A Critical Analysis of Gender Roles in Marriage in Igbo African Ontology

Abstract

Marriage among Ndigbo is a powerful institution in which the two genders involved have their respective culturally designated roles. These roles are usually not left to individual fancies because there are strong taboos regarding defaults. The woman must perform her own roles. The man must perform his own roles. It is in performing these roles that the couple fulfill their identity as husband and wife. For both genders, marriage is not just a conjugal union but an essential social requirement to be fulfilled before admission into the society’s rank of respectable adulthood as a man or a woman. The Igbo marriage is basically between a man and a woman or many women, although there are interesting but rare exceptions. The Igbo marriage system shows a complementarity of roles with the male gender clearly dominating. But the Igbo marriage system also provides strong safeguards for women. This makes the Igbo marriage stronger. The marriage is not a singular event but a series of events with carefully laid down procedures. It is a communal act also. Among Ndigbo, marriage is more of a social responsibility than an individual’s conjugal fancy. This work x-rays the traditional Igbo marriage, analyzing and portraying it in philosophical perspectives as it relates to the genders.