Groups of Mutual Assistance: Feminine and Masculine Work among Agriculturalists along the Juba River

Abstract

Groups ofMutual Assistance: Feminine and Masculine Work among Agriculturalists along the Juba River1 Francesca Declich That written texts about other people reflect their authors' perceptions and biases about those people is an issue which has been widely discussed during the last twenty years botii by historians and anthropologists . It is more difficult to highlight to what extent the authors' constructions inform the subjects described and tiirough which process certain points ofview expressed in the texts become legitimizedby the subjects as truths and included in government policies. I wish to present the case of some Italian colonial and post-colonial Hterature relating to labor activities among Somali agriculturalists. My point is that some narrative strategies in written Italian colonial reports seem to highlight die Italian identity ofthe colonizers and leave veryHide space for clear, unadulterated information about the local people described in them. What is most alarming about this fact is that the data contained in diese reports originady resulted from agricultural policies implemented in a few Somali areas; die knowledge thus gained formed the basic of new, national, agricultural polices. The correspondence between the prejudices contained in the reports and the resultant policies was mutually reinforced by die interplay between the two, especially with regard to the sexual division oflabor. This was particularly die case for the cultivable area bordering die Juba River, where women's role in the local® Northeast African Studies (ISSN 0740-9133) Vol. 4, No. 3 (New Series) 1997, pp. 77-89 77 78 Francesca Declich economy was completely misunderstood and ignored. Instead, the colonial record contains numerous references to women's kindness and hospitality , especiady to foreign travelers; indeed, graciousness is emphasized as tiieir main role in Me. I quote a typical example: the traveder who crosses die internal regions is soon impressed by die hospitality and kindness used by the natives. . . . Womenbring water and the traveder washes himself. Tea and bun are soon servedby women and the guest is considered as part of the people's home until he leaves. (ZoIi, 1928; my translation) In this paper, I shad attempt not only to break the cycle of reinforcement of these ideas but also to add some information to redress these early colonial biases about agricultural and communal work. Romantic ideals —which can certainlybe found in colonial texts—may still affect current policies. Interpretations of the Division of Labor By reading texts on the organization of agricultural work in farms along the Juba River which were written during and after the colonial period, one may get die idea that traditional agricultural farms in southern Somalia were organized very much like European farming famdies. In a typical example, Tozzi (1961) descries a famdy offarmers in which the household head is the husband: The heaviestjobs pertain to men, like hoeing, weeding, harvesting, cutting wood, seding products; women, apart from dealing with die domestic area, help men in weeding, harvesting and transporting products; chddren help the father in various work, by scaring the birds, etc. . . . (Tozzi, 1961; my translation) Tozzi, who worked in Somalia during the colonial era and returned during the Italian Trustship, may provide reliable data in terms ofquantities of crops gathered at harvest; however, his description ofhow agricultural tasks were performed on local farms seems to reflect the nineteenth century "ideal" ofpeasant famdy organization so far as male and female roles are concerned. In this interpretation, wives work to help Groups ofMutual Assistance: Work Among AgrKulturalists 79 tiieir husbands; chddren also appear as helping fathers. In other words, the farming household is depicted as being centered around the fatiier, from whom all family members get their orders and for whom they ad work. Activities which cannot be related to the "nuclear [farming] famdy" are not mentioned. The impression is given that women practice agriculture only in their husbands' fields; agricultural activities described in die reports are limited to this relation. There is no mention of the agricultural work of barren women; nor are we told whose field women work before marriage. Finally, and most prejudiciatiy, polygamous families are not taken into account; issues such as land ownership, residence, relations between co-wives, and who works on whose land, are ignored. No survey was ever done...