe European and we know you do not recognizethemas we have alwaysdone.'88
87 See Nelson, op. cit., for a discussion of the persistenceof this assumptionin literature. anthropological

R. S. Rattray, Ashanti (London, 1955), 84 (original publication, 1923). Rattray spent years in Ashanti and wrote voluminously on the precolonial and colonial periods of this monarchy during the first third of the twentieth century. His work is still considered to be the most complete and accurate ethnographic account of traditional Ashanti, and is frequently cited in more recent analyses of the culture. His observations about the status of women,

88

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In many West African societies, women traditionally played active economic, social, and political roles in extradomestic spheres, including a variety of institutionalized positions of formal authority in such state systems as Dahomey and Nupe, as well as Ashanti. Tilly and Scott demonstrate that in Europe a large percentage of nineteenth-century working-class women worked outside of the home.89 Clearly, women are not universally identified exclusively with the domestic, nor do men always monopolize positions of legitimized power. Nevertheless, as far as one can tell from available data, women are generally more closely identified with the domestic than are men, and societies in which women regularly have access to formal power appear to be relatively rare. In our society, as many contemporary feminists point out, relegation to the domestic sphere means isolation from most important seats of power. Furthermore, great value is placed on formal authority, and our lives are shaped, to a considerable extent, by decisions at least overtly made by the 'authorities'.90Feminists have argued effectively that barring women from positions of formal authority leaves them prey to ultimate male dominance. It may well be asked, however, if 'household' and 'formal power' have the same significance in other societies as in our own. Is the status of a peasant woman and a contemporary American urban middle-class woman identical, given that both center their activities in the household and have little or no access to formal power? The scholars here under discussion would argue that the same criteria should be applicable to both women, and that they have comparable statuses: both play subordinate roles. Another group of anthropologists, however, takes a more cultural relativist stance; they argue that power in the household, in certain socio-cultural contexts, may indeed be more significant than formal or extradomestic forms of power. Some have even suggested that the very selection of formal political power as a basis of analysis for all types of
particularly their considerable formal political roles, however, have gone largely ignored. For example, despite the fact that the head of state was a female position, having an elaborate female, as well as male, hierarchy under it, even analyses of the traditional political system sometimes fail altogether to mention women (e.g. H. Basehart, 'Ashanti', in Gough and Schneider (eds.), Matrilineal Kinship (Berkeley, 1962), p. 270-97). More often, the female monarch is mentioned in passing, designated by the misnomer 'queen mother', although she was never the king's wife, and was not necessarily his mother. She did not hold her position by virtue of her relationship with him; indeed it was she who appointed him, and was above him in the state hierarchy. 89 Louise Tilly and Joan Scott, 'Women's Work and the Family in Nineteenth Century Europe', ComparativeStudies in Society and History 17 (1975). 90 Recent events in our society make particularly clear the point that even where power is believed to lie in positions of formal authority, most effective decision-making may actually be done through informal, covert channels. The facts remain, however, that in our society (1) formal authority is generally highly valued by both men and women, and (2) one does not gain access to high-level decision-making, either covert or overt, if one is largely restricted to household activities.

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societies is a projection of the androcentric bias in our own. In Australian aboriginal societies, for example, 'although the men play a more important political role in intergroup relationships, political institutions are not highly developed and are geared to economic survival, in which women play a central role'.91 This perspective is considered below.
FEMALE STATUS: VARIABLE FEMALE/MALE POWER DISTRIBUTION

Virtually all of the scholars so far considered assume universal male dominance. In this respect, the feminist anthropologists discussed above have not completely broken rank with conventional anthropology. They do depart from convention by insisting that women are important actors in social and cultural processes. Another group of scholars shares this conviction, but takes it further, by rejecting, categorically or provisionally, the notion of universal male dominance. These scholars are primarily interested in addressing themselves to the paucity of ethnographic information on women, without explicit recourse to particular political doctrines. They thus free themselves from commitment to proving universal female subordination and instead seek appropriate ways of assessing female status in particular types of societies, rather than attempting to find universal criteria. Obviously, because the status of women is a politically loaded issue in our society, their work does have political implications, whether or not they are made explicit. The set of analyses which follows is based on particular assumptions about female nature (see page 137). Furthermore, it at least implicitly addresses itself to, or obviates, a number of important questions left open by the work discussed in the section above: if women are truly not passive, incapable, stupid, or inherently inferior to men, how is it that they have allowed themselves in all times and all places to be subordinated by men? How is it that late nineteenth-centuryand contemporary feminists are the first women in the world to feel their subordination and try to do something about it? If women have never before succeeded in ridding themselves of the yoke of male dominance, why should we believe we can? Much of this literature is characterizedby an insistence on examining the position of men and women vis-d-vis each other. If it is assumed at the outset that males are dominant, then one need not examine male roles. These may, in effect, be held constant, while women's roles may be examined and compared for explanations or degrees of subordination (hence the need for universal criteria). In this view, it is pointless to discuss the relative position of men and women within a culture: it will always be fundamentally the same. If, on the other hand, one assumes that the power relationships between men and women are cross-culturally variable, then
91 Leavitt et al., op. cit., 124, 111; cf. Nelson, op. cit., 560.

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what is of interest is the relative power of each.92 In this case, criteria appropriate to particular cultures or types of societies are more important than universal criteria. Also, in this less global view, it becomes irrelevant that men may be dominant outside of a particular sociocultural context (e.g., that urban men often control institutions affecting peasant life).93 What is of interest is the power distribution between those men and women who share daily life. Finally, in rejecting universal male dominance, it can no longer be assumed that male spheres of activity are by definition the most important. The relative significance of male and female spheres must vary with the relative status of each sex group in the society under study. Public/domestic spheres. The notion that males universally monopolize public spheres is found in many of these analyses. The meaning of the public sphere, however, is radically revised. For example, it has often been demonstrated that peasant societies are domestic-centered; that is, the family is the key economic, political and social unit in this type of society.94 In view of this characteristic, several scholars argue that one need not look beyond the domestic sphere to measure the relative status of male and female peasants; power in the private, not the public, sphere is of greatest real importance. Friedl, for instance, demonstrates that male monopolization of prestigious public roles gives an appearance of male dominance in the Greek village she studied.95This public prestige, however, gives men no advantage in the private sphere, where the 'realities of power' are to be found. Here, men and women play complementary roles, and neither enjoy higher prestige. Furthermore, because women bring dowries of land into the household, and remain in control of this property, they sometimes upset the balance of domestic power by controlling not only their own realms, but encroaching on those of their male counterparts as well.96 Dubisch adopts Friedl's argument, but broadens this last notion by pointing out that contributions to a household may take nonproperty forms (e.g. having children, being a good parent, standing up for the family). She suggests that the relative contribution of each spouse will shape their power relationship.97 Drawing on her study of a Greek peasant
92 Jill Dubisch, 'Dowry and the domestic power of women in a Greek island village', paper read at 70th Annual Meeting, American Anthropological Association (New York, 1971), p. 1. 93 Cf. Harding op. cit., 306-7. I would argue in any case that class is a more important factor than sex in this type of domination. In the example given, both peasant men and women are dominated as peasants. 94 For example, see Conrad Arensberg and Solon Kimball, Family and Community in Ireland(Cambridge, Mass., 1968), p. 49; Henri Mendras, La Fin des Paysans (Paris, 1970), pp. 96-7; Robert Redfield, Peasant Society and Culture (Chicago, 1967), p. 60; original publication, 1956. 95 Ernestine Friedl, 'The position of women: appearance and reality', Anthropological Quarterly 40 (1967), 98-105. 96 Ibid., 106-7. 97 Dubisch, op. cit., 3-4.

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village, she proposes the following criteria for measuring male/female power distribution: 1. respectaccordedone spouseby the other,publiclyand privately; 2. interference of one spousein the sphereof the other; 3. decisionmakingin regardto allocationof familyresources; 4. arranging plansfor children.98 Friedl points out that because the household is the crucial unit in peasant society, female power here implies considerable control over 'secondary' extradomestic functions.99 Nelson further develops this point, although she does not give priority to the household as a seat of power. She suggests that the frequently drawn contrast between the female social world, which is said to be private, 'domestic, narrow and restricted', and the 'political, broad, and expansive' public world of men, represents, in the Middle Eastern context she examines, an inappropriate imposition of Western social scientists' own categories.100She demonstrates that the sharp sexual segregation found in the Middle East means, not so much that women are relegated to restricted private realms, but that they have a wide range of contacts among themselves, from which men are excluded. The crucial role women play as structural links between kinship groups (fundamentally important in these societies), as well as the potent social control wielded by female solidarity groups101 suggest that the Middle Eastern woman's 'domestic' world is, in its own way, political, broad and expansive. Formal/informal power. Riegelhaupt's study of the public nature of female roles among Portuguese peasants brings to the fore the distinction between formal and informal power. She contrasts the realities of peasant political and economic life with the formal inferiority of women stemming from Portuguese laws barring them from participation in formal political processes and limiting their economic activities. It is demonstrated that peasant men, as structuredinferiors in an authoritarian state, gain virtually nothing from their political rights.102 In the economic realm, the productive roles of men and women in the household (the primary productive unit) are complementary and equally interdependent. Furthermore, as household directresses, women control farm budgets, making or participating in all marketing and agricultural decisions.103 Riegelhaupt maintains that the crucial dimension to be examined in determining power distribution in peasant societies is the way in which information is gained, and the means by which subsequent decisions are implemented.104 A number of factors place women at a significant
100Nelson, Ibid., 6. 99 Friedl, op. cit. (1967), 107. op. cit., 553. 101 Ibid., 559. 'Saloio women: an Joyce Riegelhaupt, analysis of informal and formal political and economic roles of Portuguese peasant women', Anthropological Quarterly40 (1967), 122.
98
102 103

104

Ibid., 119-21.

Ibid., 125.

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advantage here. Men spend most of their time working in isolation in outlying fields. Their manifest mistrust of each other, resulting in brittle social relationships, further limits contact between men. 105Women, on the other hand, divide their time between domestic-based work in the village proper, and marketing produce in urban centers. In the former arena, they are in frequent contact with each other, and develop considerable sex group solidarity. In the markets, they have access to communication with non-local potential patrons in.positions of power vis-a-vis the State.106 Women are thus in a better position than their male counterparts to control information dissemination, to be cognizant of village needs, and to aid in the accomplishment of individual and community goals.107 In this cultural context, this informal power is considerably more significant than the formal privileges of men. Formal/informal public/private roles. Chinias synthesizes all of these considerations in her development of an analytical framework from which to view women. She begins by asserting that one sex or the other is not necessarily dominant, but may be in a complementary relationship in terms of economic roles and all other aspects of the social system.108 She maintains that this possibility implies that women's roles cannot necessarily be evaluated in terms of men's roles: conclusions based on a comparison of dissimilar things are logically invalid. Like Ardener, she makes explicit and rejects two assumptions commonly found in anthropological literature: (1) 'the sexes perceive their culture and their own sex's place in it in essentially the same way', (2) 'men and women share a common culture on similar terms'.109Because most ethnographic literature takes a male point of view, she proposes to explore the female view, by setting up a series of opposing pairs. She first distinguishes between formalized and nonformalized roles: those bundles of rights and duties which are clearly defined and publicly recognized, and those which are not so clearly perceived or rigidly defined, respectively. Secondly, she distinguishes between private and public domains: the family or domestic group, on the one hand, and everything else, on the other. To understand the power relationship between the two sexes, the distribution of all four types of roles-formalized public, formalized private, nonformalized public, and nonformalized private-must be examined. She maintains that, virtually universally, males monopolize formalized public roles (e.g. mayor, priest), and that formalized private roles are most often distributed complementarily between men and women (e.g. mother/ father, wife/husband).110 In the Mexican peasant society she studied,
106 Ibid., 120. 107Ibid., 124. Isthmus Chifias, Beverly Zapotecs. Women's Roles in Cultural Context (New York, 1973), p. 1. 109 Ibid., 2. '10 Ibid., 93-5.

105 Ibid., 123-4.

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women play public nonformalized roles which are complementary to the public formalized roles of men. Within this cultural context, she suggests that the former are as crucial both to the understanding, and to the operation, of the system, as are the latter.111 Women also play a variety of nonformalized private roles; these, as well as their public roles 'function to maintain the integrity of the household, to avoid conflict and violence, and more generally to add oil to the social machinery in a system where there exists a high level of fear and anxiety'.12 Women are able to play these roles largely because they 'operate in a social universe separate from men and therefore are privy to information which men either do not or may not circulate among themselves, and [because] certain types of movement and courses of action are open only to women'.113 Perhaps because nonformalized roles are extremely important in peasant societies, Chifas suggests, female status in these societies is apt to be relatively high. She maintains that there are no societies where women completely dominate men. However, in some societies, as among Mexican peasants, neither group is dominant. The power relationship between males and females varies cross-culturally, from this situation, to one in which women are very subordinated to men. She leaves unanswered the question of how sex-group status is determined in particular societies. She rejects the notion that it is determined on the basis of contribution to subsistence, or that female status improves along social evolutionary lines. She tentatively suggests that there may be some relationship between the relative status of the sexes and the value placed on nonformalized roles, or the importance of sex as a social marker.114 Cross cultural variations in female role analysis. Most of these analyses are based on work in peasant societies. In noting this tendency, Chifias suggests that it may be because nonformalized roles seem to be of particular importance among peasants, so that male dominance does not exist in this cultural context. 15 It should be clear, however, that concepts developed for analysis of peasant societies are not applicable to all types of societies. The results of such projection would be as unsatisfactory as the general application of concepts developed for analysis of sex-group relationships in our own society. Although little work of this sort has been done in other types of societies, work by Denise Paulme underlines this point. In her review of some of the more common themes in sex-role definition in sub-Saharan Africa, Paulme rejects the assumption found in much of the ethnographic literature on African women, that divergence from the Western ideal implies lower female status. She asserts that the picture often drawn of the subservient African woman 'merely expresses a fondly entertained masculine ideal which does not tally with the realities of
111 Ibid., 100-1.
112

Ibid., 108.

113

Ibid., 109.

114

Ibid., 96-7.

115

Ibid., 97.

1 everyday life'. 6 She notes that in many African societies, women have no rights over their husbands' property, but that they often have their own property, over which their husbands have no jurisdiction.ll7 In many cases, women have full (formalized) authority over a considerably wider area than the household (e.g. voluntary associations, marketplace).1l8 Women also often have a wider network of interpersonal relationships than do men. Particularly in patrilineal societies, 'men never seem to conceive of ties other than those of kinship linked with common residence... [whereas] among women the mere fact of belonging to the same sex is enough to establish an active solidarity'. 19 Finally, she points out that insofar as familial orientation is strong in particular African societies, it is most frequently directed toward the natal, rather than the conjugal family. Thus, the parent-child bond is likely to be stronger, and to entail more (or more important) rights and duties than, for instance, the husband/wife bond. 20 All of these factors suggest that theories of women based upon 'women's attachment to the domestic' (in the Western sense of the domestic), their exclusion from activities in the larger world, their lack of economic autonomy, and their paucity of public, formalized roles, will have only limited applicability. This set of analyses, then, differs from the previous one primarily in the rejection of the conventional notion of universal male dominance, and also in the lack of a search for universal criteria for measuring sex-group status. As a result, the projection of American cultural values and conceptions is avoided to a greaterextent: to these scholars, such projection is invalid and promises little illumination of female status or roles in other societies. Therefore, they also reject a number of other culture-bound notions common in the ethnographic literature, which appear in the work of the first group of feminist anthropologists considered. For instance, 'power' is most often used in ethnographic literature to mean primarily, or most importantly, legitimized formal authority. 12 The insistence upon informal expressions and channels of power as integral parts of the social system, often as important or more important than formalized power, is a radical departure, having implications especially, but not exclusively, for the study of sex-group power relationships. Their work establishes that such in117 Ibid., 4. Paulme, op. cit. (1963), 5. Cf. Hoffer op. cit., in which the formal political roles of Mende women in Sierra Leone are described and analyzed. Hoffer's work is fairly conventional in its approach to formal political structure but, in this context, this does not result in automatic exclusion of women. 119 Paulme, op. cit. (1963), 7. 120 Ibid., 14. 121 For example, see Marc Swartz, 'Introduction', in Swartz and Turner (eds.), Political Anthropology (Chicago, 1966), p. 14; Ronald Cohen, 'The political system', in Cohen and Narroll (eds.), Handbook of Method in CulturalAnthropology(Garden City, 1971), pp. 487-8, 492.
118

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formal behavior is hardly more random, arbitrary, or individualized, than formal behavior, and is thus as open to the scrutiny of social scientists.122 A second common assumption which is challenged is the notion that the domestic sphere is necessarily of secondary importance. While the first group of feminist anthropologists sees woman's 'relegation' to the domestic sphere as evidence of subordinated status, the second group maintains that, in some cultural contexts, the domestic sphere is a key seat of power. Also, it may have decisive impact on activities and relationships beyond it. The African analyses further suggest that the double association of domestic/woman, extradomestic/man is not necessarily an accurate one. In sum, what distinguishes this group of scholars is that they do not assign a priori a negative valuation to characteristicallyfemale aspects of social life. The major problem with much of this work is the distortion resulting from overemphasis on women. Because the problem is defined, for the most part, as one of understanding the relationship between male and female roles (particularly in terms of power distribution), one would expect more balanced information on both sex groups. It might, of course, be argued that it is information on women which is missing from the ethnographic record: we already have information on men, so it is appropriate to emphasize data on women. Exclusive focus on female forms of power, however, may give the impression that women are relatively more powerful than they are: it is possible to overstate the case. Particularly if one is arguing that a complementary or dialectical relationship exists between the two sex groups, overemphasis on one or the other makes it impossible to adequately understand the relationship between the two.
THEORETICAL PROPOSAL

In the following pages, I will formulate a series of problems and propose an analytical framework from which to approach them. A tentative formulation, it is meant to be suggestive rather than definitive. This framework ought to be general enough to be universally applicable, but specific enough to be useful. Like most of the scholars above, I will treat the categories 'male' and 'female' as if they were homogeneous groups. This does not imply that such factors as age, class, and individual capabilities have no effect on the determination of status. On the contrary, age is everywhere a crucial determinant, and where class structureexists, this too is exceedingly important. This assumed sex-group homogeneity therefore, is a heuristic, rather than a realistic, device, arising from the preliminary nature of this kind of analysis, and from the notion that we cannot begin to deal with the
See Julian Pitt-Rivers, The People of the Sierra (Chicago, 1961), pp. 200-1; Eric Wolf, 'Kinship, friendship, and patron-client relations in complex societies', in Banton (ed.), The Social Anthropologyof Complex Societies (London, 1966), p. 2, on the importance of informal behavior patterns in other research domains.
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finer points of male/female power distribution or relative status, until we have a general conceptual framework. For the present then, I will deal only with men and women of a comparable age and class. The primary problem is to explain and predict cross-cultural variations in the distribution of power between men and women. This implies that this distribution might vary: it is possible that men are not universally dominant. As in the analyses reviewed above, the status of women is here of primary interest, but the possibility of measuring female status in absolute terms is rejected:women's status/power can be understood only within the context of particular sociocultural arrangements, and in terms of the amount of power or control each sex group has over the other, and/or relative to that of the other. Thus, to understand female status, I have shifted focus somewhat from one particular sex group to the relationship between the two. This shift in focus implies an integration of the problems associated with sexual differentiation and those associated with the measurement of status. They are so closely interrelated that neither can be resolved without recourse to the other. Before approaching the problem of power distribution between the sexes, then, the nature of sexual differentiation must be established. Within the context of the problem defined here, explanations of why the sexes are differentiated are not of particular interest. Rather, I would begin by suggesting that sex differentiation may exist in a variety of forms, and in two in particular. The first, evidently universal, will be called behavioral differentiation, to mean that each sex acts out different roles, participates in different activities, and so on. The second, ideological differentiation, is the type to which Ardener refers (cf. p. 129 ff.). That is, males and females view themselves as fundamentally different from each other, e.g. as separate entities or species. Where they are ideologically differentiated, each sex may be expected to have its own perception of the universe, values, goals, and so on (within the overarching basic values of the society). This kind of differentiation involves what Bateson refers to as
sex-based ethos.123

These two kinds of sex differentiation may, but need not, occur together. Therefore, four varieties of sexual differentiation are logically possible:
ideological
1.

behavioral
+

2.
3.

4.

To determine which of these patterns is present, it is imperative to elicit information on the ideologies and behavior of both men and women. It is
123 Gregory Bateson, Naven (London, 1936), p. 198, '. . . in this society [Iatmul] each sex has its own consistent ethos which contrasts with that of the opposite sex'.

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obviously impossible to know if they are similar or different without knowing what they both are. I would hypothesize that each variation will result in a different kind of power relationship between the sexes. Power may be measured in terms of control over significant resources. 'Resources' is here broadly defined to include not only economic resources (e.g. land, labor, food, money), but also such resources as ritual knowledge, specialist skills, formal political rights, and information. There will be considerable cross-cultural variation in which resources are present or controllable and in the relative significance of each. For instance, formal political rights are altogether absent in some societies (e.g. hunting and gathering bands), whereas they are present, but relatively unimportant in others (e.g. peasant societies), and present and relatively important in still others (e.g. African state systems). Therefore, the anthropologist interested in power distribution between the sexes in a particular society must determine both the nature of sexual differentiation in that society and the relevant resources in that cultural context, their relative value, and the way their control is distributed between the two sex groups. Where ideological differentiation is present, there will be disagreement between the sexes as to the relative value of particular resources. That is, women, for example, will consider some male-controlled resources relatively unimportant, and value highly their own, while men hold the opposite valuation. Whether or not ideological differentiation is present, another point of disagreement might be between public and private assessments of particular resources. For instance, male resources may be publicly recognized as most important by both sexes, and privately belittled by one or both. Finally, one sex group might have access to formal control of a resource, while the other has actual control of it. Ultimately, it is the ethnographer who assesses the value of each resource and determines who controls it. His or her analysis, however, must be based on the sociocultural context in which the work is carried out, not the values or social organization of his or her own society. Also, it is important to weigh the various points of disagreement appropriately. For example, an accurate analysis may not be forthcoming if data are elicited only from male informants, or only in public situations. Obviously, it is impossible to measure precisely the value of each resource, or, in some cases, to discern exactly who controls it. The anthropologist should, however, be able to estimate roughly to what extent one sex group wields more power than the other, or to demonstrate some measure of equivalence in power distribution between the two. The next question to be raised is how the nature of sexual differentiation is related to power distribution. I would hypothesize the following relationships. First, where both ideological and behavioral differentiation exist, a balance of power is most likely to occur. Because men and women

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are believed to be fundamentally different, it follows that they behave differently. But they are also highly dependent upon each other because they are highly noninterchangeable categories. Assuming that each sex group in this case controls essential resources, one cannot dominate the other, because they are equally interdependent or complementary. Furthermore, because differentiation is stressed on the ideological level, the two groups may not be related hierarchically, because they are perceived as two different things.124 Rather, they are related dialectically, at once opposed to each other, and equally dependent upon each other. In the second case, where behavioral differentiation exists without ideological differentiation, a hierarchical relationship between the sexeswith a clear imbalance of power-becomes more probable. Here, it is believed that males and females are fundamentally the same. The group as a whole, rather than its component sex groups, is the primary reference point. Men and women share the same goals, perceptions of the universe, and so on, and value identical means of attaining them. To the extent that behavioral differentation exists, different resources will be controlled by each sex group. The resources controlled by one group, however, are likely to be more highly valued by both. Because differential access to control of resources is not firmly grounded in differential ideology, behavioral differentiation may be perceived as unjust, immoral, or illegal, at least by the sex group without access to highly valued resources. A hierarchical relationship is evident with the other group in a higher or dominant position. The third possibility (lack of both behavioral and ideological differentiation) is one way of redressing the injustice perceived in the second. Here, because both men and women are believed to have the right and ability to control the same resources, behavioral differentiation is removed so that they share this control. This is likely to be phrased in terms of giving the subordinate group equal control of the dominant group's resources. In this case, power will no longer be distributed along sex lines. Provisionally, I would suggest that the first pattern (ideological and behavioral differentiation) is the most common cross-culturally, and the one in which a dominant/subordinant relationship between the sexes is least likely to occur. I have shown elsewhere that this pattern and a 'balance of power' between the sexes exist in traditional European peasant societies.l25 A similar fundamental pattern may be discerned in precolonial West African societies, although the actual distribution of resources between the sex groups, as well as the content of male and female
124 This point is further developed in S. Rogers, 'Espace masculin espace feminin: essai sur la difference', in I. Chiva (ed.), Famille et Parente en Europe rurale (Paris, forthcoming). 125 Rogers, op. cit. (1975), 729-30, 746-8; S. Rogers, 'Woman's place: sexual differentiation as related to the distribution of power', unpublished paper (1974), pp. 70-86.

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ideologies and the mechanisms allowing them to coexist, differ sharply from the European situation.126 Evidence of a transformation to the second pattern (behavioral differentiation without ideological differentiation) may also be found in these two world areas. All of the factors which might contribute to such a transformation are by no means clear. However, changes in the degree to which one sex group's resources are available or controllable will have a significant impact on the system. Colonization of West Africa, and industrialization in Europe had such an effect. In the African situation, colonization resulted in the outlawing of warfare between neighboring groups, so that male control over war and peace vanished. Furthermore, the imposition of colonial rule circumscribed formal political power held by males. Finally, the arrival of the missionary influence and the outlawing of various 'native' ritual practices eroded the ritual and religious powers of men.127At the same time, where women traditionally controlled economic resources, their positions were enhanced by colonization. The Pax Britannica (and its counterpart in French colonies), improvement of trading routes, and greater opportunities for trade under colonialism, gave women access to a degree of wealth and power outstripping that of their husbands and brothers.128Men thus become relatively more dependent upon women, and come to share women's high valuation of trading activities. Women assume a more domineering role in the group which 'is openly resented by the men who are, however, helpless and unable to redress the situation'.129 In more recent literature, there is some evidence that men in these societies have attempted to redress the situation by pushing into trading activities. Although they may initially suffer some social stigma for such 'feminine' behavior, this seems to be overriden by the shared goal of amassing wealth, and the newly shared perception of trade as an important activity.130 In fact, men may be able to achieve a position of control over the local-level trading activities of women. Mintz notes that Igbo men, for example, perhaps because of preferencesshown by European trading firms, are becoming more and more involved directly in the import-export trade.
Rogers, op. cit. (1974), 86-98; S. Rogers, 'Sex differentiation and female forms of power in West Africa: a survey', unpublished paper (1973). 127 Robert Levine, 'Sex roles and economic change in Africa', Ethnology 5 (1966); P. Ottenberg, 'The changing position of women among the Afrikpo Ibo', in Bascom and Herskovits (eds.), Continuity and Change in African Cultures(Chicago, 1959), p. 214. 128 D. McCall, 'Trade and the role of wife in a modern West African town', in Southall (ed.), Social Change in ModernAfrica (London, 1961), p. 298; Ottenberg, op. cit., 223; Colette Grandmaison, 'Activit&seconomiques des femmes Dakaroises', Africa 39 (1969), 147; Polly Hill, 'Hidden trade in Hausaland', Man 4 (1969). 129 S. F. Nadel, 'Witchcraft in four African societies: an essay in comparison', American Anthropologist 54 (1952), 21; see also Levine, op. cit. 130 Sidney Mintz, 'Men, women and trade', ComparativeStudies in Society and History 13 (1971), 263.
126

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They are thus able either to displace female tradersaltogether, or at least to expand their own economic activities to a greater extent than women. Thus, although economic growth induced by colonization initially upset the balance of power in women's favor, there is some indication that with integration into wider economic systems, men may take over and surpass women in the control of formerly feminine resources. They may thus attain a more powerful position than women.131 This tendency may also be seen in non-economic spheres of West African life. For instance, British colonizers, for the most part, exercised a policy of indirect rule, keeping intact, insofar as possible, traditional political systems. Where women participated in these, however, female positions were often overlooked, and obliterated or greatly reduced in power.132 In those societies without formalized, specialized political institutions, such organization was imposed, with male officials having jurisdiction over the whole group. This left no place for institutionalized female solidarity, or for what became extralegal or illegal forms of group coercion. In both cases, women could no longer protect their own interests, and became dependent upon male protection from men.133 In educating, employing, and otherwise preparing Africans to participate in 'modern' society, the colonizers have given preference to men.134 It has been assumed that women played or should play roles similar to those of middle-class Europeans, so that girls' education has been either nonexistent, or geared almost exclusively to home care and motherhood.135 Men, meanwhile, have been preferentiallyintegrated into the modern sector of the economy, government, and so on. African development, as a result, 'has largely been men talking to men about problems men conceive as important'.136 I would suggest that women come to perceive them as important also, but are without the means either to talk about them, or to resolve them. This process results, then, in the upset of the previous power balance, and men become predominant in the society as a whole. Whereas under the traditional system, women had recognized authority and jurisdiction over important matters, they are barred from comparable participation in
Ibid., 263-5. R. S. Rattray, Ashanti Law and Constitution(Oxford, 1929), 88; Annie Lebeuf, 'The role of women in the political organization of African societies', in Paulme, op. cit., 94. 133 Van Allen, op. cit., 172. 134 Ibid., 179; Kenneth Little, 'Voluntary associations and social mobility among West African women', CanadianJournalof African Studies 6 (1972), 275; Josef Gugler, 'The second sex in town', CanadianJournal of African Studies 6 (1972) 293, 296; N. Atangana, 'La femme africaine dans la soci6et', Presence Africaine 13 (1957), 141. 135 Leith-Ross, op. cit., 314-16; Van Allen, op. cit., 179;David R. Evans, 'Image and reality: career goals of educated Ugandan women', CanadianJournalof African Studies 6 (1972), 213. 136 Audrey Wipper, 'The roles of African women: past, present, and future', Canadian Journal of African Studies 6 (1972), 145.
132
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Western, non-traditional forms of administration.137 They therefore increasingly lose control over extrahousehold resources while the household becomes an increasingly less significant locus of social life.138 The mutual interdependence of the two sex groups shifts, so that women become relatively more dependent upon men.139 As I have shown in more detail elsewhere, a strikingly similar process may be discerned in Western Europe. As industrialization takes over the countryside, peasant men lose control of their resources, or these are devalued by the group as a whole, with a subsequent rise in the relative value of women's resources, and a power imbalance favoring women. Male control resurfaces, with new resources, most notably those relating to integration in a larger group. These become more highly valued by both sex groups, and male dominance becomes clearly established.140 This process is not necessarily an inevitable or universal one. Rather, the primarypoints to be made here are that power relationships may change over time, and that a hierarchical relationship between the sexes may entail either male or female dominance. I have here implied the fallacy of perceiving the 'traditional' as static, balanced, unchanging over time, while viewing 'modernization' as the introduction of change, upsetting-necessarily and for the first time-the equilibrium of 'traditional' society. This weakness reflects the crudity of both the analytical tools and data available at present. It is hoped that the future refinement of the model here proposed, or the development of other analytical tools, will lead to a more sophisticated understanding of sexual differentiation and power distribution. Although the first two patterns seem most worthy of ethnographic investigation, the remaining two ought to be briefly illustrated. They both entail the breakdown of sex roles, and so are out of the scope of the study of sexual differentiation. Furthermore, it is unclear if either of them actually does or can exist. They are, however, present in several utopian schemes, and are therefore possible at least within the realm of imagination.They are worth noting insofar as they fit into the general model proposed, to further illustrate its dynamics. One example of the third pattern may be found on some Israeli kibbutzim, where the founders, in reaction to their native Eastern European communities, attempted to abolish sexual differentiation by
137 Sylvia Leith-Ross, 'The rise of a new elite amongst the women of Nigeria', International Social Sciences Bulletin 8 (1956), 484. 138 de Th&,op. cit., 1559-61. 139 K. Little, The Mende of Sierra Leone (London, 1951), p. 172; Claude Tardits, 'Reflexions sur le probleme de la scolarisation des filles au Dahomey', Cahiers d'Etudes Africaines 3 (1963), 274. 140 Rogers, op. cit. (1975), 749-52.

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removing the legal, social, and economic dependence of women on men. 141 The family or sex group as meaningful social entities were replaced by the group as a whole,142 and the distribution of labor by sex was abolished. Although ideological commitment to this arrangement remained, defacto behavioral differentiation was gradually reinstated (i.e., return to pattern 2), with men monopolizing more highly valued activities and positions.143 This discrepency between ideological equality of the sexes on the one hand, and the actuality of behavioral differentiation and a hierarchical relationship, on the other, bred a great deal of resentment and discontent, especially among the women.144 This imbalance has apparently been redressed among the second generation of kibbutzniks, by a return to pattern 1. That is, it is believed that each sex group is fundamentally different, has different capabilities, and ought to behave differently. Neither is more highly valued by the group as a whole.145 The style of feminism espoused by Betty Friedan, 146 among others, may be seen as another example of an attempt to implement the third type of structure. The female ideology expressed in the 'feminine mystique' is rejected and replaced by a male value system. Males and females are perceived as fundamentally the same, and therefore both should have equal access to important (i.e., male) resources. Differential access, and the ensuant sexual hierarchy, are thus injustices which should be redressed, so that sex roles would disappear in most areas of life, and power not be distributed on the basis of sex. The women's movement established to achieve this goal, however, has had the effects of building female solidarity, and establishing women's consciousness of themselves as women. One logical outcome of this movement is the development of a 'segregationist' line, as expressed for instance by Jill Johnston. 47 Here is an example of the fourth pattern, as ideological differentiation reemerges, with males and females viewed as different species,148 women revalued, and male goals and aspirations rejected by women. At the same time, a breakdown of behavioral differentiation is advocated, so that women will no longer depend on men for essential goods and services. The result of this scheme would be completely separate power hierarchies and no relationship between the
Stanley Diamond, 'Kibbutz and Shtetl: the history of an idea', Social Problems 5 (1957), passim. 142 Melford Spiro, Kibbutz: Venturein Utopia (Cambridge, 1956), pp. 113-14. 143 Spiro, Childrenof the Kibbutz(Cambridge, 1958), pp. 350-1, 352, 446; Eva Rosenfield, 'Institutional change in the Kibbutz', Social Problems 5 (1957), 120. 144 Spiro, op. cit., (1956), 222 ff. 145 Spiro, op. cit., (1958), 302 ff, 351. 146 Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique (New York, 1963). 147 Jill Johnston, Lesbian Nation. The Feminist Solution (New York, 1973). 148 Johnston, Gullibles Travels (New York, 1974), 190.
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sexes. As suggested by the title of Johnston's book, Lesbian Nation, sex-based societies would replace sex-based roles. A great many questions remain in regard to this model. Where ideological differentiation exists, is power distribution necessarily balanced? Does the modernization process always precipitate the blurring of previously sex-differentiated ideologies? Under what other circumstances might such blurring occur? When it does occur, does the distribution of power between the two sex groups necessarily become unbalanced? Are there circumstances under which it is possible or meaningful to make an 'objective' assessment of a power relationship which is in contradiction to, and more accurate than, the perceptions of all or most of the participants in that relationship? Is it possible to set up a series of general conditions to predict which sex group will achieve higher relative status when ideological differentiation blurs? Are the second two patterns outlined within the realm of human possibility? Research directly aimed at resolving these questions, and thus clarifying and testing the model I have proposed is needed. Bits and pieces of data from several world areas may be put together to illustrate in some manner the various patterns I have proposed. It is impossible, however, to further develop this scheme, or to judge its adequacy, until truly applicable data from many different kinds of societies are forthcoming.
CONCLUSIONS

Anthropology is indeed the 'study of man'. Devising an analytical framework from which to view women is therefore problematic: it is as yet unclear even to what extent special theories are required for the study of women. It is certain, however, that to adequately understand how societies operate, both sexes must be taken into consideration, and constructing theories about women (the 'other' in our predominant cultural view) is one way of asserting that the human race comprises two sexes. In this paper, I have examined some of the assumptions, epistemological styles, political considerations, and methodological problems which have affected the development of theories relating to women. While these may ultimately tell us relatively little about women in other societies, they at least indicate a great deal about the ways in which women are viewed in our own, and the ways in which our perception is limited by our culture. It is hoped that by making these underlying factors explicit it will be possible not only to understand what has gone before, but to weigh the various influences at work, self-consciously incorporating or capitalizing upon some, and rejecting or revising others. I have suggested that 'woman's place' in particularcultural contexts may be best understood by examining the relationship between the two sex

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groups, and have proposed two different kinds of relationships, hypothesizing an association between them. On one hand, the relationship between men and women may be examined in respect to power distribution, measured in terms of control of valued resources. I have maintained that particular resources may vary in value cross-culturally. Second, the conceptual relationship between the two, or the nature of sexual differentiation, may be examined in terms of the presence or absence of ideological and behavioral differentiation. Particular kinds of sexual differentiation may be expected to result in particular kinds of power relationships. The relationship between the sex groups-and therefore the status of either one-I have suggested, may not be adequately understood without reference to this complex of factors. It remains to be seen if this is a useful analytical scheme. It clearly needs further testing and refining, and many problems remain unresolved. It is hoped, however, that in working toward their resolution and in seeking to understand woman's place through a focus on the dialectical relationships between the two sex groups, we will learn to perceive culture and society as other than male phenomena.

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