People in between: the Matawai Maroons of Suriname

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6
Continuity and Change

In the foregoing analysis we have indicated specific aspects of change in descent group organization, local group formation and the marriage system. These changes were related to substantial economic, demographic and religious changes. In general, matrilineal descent groups tend to be delicate entities in the face of change. They seem unable to adjust to strong demographic imbalances and the pressures of economic change. Douglas, for instance, points out that

Matrilineal descent groups are at a disadvantage for recruiting by birth compared with patrilineal descent groups. Given the same hazards of disease and mortality in the population at large, matrilineal descent groups are likely to be more short-lived, more liable to dwindle and die out. This follows simply from the fact that a system in which descent is transmitted through males can offset the infertility of any particular woman by taking on more wives.... By contrast, in a matrilineal descent group, if a woman dies or is barren the group suffers an irreplaceable loss of reproductive powers (1969: 124-5)

It has frequently been observed that the increase of cash cropping or wage labour, accompanied by economic differentiation, tends to weaken matrilineal bonds as soon as men start to transfer wealth to their own children (Meek 1957: 179; Colson 1958: 347). Direct changes in group formation made to adapt to these pressures, will ultimately affect the ideological principles on which traditional group formation is based. In fact, economic and demographic factors have a more direct impact on

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social organization than religious factors, which are likely to influence only the ideological level.

Matawai social organization is, however, remarkably resistant to change and the descent group ideology has been maintained with tenacity. Christian ideology, introduced by the mission, has clashed with traditional Matawai ideology. The propagated Christian model, closely linked to western ideals, is based on the conjugal family, in which the authority over both the wife and children is vested in the husband/father. Marriage is considered to be an individual tie between the partners, and monogamy is the cherished ideal. In contradistinction, the traditional Matawai model is based on the matrilineal descent group, in which the authority over its female and junior members is vested in its senior male members. Both descent groups of the two partners are involved in marriage. And polygyny was the preferred type of marriage. The mission has always considered the descent based social organization, even wrongfully characterized by them as ‘matriarchy’, as a threat to the development of Christianity among the Bush Negroes (see for instance Schmidt 1947: 11-4). The fact that the mission was more successful in bringing about changes in the marital system than in matrilineal descent organization, can be understood in terms of the specific circumstances in which Christianity was introduced in Matawai, and the way in which the Moravian mission was incorporated in village life.

Remarkable, in the Christianization of the Matawai, was its introduction by the local prophet Johannes King and his followers, who inspired by visions, contacted the Moravian mission (see further p. 179) In most societies only part of the members affiliate with a Christian denomination, adopting a life style that differentiates them from the rest, who continue to be involved in traditional religion and social organization, or resulting in a tribal division between Christian and non-Christian villages. In Matawai, however, all people joined the Christian faith, although traditional religious principles remained significant for them. By the time the Moravians had established a congregation in their village (during the 1920s for the upriver area), most people were already baptized. The foreign evangelists who came to reside in the congregations, and were assisted by local functionaries

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chosen among the congregation members, were soon able to pass from insulating their congregation members from non-Christian ones, over to exerting social control. But it was easier to interfere in highly evident aspects of social organization that were ideologically conflicting with Christianity, such as in marriage relations (polygyny, partner choice, adultery and divorce) than in the more implicit aspects of social organization related to descent group principles.

Matawai soon internalized these ideas and came to consider polygyny to be in conflict with their own - Christian - ideology. They were, therefore, as prepared to combat it, as were the evangelists of their congregation. As we have indicated, marital stability increased as a result of the social control of church functionaries paralleling that of lineage elders, in trying to bring the partners towards a reconciliation (see p. 120). On the other hand, the Matawai did not always conceive of their social organization as being incompatible with Christian ideology. For example, under the influence of the mission, the customary remarriage of a widower to a classificatory sister of his deceased wife, was abandoned. This was an indirect attempt on the part of the mission to attack descent organization, which essentially failed since the lineage of the deceased wife continued to be highly involved in the remarriage procedure of the widower. And while on the instigation of the mission, marriage arrangements were begun at a later age, the involvement of the two lineages in the marriage of the partners did not change significantly. In a sense, the mission even contributed to the continuation of traditional social organization by using the traditional boundaries of village clusters for the settlement of church congregations. Furthermore, Matawai selectively emphasized those aspects of the Christian ideology that most agreed with their own organization.

Unlike in Luapula (Zambia) (Karla Poewe 1980: 118), where people who affiliated with a Protestant denomination, greatly reduced their network of economic cooperation, the cooperation patterns in Matawai did not change under the influence of Christianity. It was only in the face of economic change, when temporary migration started to loose its strict seasonal character and labour differentiation increased, that cooperation patterns became more restricted.

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For a long time matrilineal descent groups, monopolizing economic resources, were able to adjust to population fluctuations by segmentation, fusion and resettlement. When new economic resources became available, and resulted in an increase of mobility, residence patterns were affected directly. The later transition to permanent migration caused changed which were not restricted to residence patterns. The enduring migration had a profound effect on demographic characteristics of both the tribal and migrant populations. Due to its influence on sex-ratios, it would affect the marriage system, while the imbalances in age and sex composition necessarily influenced cooperation patterns and the performance of rituals. This is particularly the case in some downriver villages, in which migration has so strongly truncated village life that descent groups have lost many of their traditional functions.

We have already shown that upriver lineage elders are still able to make claims on the young migrants who return to the tribal area to contract a marriage with a woman in one of their home villages. Fearing the rapid depopulation that threatens downriver villages, the elders are firm in their insistence that young women remain settled in their own villages (resulting in the temporary autolocal residence pattern of spouses), and they expect the men to clear a garden and build a house in their wife's village. The stronger the economic position of men becomes, the more effective their counter claims will be to take their wife to the coastal area. These days they are already expanding their households in town, by lodging other lineage members instead of living predominantly with kinsmen of their wives.

The lineage still tries to retain its control over its migrant members, insisting that migrant women return, upon divorce, to the tribal area. As long as particular conditions are met, descent groups in the tribal area may yet remain relatively viable units, even with a number of its lineage members living dispersed on the coastal area. Regular contacts are maintained via their tribal kinsmen who temporarily work or do some shopping on the coast. In times of crisis, migrant kinsmen are summoned, and parallel rituals are performed in the tribal and coastal area. Cooperation patterns are continued and descent groups can, with the necessary adjustments, continue to dominate Matawai social life.