The Mbuti have an egalitarian society which means that
women, men, and children have all equal opportunity to get resource. There is
not a power difference between men and woman in this society. They both share
equal power. Any decision is made through a group vote. In a more conceptual
manner, the village and physical location is represented as a male, but the
layout of the village and what the space is used for is female. As hunters and
gathers, the Mbuti must go out and find their food. Although most culture
delineate the men to be the sole hunters, woman are incorporated in the hunt,
however, they do have different roles. The men are the ones who hold the nets
and kill the animal. Women are the beaters and push the animals out. The women
also gather vegetables which the men are allowed to help. Both women and men
participate in discussions. If an argument arises and a man is winning, another
will join the women talking in a falsetto mocking the women, but if a woman is
winning, another will join the men and talk in low voice mocking them. This
happens until both sides start laughing stopping the argument.
Family and Marriage
The basic unit in the Mbuti is the nuclear family which
consists of a father, a mother, and the children. These units live in one hut.
Each nuclear family put together becomes a band. During the rainy season, the
band stays as one and helps each other with food, but during the dry season, each
band goes into the forest for food. In marriage, a member is not allowed to
marry kin on either their mother or father’s side. One also cannot marry
outside their age group because it is believed that the forest does not like
this. The marriage in a community is recognized when the spouses move in
together. This is not a formal marriage or divorce ritual in the Mbuti tribe. A
divorce is when one of the spouses leaves the house and moves into another.
Either spouse has the capacity to do this. The marriage ceremony is composed of
giving gifts which are subjective to the couple. The ceremony is in the village
according to the custom of the village. They consecrate the marriage by a dance
with the forest leaves and singing of elima songs which is a women’s religious
association. There is no magical or religious significant in marriage. Globalization
The Mbuti people are threatened by the destruction of their
land and by official government policies which threaten to end their forest
traditions. The Mbuti have no legal land titles given by the government. In the
1980s and first part of the 1990s, Africa lost the highest percent of
rainforest according the United Nations and Agriculture Organization. This has
further declined the Mbuti population. This loss of rainforest is caused by
village expansion, population pressures, and commercial logging. Logging has
become especially detrimental to the Mbuti because they bring colonists and
diseases to these people who do not have immunity to the illnesses. The animals
have become scarce because of the poaching and noises the loggers are creating.
Government wise, in the 1970s, the government attempted to place the Mbuti as
farmers in permanent villages by the road, but the project was discarded. Now a
days, the Mbuti have little contact with the government. There have been attempts,
however, to tax the people, and soldiers or police sometimes go into the
hunting camps to attain tributes of meat. When immigrants where introduced, the
Mbuti liked them because of the wealth. They helped with food and construction,
and the immigrants gave them garden food. As the immigrants got a firm hold,
they did not need the help of the Mbuti. The immigrants also do not reciprocate
relations with the Mbuti anymore. They prefer that they pay them in cash. This
has led to the Mbuti doing low end jobs such as caring water in restaurants to
pay for these garden foods. The Mbuti are hired and exploited for their knowledge
of the forest by helping loggers with identifying and cutting trees, and
reducing the wildlife population for commercial traders. Mbuti also help the
elephant hunters. There are many prejudices against them, and they find it
difficult to enter the towns. Education and healthcare processes are slow, and
the need for them is great with the increase of alcoholism and disease gained
from life in the town.
