DIAGNÓSTICO EXTERNO POAM

The high groom price might not seem to favour women in matrilineal systems. However, the practice of buying the men through marriage, the requirement for the men to move in with their wives’ families and the ultimate control of women over their children, in fact, work to protect women and provide the necessary support for them, economically and emotionally. K’ho women in Kala Tongu themselves take a firm stance on this. As a woman told me:

Here the [customary] law is that the children will follow the mother [and the mother’s family]. The mother has to raise her children. When they grow up they can work for others to earn for their living, but [when they are small] the mother’s family definitely will not let the father take away the children. (Interview with ID14, 2015)

Children following the mother and her family is the core principle of matrilineal society and among K’ho people in Kala Tongu. This partially results from their perception, or more precisely, social stereotype, of men’s (in)capacity to raise their children. Women in the village occasionally refer to divorce cases where the custody of children remains with the mother. In a group interview with women, I learnt that:

if the children are to be divided between the mother and the father, the men will not stay in the house [or stay unmarried] to raise the children. They will wander around [seeking other women] and drink wine. How can they take care of their children? We [women] will feel worried about our children. We’d rather they live with us… (Group interview with women, 2015)

It is noted that in cases of separation and divorce, the burden of child-rearing, seemingly, is shouldered by women and their natal families; therefore, they prefer to live near to their sisters and natal families. Since the men are not allowed to bring any valuable property (except the shared properties between husband and wife after marriage), women do not expect their husbands to pay maintenance cost for their children; and this is seen as fair for both husband and wife. A young woman married to a man from a different province and different ethnic group and currently separated from her husband for several months, told me her bad experiences with her own inter-ethnic marriage and articulated the im- portance of kinship support to her:

My husband wanted me to follow him there [Dak Nong Province]. I thought we would just stay there for 2 or 3 years, so I agreed. But after marriage, he became

lecherous and I did not like that, so I moved back here and stayed in my mother’s house. That’s us, K’ho people, if we quarrel with our husband, then we go back home with our mother. Here if there’s anything needed in the house, I supply [it]. My siblings are not jealous [of me being given a piece of land to work], we share the same house so they have to sympathise with my situation. I bring back my two older daughters [out of three] and work to feed them. My husband does not bother to care or give me maintenance [...] Here, I live nearer to my siblings and relatives, [so] he dare not beat me, because I have a lot of family members here; there I am on my own, and he can live the way he wants, no-one says anything. (Interview with ID15, 2015)

Interesting aspects of matrilineal systems can be teased out from the story above. For a woman who is separated from her husband, it is indeed essential to have her family to provide support and protection. That’s partially why she decided to go back to her village after her relationship broke down. Currently, the kinship support comes from sharing the house, child-rearing, productive land and farming work between her siblings and herself, even though it sometimes affects their own share of property. For men, having their in- laws around might pose certain restrictions, as they often feel insecure and less comfort- able in a matrilineal village due to their dependent status. Kinship support is even more important in divorces. For a middle-aged divorcee, this kind of support was provided to herself and her six children since she left her husband in 1993. When I first talked to her, I thought getting divorced was social stigmatised for K’ho women. It was, and it still is, for local villagers. However, in her case, everyone in the family supported her to divorce her husband because he was seen as irresponsible, lazy and indecent. Divorce was not common at the time, but since she had a legitimate reason to leave her husband, she re- ceived full support from her natal family. At court, the judge decided to divide the care of the six children between both father and mother, but she ended up keeping all of them and did not receive any money from him. Beneath her calm attitude as she responded to my questions about how she managed to raise her six children, I could see the stability and reliability of the kinship support networks that might not be available to the women in patrilineal societies. During my interviews with her, she told me the same things, simply but in a determined manner:

I worked myself to feed my kids. I collected bamboo shoots during rainy seasons and cow dung41 during dry seasons and sold them to buy rice. My [unmarried] brother came to live with me and helped me raise the kids, but they worked to feed themselves too. (Interview with LH8, 2015).

Kinship support for women in matrilineal society, I argue, requires certain responsibili- ties. Specifically, these women have to keep the ancestral land within their clans. In some cases, the youngest daughters or those who get the bigger share of family land are com- mitted to take care of their ageing parents. Although in K’ho people, the surname is not to be passed on to different generations, women also have to play a role in carrying the family lineage forward. It is, however, seen slightly different from patrilineal/patriarchal societies of Kinh people. This was pointed out to me by one of the male participants of a photovoice group as we discussed the preference for sons or daughters in K’ho society. He explained to me:

If there are no daughters in the house, male siblings like me will only live in our wives’ families. That makes us grow apart. We male siblings belong to the same clan, but we know it’s just [a] word slipping out of [a] mouth. I have to follow my wife’s family and my children, and so do my other brothers. If we have sisters, then the sisters will keep the land and stay with parents. When we male siblings quarrel with our wives, we can still go back to the main pillar [i.e. the natal fam- ily]. Then our natal family will assign someone to take me back to my wife’s family and act as the mediator between me and my wife. Otherwise, I will have nowhere to run to but my wife and her family. (Interview with PV1, 2016) The importance of female siblings as the main ‘pillar’ on which their brothers can rely to maintain contact with each other, illustrates the gendered divisions of roles between male and female K’ho. In matrilineal societies of K’ho people, the children belong to the women and her families/clans regardless of their parents’ marital status. From the per- spective of K’ho women, men are not involved in the process and in some cases, are not expected to be, while women are fully aware of their responsibility for their children’s well-being. From the perspective of K’ho men, they learn to accept their marginalised role in child rearing and their wives’ control over their children during their marriage, and also become more attached to their natal families and their female siblings. This is because they still have significant voices in decision-making back in their natal families even after they marry and have moved out. Once there is no female sibling in the family, there will be no ‘base’ for them to exercise their ‘power’ anymore.

Having no daughter, therefore, is seen as bad luck for K’ho people as it affects the caregiving for ageing parents and the continuity of family lineage. That is why in Kala Tongu, everyone prefers to have both sons and daughters. This, as a matter of fact, also results from the need of labour to work the land, especially in coffee lands. Kala Tongu people indeed still preserve a lot of their traditions despite their geo-political location at

a crossroads between the ethnic communities and Kinh newcomers. As long as the tradi- tional ideas of groom price, control of children by women and family lineage are circu- lated and approved by the local people, the matrilineal systems will still function well in this village.