African Studies Seminar series. Paper presented March 1991The state of African marriage in colonial Zambia has been a matter of discussion, research and policy debate since the colony developed in the late 19th century. The outline of these
discussions is well known. Chanock (1985) has described the
initial repugnance by missionaries and colonial rulers towards
"barbaric" African marriage customs, and the provision of jura!
rights to African women to counter this tendency. The resulting
flood of marital litigation alarmed colonial and African (male)
authorities, and consequently, in the 1920s, the discourse on
African marriage changed. Researchers, missionaries and colonial
officials expressed alarm about the "crisis in African marriage", particularly in the new urban centers. Traditional marriage customs, especially those strengthening control over women, began to be seen as a solution rather than a problem, and efforts to shore up traditional African marriage intensified (Richards 1940; Wilson 1942). During World War II the debate began to change, and concern for development spawned a renewed interest in marital stability, but this time in conjunction with support for the new developmental elite, the urban working and middle classes. Thus the debate came full circle- Once again colonial officials advocated a more interventive approach to African institutions, particularly marriage and the family, which were seen as central to issues of social and economic development as well as public order.
While the outline of this debate is well known, there has been
a tendency to present colonial discourse an marriage as a monolithic entity, lacking internal contradictions. The importance of these internal contradictions, and the contribution by African men and women to this debate, has been underestimated. The role of emerging class forces in the African community has also been largely ignored. This article is an attempt to achieve a deeper understanding of the debates around African marriage in the British colony of Northern Rhodesia, with particular attention to the towns that grew up around the copper mines in the 1920s. The article intends to investigate the various strands of the debate around African marriage, and the possibility that contending interpretations of the crisis over colonial marriage in Africa, both in the European and African communities, may have provided openings for African women to influence the discourse on African marriage and
the reality of their lives in town
