Book Reviews 97
Changing Family Life in East Africa: Women and Children at Risk, Philip
Leroy Kilbride & Janet Capriotti Kilbride, Pennsylvania State University Press.
1990. (ISBN 0-271-00676-5). Price £28,45.
This is not a book for the casual reader or for those allergic to sociological
"inspeak". The book's message is not reassuring: Kilbride and Kilbride offer a
bleak:prognosis of the risks that women and children increasingly face in modem
East African society, and they offer impractical and weak:conclusions on how to
redress the problems they so convincingly characterise. Kilbride and Kilbride are
social anthropologists with more than 20 years contact with the same communities
in Uganda and Kenya (thus their advocacy of fieldwork methodology of the
"repeated visit" type and they have produced here a very solid, ifturgid, contribution
to understanding the current predicament of the African child and woman. The
book has significance for anthropological theory, as well as for the development
worker engaged in working with women and children in modem Africa It is
strongly recommended. This review will address itself to the development worker.
The book is divided into three parts. In the first part the authors describe their
theoretical orientation (Interpretive Framework) and methodology (using the
phrase "Interactive Ethnography" instead of "Participant-Observation"), but
reiterating their commitment to structural-functionalism. They posit their theme
of delocalisation (the process whereby old village-based agrarian economies
become incorporated into and dependent upon themodem national and international
economies) and the particular predicament and increasing vulnerability of women
and children in this process. For Kilbride and Kilbride, modemisation has produced
a move from a "genuine" culture towards a "spurious" one; their intent is to show
that "moral erosion" is threatening children with child abuse and neglect, in a
hostile modem environment where the extended family is under siege.
In the second part of the book, unfortunately the shortest section, the authors
offer a few examples of pregnancy, childrearing and childhood experiences. This
section is not the standard anthropological description of rites of passage and
quaint exotic customs; rather it provides a backdrop for what is to follow in the third
section. Given the Kilbrides' undoubted rich ethnographic experiences, this
section is disappointingly short and does not offer the smorgasbord of experiences
that the preface would have the reader expect They are especially successful in
depicting the socialisation of the young and in defending the importance of
mothering and affective experiences. In particular, the sixth chapter has valuable
discussion of birth and infant mortality, the infant's home environment, clothing.
food practices, infant care practices, and a fascinating discussion of comparative
infant sensorimotor development.
98 B~Reviews
The third part of the book is the "meat" of the book: in this section Kilbride and
Kilbride describe the role that industrialisation, nationalism, missionary activity,
formal education and a monetised economy are playing in marriage and family life,
and argue that the process of cultural and moral delocalisation is now well
underway. This section begins with a chapter on the increasing powerlessness of
women, especially on the predicament of the bar-girl in Kampala. The second
chapter in this section dwells on the alarming phenomenon of pre-marital pregnancy
and the challenge it poses to the extended family. Kilbride and Kilbride include
here a very pertinent discussion on the role of grandparents in relation to their
grandchildren and also the increasingly precarious role of the extended family in
modern marriages. This is followed by a chapter on polygamy and the economic
and social tensions and threats which this presents to women and children. The
Kilbrides successfully depict the increasing strain and friction within polygamous
homes and the moral disorientation that now surrounds polygamous marriages in
modern East Africa. This is followed by the penultimate chapter of the book which
dwells expertly on the issue of child abuse and neglect. The book concludes with
a summary chapter on women and children at risk.
The Kilbrides propose that a solution to the problems they have described
resides in an acknowledgement of three basic principles: that power differentials
between individuals, social groups and nations exist and that those with this
"power" have a responsibility that comes with such influence; that all action to
redress the problems should be intra- and cross-cultural; and that a universal
perspective must be an integral part of any resolution. Their specifIC conclusion
is that there must be a "convergence of interpretative frameworks" and that
socioeconomics, feminist theory and child-centred ideology should be combined
aMharnessed to resolve the problem. Forthe Kilbrides the answer lies ina "locally
derived child-centred Africanity". This tantalising idea that whets the appetite is,
unfoctunately, never satisfactorily explored and is only articulated through the
partial reporting of newspaper editorials: the reader is left feeling disappointed that
this "Africanity" is not investigated more thoroughly.
There are, moreover, inevitably in a book of such scope, some glaring omissions.
One searches in vain, for example, for a mae profound insight into coping
mechanisms thatare presumably currently evolving in the urban context for single
mothers or, even more crucially , formore than a cursory mention of the implications
of AIDS on the situation of children - especially in Uganda. In particular, the
rather forced conclusion serves to detract from the work as a whole. Academic
anthropologists might also take issue with some of the theoretical positions
inadequately described in the first section. The book's limited conclusion and the
excessive sociological jargon notwithstanding, it is highly recommended reading,
especially for those interested in grappling with the difficulties and complicatioos
B,oolcReviews 99
that besiege the African family, and the enormous and growing threat that African
children are currently confronted with. Most important, the authors give a welcome
and unequivocal emphasis to a child-centred perspective that encompasses all
aspects of what we normally think of as "development work".
Reviewed by Gerry Salole, former Southern Africa sub-Regional Director, Save
the Children Federation (USA).
Faces in the Revolution: The Psychological Effects or Violence OIl Township
Youth in South Africa, Gillian Straker with Fathima Moosa, Rise Becker, and
Madiyoyo Nkwale, Cape Town: David Philip and Athens: Ohio University Press,
1992 (156pp). ISBN: 0-86486-203-2 (David Phillip); ISBN: 0-8214-1040-7 (Ohio
Univ) No price listed.
Through the use of composite vignettes based on extensive interviews with 60 girls
and boys, ages 12-22, Gillian Straker brings into clear telephoto view some of the
psychological struggles of youth engaged in the fight against apartheid during the
mid-1980s in Leandra, South Africa.
Straker's analysis seeks to shed light on the diversity of trauma experienced by
youth, to explore the self-perception of youth, and to examine the psychological
resilience and vulnerabilities of the youth within a war context In addition, she
addresses the important question of whether violence begets violence.
The book represents scholarly, clinical research done in the real world. The
method is a qualitative case-study approach involving over 300 hours of audio
tapes. The vignettes themselves are masterful compilationsofindividualexperiences.
An initial reading of the appendix serves to orient readers concerned with
methodological issues. The experiences of the youth, which form the basis of
Straker's analysis, are presented in six well-organised chapters. The theoretical
underpinnings are wide-ranging, from the political analysis ofFanon (1963), to the
mythological focus of Campbell (1956), to morepsychologica1 theories of behaviour
and group process (Slater, 1966; Anthony, 1987; Bion, 1961).
Following violent confrontations with authorities in the Leandra Township, a
group of youth fled to the Wilgespruit Fellowship Centre seeking shelter. The
author was part of a counselling team called on to provide services to the youth. The
data were collected during the initial stay of the youth at the Centre and during
follow-up interviews conducted with 40% of the youth three years later. Straker's
focus is on the individual and psychological, the boys and girls; nonetheless, she
is careful to stress the powerful impact of war and poverty on the psychological
development of these youth.