Infibulation: Female Mutilation in Islamic Northeastern Africa

by Esther Hicks

Overview

Infibulation is the most extreme form of female circumcision. It plays an important role in the Islamic societies of northeastern Africa. Until now, the social significance and function of this practice has been poorly understood. This has been no less true of Western commentators who have condemned the practice than of relevant governments that have attempted to curb it. In Infibulation, Esther K. Hicks analyzes female circumcision as a cultural trait embedded in a historically traditional milieu and shows why it cannot be treated in isolation as a single issue destined for elimination. In its brief history it has been recognized as a pioneering piece of research with enormous consequences.

As Hicks demonstrates, much of the popular resistance to official efforts to eradicate infibulation has actually come from women. Circumcision constitutes a rite of passage for female children. It initiates them into womanhood and makes them eligible for marriage. Often, this is the only positive status position available to women in traditional Islamic societies. Hicks points out that although female circumcision predates the introduction of Islam into the region, the religious culture has successfully codified infibulation into the structural nexus of marriage, family, and social honor at all socioeconomic levels.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781560008415
Publisher:	Transaction Publishers
Publication date:	01/31/1996
Edition description:	REV
Pages:	332
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)
Age Range:	16 Years

About the Author

Esther K. Hicks was senior researcher with the faculty of management and organization at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands.

Esther K. Hicks was senior researcher with the faculty of management and organization at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands.

Table of Contents

Figures, Maps, Plots, and Tables

Preface xi

Introduction

1. Infibulation: Description, Function, and Diffusion
/ Function: Indigenous and Academic Perspectives
/ Diffusion

2. The Socioeconomic Distribution of Infibulation
/ Pastoralism in Northeastern Africa and the Sudan
/ Pastoral-Rural-Urban Interaction and Infibulation

3. Infibulation in the Social Nexus
/ Closed Cultural Systems
/ Islam: A Closed Cultural System
/ Social Space in Islamic Societies
/ Gender Identification and Differentiation in Open
/ and Closed Cultural Systems
/ The Status Position of Women in Infibulation-Practicing
/ Societies
/ Marriage Customs and Laws: An Overview
/ Male Absenteeism, Sexual Abstinence, Sleeping
/ Arrangements, and Infibulation
/ Fertility Levels and Patterns, Mortality and Birthrates,
/ Sex Ratio Distribution, and Infibulation

4. Methodological Approach and Research Strategy
/ The Problem of Sources
/ Sample Selection and Statistical Analysis
/ Statistical Analysis
/ The HOMALS-technique

5. Infibulation and the Composite Variables
/ The Variables Considered
/ Marriage, Status, and the Practice of Infibulation
/ Early Marriage and Infibulation
/ The Composite Variables

6. The Future of Infibulation

Editorial Reviews

Painstaking research and documentation support the conclusions of this unusual work. . . . This work presents an interesting challenge to feminist assumptions and to Western conceptions of human rights.” —Caroline Hooper-Box, Foreign Affairs “[The] influx to the West of immigrants from the Horn of Africa and adjacent areas has activated the issue of female infibulation in Western discourse. Voices from the media, health sector and the general public have called for information, explanation and action. The present book which basically concerns the existence and distribution of female infibulation takes up this challenge.” —Aud Talle, The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute “Hick’s thesis is a powerful one. . . . An informative and analytical discussion about infibulation, past, present and future.” —Louise Hulton, Population Studies “A useful introduction to the topic because it contains much background information, is dispassionate in tone, and entirely avoids the sensationalism that often accompanies discussions of the topic.” —Nancy E. Gallagher, Middle East Studies Association Bulletin “Hicks reaches conclusions of considerable significance for would-be social engineers.” —Orbis

From the Publisher