Tiv People Research Paper

The Tiv people are a group of individuals who reside in West Africa. With approximately 6 million people, the Tiv live in regions with significant populations in places such as Nigeria and Cameroon. “Tiv”, as the culture is called, is the name of the ancestor from which all Tiv people descended. The Tiv people believe that they all come from a single patrilineage, as they reckon patrilineal descent from their earliest ancestor (Fardon, 4; 1984). Both their social and political organization is founded on the lineage system (Fardon, 2; 1984). As subsistent farmers, the Tiv perceive their patrilineal genealogy as the foundation of their land-tenure structure. As such, the social organization of the Tiv culture is founded on kinship that is structured
by tracing descent solely through the male. The basis of the Tiv people’s economy is agriculture, “supplemented by an effective network of markets particularly in the southern and central portions of their country” (Bohannan & Bohannan, 60; 1953). The Tiv prides itself on their ability to farm as well as their wealth. The Tiv divide their labor between the men and women.
The men primarily perform the heavy farm work in order to prepare the land for planting. Women, on the other hand, perform lighter work such as weeding. Women further perform tasks such as harvesting yams, as well as other crops. While women are also responsible for duties such as cooking and raising the children, traditionally, they receive help from either their own children or children borrowed from their kin. Tiv children are typically given to a nurse at six months old, whereas “children five or six years of age take charge of much of the parenting, particularly the habituating and educating” (Hsu, 60; 1971). The Tiv household is founded on successful parenting. If, for instance, parenting becomes unsuccessful, “the result is either the derangement or the breaking up of the household” (Hsu, 57; 1971). Men primarily have the authority over a large portion of the land in order to farm for their wife. This is similar to the Bedouin culture perhaps in regards to labor as the Tiv people and the Bedouin’s are both polygynous, leaving women with less work as a result of having multiple wives (Abu Laghod, 121; 2009). When there are multiple wives the labor can be divided between the wives, allowing women to do less work than if they were in a monogamous marriage. In the Tiv culture, all married women are able to farm in order to feed themselves and those that are dependent on her. As far as joint work, however, both men and
women take part in harvesting grain crops and work together to pull grass in order to clean the land. Tiv people believe that each person has a right to a significant amount of land necessary to feed their dependents. If the land is short, the Tiv will take more. The Tiv always take the land “from the person whose land bounds his own, but who is most distantly related to him: that is, he secures for himself the largest possible group of supporters in the dispute which he knows will almost surely ensue” (Bohannan & Bohannan, 55; 1953). In the Tiv culture, sons are greatly valued, as they are needed in order to continue the lineage.
A Tiv woman obtains “a firm place in a household only as a mother of sons” (Hsu, 49; 1971). The value of sons in the Tiv culture is similar to one of the principles that are important to the Nepali patrilines. The Nepali Brahmans value continuity, for in order to continue the patriline, they too must have sons as well (Stone, 98; 2014). In the Tiv culture the mother’s role in procreation is to determine the sex of the child. After Tiv women give birth to a child, the mother is marked with a scar on her abdomen in order to represent womanhood. This practice reminded me of the right of passage with the Nuer. At puberty, the young Nuer men receive facial markings called ghar marks that scar a boy’s forehead (Class Film Clip: “Nuer”). Nuer women, on the other hand, celebrate a woman’s adulthood when a women gets married, yet they do not have a scarification for doing so. While scars symbolize a right of passage or represent distinctive tribal marks in some cultures, the Tiv scarify themselves for aesthetic purposes. Scarification among the Tiv “is revered not only for its beautiful results but also for its indication of a willingness to endure pain” (Favazza, 154; 2011). As part of the Tiv culture, boys are also circumcised. The Tiv culture does not have any taboos in relation to
menstruation. In regards to the cultures views on having a sororate or levirate, the Tiv people do not have a sororate. A sororate is a custom by which a wife is replaced through marriage by her sister. A levirate, on the other hand, is a custom defined as the marriage of a widow to her deceased husband’s brother. This is different from the Tibetan Nyimba in Nepal, whereby their culture practices sororal polygyny. If a brother takes a second wife for the family, he hopes to get the sister of the first wife because they feel that they can only trust people within their family (Stone, 84; 2014). However, when Tiv women are widowed they are able to go to the deceased male’s brother. The individual who inherits the widow is usually in the same lineage as the husband. This cultural practice is similar to the Nuer, for while polygyny is practiced, the Nuer also have a levirate, whereby “a widow is “inherited” by her dead husband’s brother” (Stone, 77; 2014). The levirate is optional for women in the Nuer culture. While the Tiv do not have a