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Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/102000/0002 (Accessed: 22 August 2017). 1 WOMEN AS QUEENS ON THE PERIPHERY OF THEIR OWN REIGN: READING THE RAIN QUEEN MODJADJI-TRADITION GENDER-CRITICALLY By MOTASA KABELO OWEN submitted in accordance with the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS in the subject BIBLICAL STUDIES at the UNIVERSITY OF JOHANNESBURG SUPERVISOR: Prof SJ Nortje-Meyer 3 Abstract This research set to read the reign of the Modjadji Rain Queens from a gender-critical lens. The setting of their dynasty on the one hand in a South African democratic space with an appraisal of women’s rights and on the other in a rural traditionalist setting where women have a designated place under patriarchy. How the Queens navigate their rule in such instances where the modern and traditional seek to occupy the same space calls for such a reading. Thus questions about their ability to autonomously dispense their duties as Queens and exercise freedom over their livelihoods in a culture that emanates from patriarchal rule form the core objectives in this research. It is to delve beyond sensationalist view awash on the internet about rain making to micro level of what such rituals mean to women in general. Diverging from the Western form of feminism which has been suspect of universalising challenges faced by women to the more African one which is more context based, helps in unearthing patriarchal traits directly affecting African women. This research does not intend to discredit one form of feminism over the other, but how such a fusion can help in the emancipation of women as it is the goal with the two brands of feminism. In this regard the Book of Esther, which in itself split feminist asunder, will be used to show salient lines of convergence of the two strands. The book will also be used comparatively to highlight the narrative merging points of the Modjadji queens as well as Queen Esther. 5 Table of Contents Title Page 1 Affidavit 2 Abstract 3 Table of Contents 4 Chapter 1: Research Premise 6 1.1 Introduction 6 1.2 A Critical Discussion on available Literature 9 1.3 Outline of Methodology 14 1.3.1 Theoretical Framework 14 1.3.2 Research Methodology 15 1.4 Structure of Study 16 Chapter 2: Rain Rituals 17 2.1 Introduction 17 2.2 History and Time 18 2.3 The Social Life of the Modjadji people and the Rules that Govern her Rule 22 2.4 African Rituals 26 2.5 Conclusion 36 Chapter 3: The Queen Modjadji 37 3.1 Introduction 37 3.2 History and Development of the Tradition and Dynasty of the Modjadjis 39 3.3 Conclusion 44 Chapter 4: Gender-critical Interpretation and Discussion 46 4.1 Introduction 46 4.2 A Gender-critical Approach to the History and Reign of the Modjadji Dynasty 53 4.3 Assessment of the Queen Modjadjis’ Contributions as Women to the Development and Success of their Society 54 6 4.4 The Autonomy of the Queen 56 Chapter 5: Comparative analysis of the Modjadji Queens and Queen Esther from the Book of Esther in the OT 66 5.2 Introduction 66 5.3 Context of the Struggle of Women 66 5.4 The Biblical Context of the Book of Esther 68 5.5 Who is the writer of Esther? 69 5.6 Esther and Vashti as Feminist Symbols 72 5.7 Can Vashti and Esther be perceived as Feminists? 76 5.8 Modjadji and Esther 81 5.9 Patriarchy: Modjadji and Esther 83 5.10 Conclusion 86 Chapter 6: Summary and Conclusion 87 Bibliography 92 7 Chapter 1: Research Premise Specification of the Research Problem; a Rationale for the Study, a Critical Discussion of Relevant Literature and Outline of Methodology 1.1 Introduction A woman of no importance by Oscar Wilde is a fascinating play written during the Victorian era in 1893 in which women are portrayed to have fewer rights than men. It comments on the idea of women bearing the full brunt of society’s insults when they have babies out of wedlock and exonerates the man. The play thus looks on a woman's 20-year-old silence that brings her full circle into confrontation with the man that didn't want to commit to her. It is not so much the contents of the play that is alluring but the very title which can be read in various ways: on one hand it comes off as a response to a specific woman who has claims of being important and on the other appears as an incomplete sympathetic contemplation. This is characteristic of how the role of women has, for eons, incited such readings into their beings i.e. of being subjugated by patriarchal structures when they seek some form of recognition and some sense of inactive contemplation of their horrid experiences which they endured from their male counterparts. For feminist scholars the antagonist of women emancipation has always been the patriarchal system with its hegemonic ideologies. Ideologies that have justified much of the atrocities endured by women globally. Since the common theme in feminist writing is the critique of patriarchy, there is a greater need to understand what it is. Geraldine Moane’s (1999) account on how patriarchal systems came into being in Gender and Colonialism is key to understanding the patriarchal systems as it highlights how this system did not just popped up, but how it slowly evolved from egalitarian societies and ultimately usurping them by male domination. This system then created a top-down structure of society to the disadvantage of women. What is of importance in her analysis is how patriarchal systems have to maintain class and gender distinction in society through the six modes of domination to sustain their dominance: violence, political exclusion, economic exploitation, cultural control, control of sexuality and fragmentation or “divide and rule”; of which the psychological implications of those modes is that those 8 suppressed/oppressed end up accepting not only their position in society but also seeing them as good for them (Moane, 1999:36). As this system evolved it allowed those in the dominant class to dictate what should be characteristic of particular genders in society. The narrative thereof replete in discourses and history books emanating in biased conception of white males from that class about society and that becomes problematic as it represents ideas of a select few as universal. One gathers then that gender is not an innocuous term at all. But within such fledged systems genders are manufactured to the whim of those systems which institutionalize oppression through subliminal messaging. This not only diffuses the center of power through discourses but also creates a matrix in which both the oppressor and oppressed are caught in and cannot distinctly recognize them (Moane, 1999:35-36, Butler, 1999:37; Foucault, 1978:32). Though such is the reality males have benefited from the system thanks to the architect historians: white males. Their interpretation of reality gave a botched representation of the past and elevated the ideologies of those select few as sacred in order to regulate, not only the sexualities of women but to also create prototypes which they had to fit into being socially accepted: a picture which a lot of feminist scholars since have been trying to correct (Keane, 1998:122; Dzregah, 2007:7; Ferguson, 1995:35-36). In light of the above, two cases come to the fore: one being the IAAF judgement on the sexualities of female athletes with natural occurring higher testosterone levels like Caster Semenya who will be forced to take medication if she still wants to compete. The other being more historical in which Pascale Lamche gave South Africans a different portrayal of Winnie Madikizela-Mandela apart from the age-old narrative about how women accrue a status by virtue of the males they are connected to (Ferguson, 1995: 36) but accentuated her immense contribution to the transition to the democratic dispensation in an absence of a male figure. Winnie Madikizela-Mandela is one of many who have fought colonialism, patriarchy and showed resilience in spaces traditionally thought to be ‘male’. Her resilience is reminiscent of Queen Amina of Zaria who was commonly known as a warrior queen; also Queen Nzinga of the Ndongo and Matamba kingdoms (Angola), Beatriz Kimpa Vita the prophetess (Kongo Empire), Queen Yaa Asanteewa (Ghana), Rosa Parks (USA), Harriet Tubman (USA), Nadia Murad (Iraqi), Malala Yousafzai (Pakistan) to mention a few and a countless others whose contribution to humanity is undocumented. 9 What the above seeks to highlight is that patriarchal societies do not necessarily give credence to women’s individuality as sentient beings endowed with the same thinking tools in effecting change in society but are seen as passive and in need of men to validate their existence and the only means through which they can accrue status in society (Ferguson, 1995:33). This creates a hierarchy in which males take precedence over females and projects power as synonymous to the male gender (Beard, 2017).