reasons why polygamy is practice in africa

There are many reasons why Africans practiced and valued polygamy: 1. Today, polygyny is more widespread in Africa than in any other continent. One of the reasons why this has happened is because the African societies have managed to see that children were a form of wealth and this way a family with more children was considered to be more powerful. In Senegal, for example, nearly 47 per cent of marriages are said to feature multiple women. Polygamy was widely practiced in Africa and it often formed the backbone of the traditional African family patterns. Such a practice was not considered evil or immoral/sinful until the Christian missionaries arrived in Africa. It is one of the factors that holds many countries back economically. Polygamy and poverty are both widespread in sub-Saharan Africa. 1 Several arguments have been made suggesting this correlation is causal. The selection of our samples from DHS data and a description of the statistical method are presented in Section III. Some scholars see the slave trade's impact on the male-to-female sex ratio as a key factor in the emergence and fortification of polygynous practices in regions of Africa. The polygamous family, consisting of a man, his wives (more than one wife), and their children, is the ideal for most Africans [2].Studies conducted from the 1930s to 1950s indicate that polygamy was common virtually in all regions of Africa. Our To conclude, there are many good reasons why polygamy is a fantastic practice, but because of time and space, only ten reasons have been proffered. I’ve been reading the 335-page legal decision upholding Canada’s laws against polygamy, and boy is it juicy. However, the rationale given for the practice of polygyny in Africa is provided by two schools of thought - the Social and Economic. – Agriculturally is easier to have a big family to cultivate the land Polygamy still exists as either being recognized or unrecognized by the state. It informs things as fundamental as how we date, how we marry, and how we organize society. Under these circumstances the polygamy in Africa was considered to be part of the way you could build an empire. These wives were married according to local custom and they were all legal in the understanding of the local world-view. The desire to marry many wives among the Igbo’s for instance, is to ensure that many children are born in the famil y. Incidence. Generally in rural areas with growing populations, the higher the incidence of polygyny, the greater the delay of first marriage for young men. Before I dive into it, I want readers to understand why I am covering this topic: this evolutionary perspective doesn’t just inform how we eat, how we run, or how we sleep. The polygamy in Africa in many places is a traditional tribal practice and the way it is done varies widely in different areas and countries, although I'm sure there is Islamic polygamy as well. then, is one of the reasons for polygamy in Africa. There are many reasons why Africans practised polygamy but here are the common reasons given through the years: – A man’s wealth is measured by the number of wives and children he has – The more wives a man has, the more political alliances he makes. Scholars have suggested, for example, that polygamy crowds out productive investment (Tertilt 2005), reduces investment in girls’ education (Edlund and Lagerlöf 2006) or diminishes the labour supply of unmarried men (Edlund and Lagerlöf 2012). Polygamy is very common in the animist and Muslim communities of West Africa. FACTORS ON POLYGAMY 295 The organization of the remaining part of the paper is as follows. 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