I have found the various debates on abolishing the payment of bride price in Africa interesting. The widely varying descriptions of the bride price I have found especially interesting: people have called the practice barbaric, necessary, traditionally required, oppressive, a mark of respect.....the list goes on. The arguments and commentaries? They are either heart-breaking, amusing or thought-provoking.

Here, I want to examine the case of the payment of bride price and the implications for all the parties. I am doing this so we can begin to understand the more upstream, structural drivers of patriarchy in the African society. And perhaps we can also understand what the bride price means to the man, and to the woman.

Man

I am the man. From a young age, I have been taught to rule, to dominate. My role is clear. I am to provide and to protect, to direct and to rule, to be looked up to and feared/respected (choose whichever you like). I am to do all I can to ensure my woman and children are provided for. I am to ensure that no other man disrespects me or whatever/whoever I am responsible for. My masculinity must be preserved and esteemed. It should not be demeaned. I must not cry, cannot show pain, and cannot be humiliated. Huge responsibilities. My expectations? Women cook for me, serve me, wash for me, make sure the house is clean for me, pre-empt my needs, ensure my comfort. Equally huge responsibilities. Even though this is the role of the woman, she must be valued for those responsibilities. To justify the absolute devotion and loyalty to me, that is expected of her, something of value (money, cows, cowries, land, gold etc.) must exchange hands. My ability to provide the value that exchanges hands is a validation of my masculinity. Inability to do so invalidates my masculinity. 

Woman

I am the woman. My role is to obey, to please, to respect. The extent of my domestication is directly proportional to society’s validation of my femininity. I smother my desires, and my dreams to meet society’s expectations of my ‘woman-ness’. My silence, my ability to ignore my most deep seated needs, my ability to kill my dreams, the ones that make me smile in secret and give my heart a flutter, my ability to predict my husband’s needs and provide them before he asks, become the values with which I am judged. The only thing that shows my worth, that justifies the death of my dreams and desires, is that which my husband gives in exchange for my bowed head. If that is taken away, I feel I am worth little. He has to feel some bite in order to have my ‘services’. The death of my dreams, my needs and my whims should come to him at a price. 

The bride price is WHAT society says the man is, paying for,WHAT society says the woman is. Until our society stops saying WHAT men and women are, but accepts WHO they are, the heart breaking stories of women for whom the bride price has proven to be a shackle, will continue.

Omolara Plang, 8.3.18