''Women Palavers'': Marriage, and Gender Struggles in Colonial Abeokuta, Southwestern Nigeria

Morenikeji Asaaju, Birmingham

The presentation explores the dynamics of the struggle over ‘‘women palavers’’ as it was waged between generations of Egba citizens, between women and men, and between the colonial state. I argue that one of the primary terrains of contest, the power to conceptualise, codify and administer customary marriage law in the native courts exacerbated ‘‘women palavers’’. 

Morenikeji Asaaju is the Cadbury Postdoctoral Fellow in African Studies in the Department of African Studies and Anthropology at the University of Birmingham. Dr Asaaju is an historian of Africa with particular thematic interest in gender, marriage, family, slavery, emancipation and the slave trade. 

This event has been organised by the Department of African Studies and Anthropology’s Africa Talks Series (DASA), in collaboration with the Birmingham Research Institute for History and Cultures (BRIHC).