Brides behind bars

Maale women as captives between tradition and development

Abstract

The seclusion of brides is an important transition period among the Maale of southern Ethiopia, which is still practised by all Maale today, regardless of the family's religious background. The seclusion of the bride is not only a way to accept a bride with respect and offer her safety during a dangerous period of transition, it also serves as a time of apprenticeship and of a deepening of traditional skills. Recently, brides who have attended school before getting married are taken to prison if they are absent from school while in seclusion, and then forced to carry on with formal education. The seclusion of brides has therefore been disturbed and may even vanish or be radically transformed in the future. The interference with this meaningful tradition for the sake of formal education shows the Ethiopian state's current preference for modernisation and development over cultural practices.