Putting an end to Cameroon's Traditions that are harming women

Cameroon Activists Calling An End For Traditions 

That Are Harming Women      

                       

              Today in Cameroon, activists are working on putting an end to "gender-based violence" which is "part of the global campaign 16 days of activism that ends in December 10."(Kindzeka) These rights groups are advocating against traditional practices that are harmful and unlawful to women.  Cameroon is home to three hundred ethnic groups who each recite their own traditional practices.

            What kind of traditions/rituals are occurring?

 For example according to Voice of America news, author Moki Edwin Kindzeka stated how"In Ngomedzap village just south of Yaounde, village notable Essomba Eloundo said that as part of a cleansing ritual for a woman who has lost her husband, he feeds her millipedes and asks her to walk on her knees. He beats her with banana leaves and washes her with muddy water early in the morning.The 60-year-old man said this is a tradition they inherited from their forefathers and they will continue it.The point of the ritual is to prove that a woman did not kill her husband or conspire in his death." Yet their are other other stories of other rituals that are done to women, that are much more disturbing than this one. 

         Another story that stood out to me was how a twenty-four year old women stated how she and three other women had to go through a ritual when they lost their husbands in a car crash a few years ago. She stated how they had to shave their heads after being locked in a small room for a week.During this week they were fed through a small window, which makes them feel like they were prisoners or animals. Other than being locked in a room, they were not allowed to take showers and they were asked to do many rites just to prove their innocence. After the ritual was over, the main women who had started this ritual with the other women, was forced to marry her late husband's younger brother. It's   shocking to know how other women around the world are getting mistreated a lot. These rituals are harming them physically, emotionally and last of all mentally. 

          Demanding Change:

           Cameroon women have had enough of these rituals and also practices such as female genital mutilation, which still occurs in some parts of the country. Wives often get abused by their husbands. Overall women aren't being respected and don't have any rights in Cameroon. This event the first year that women right advocated are raising awareness in Cameroon about these traditions. It is actually the fourth year.  Yet change is occurring within Cameroon, due to the lack of awareness within Cameroons political world and also because of education, which many Cameroon women don't happen to have, since when they are young, they stay at home and do household chores, whereas the boys go to school.  This just shows how inequality is still an issue within Cameroon, and as time goes on; hopefully these traditions will start to decrease, and no longer be a harm for Cameroon women.  

Article link: http://www.voanews.com/content/cameroon-activists-call-for-end-to-traditions-harmful-to-women/3082364.html

Possible questions for take-home final:

1.) What were the key goals of colonialism? 

2.) How does Christianity play a big role in the novel "The River Between"? Did it influence those villages in central Kenya? 

3.) In the novel " Things Fall Apart" the author explains the lifestyle of a Nigerian tribe that was connected to nine other villages. What was the daily lifestyle of those men who belonged to these tribes? How were women treated then? 

4.) In the novel "Kaffir Boy" the author explains the living conditions during the apartheid years in South Africa. What did these families have to go through? And how harsh was the South African government to it's people?