Book

Baba of Karo, a woman of the Muslim Hausa

Farber and FarberLondon • Published In 1954 • Pages:

By: Baba of Karo, Smith, Mary Felice.

Abstract
This is an autobiography of a Hausa woman whose story begins at about the time of the British occupation of northern Nigeria at the end of the ninteenth century and continues to 1950. It was recorded in Hausa by Mary F. Smith during an eighteen month field study of a series of Hausa villages by Smith and her husband. In the form of personal recollections of conditions and events through the half-century, Baba's account is concerned primarily with domestic affairs; it also treats women's role in economic activities, religious rites of the BORI or pagan spirit cults, and cultural attitudes toward numerous changes made in the period. As it is related by a woman to a woman ethnologist, it presents much material which would otherwise be unavailable in a society practicing wife seclusion. The introduction gives a culture summary of the Hausa as a background for the autobiography.
Subjects
Life history materials
culture
Hausa
HRAF PubDate
1997
Region
Africa
Sub Region
Western Africa
Document Type
Book
Evaluation
Creator Type
Ethnologist
Document Rating
5: Excellent Primary Data
Analyst
George R. Bedell ; 1959
Field Date
1949-1950
Coverage Date
ca. 1900-1950
Coverage Place
Nigeria
Notes
by M. F. Smith ; with an introduction and notes by M. G. Smith, Ph.D. ; preface by Daryll Forde
Includes index
LCCN
54004526
LCSH
Hausa (African people)