Editing Matrilineality (section)

==== Akan ====
{{Main|Akan people|Abusua}}
Some 20 million [[Akan people|Akan]] live in Africa, particularly in [[Ghana]] and [[Ivory Coast]].  (See as well their subgroups, the [[Ashanti people|Ashanti]], also called Asante, [[Akyem]], [[Bono people|Bono]], [[Fante people|Fante]], [[Akwamu]].) Many but not all of the Akan still (2001)<ref name="2001book">{{Cite book |last=Witte |first=Marleen de |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Fmf5UqZzbvoC&dq=Abusua&pg=PA52 |title=Long Live the Dead!: Changing Funeral Celebrations in Asante, Ghana |date=2001 |publisher=Aksant Academic Publishers |isbn=978-90-5260-003-1 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|last=Studies|first=University of Ghana Institute of African|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4FuWXpYixYUC&q=akan+matrilineal+inheritance|title=Research Review - Institute of African Studies|date=1988|publisher=Institute of African Studies.|language=en}}</ref> practice their traditional matrilineal customs, living in their traditional [[extended family]] households, as follows.  The traditional Akan economic, political and social organization is based on maternal lineages, which are the basis of inheritance and succession.  A lineage is defined as all those related by [[matrilineal descent]] from a particular ancestress.  Several lineages are grouped into a ''political unit'' headed by a chief and a council of elders, each of whom is the elected head of a lineage – which itself may include multiple extended-family households.  Public offices are thus vested in the lineage, as are land tenure and other lineage property.  In other words, lineage property is inherited only by matrilineal kin.<ref name=2001book /><ref name=encyBr>Busia, Kofi Abrefa (1970). ''Encyclopædia Britannica'', 1970.  William Benton, publisher, The University of Chicago. {{ISBN|0-85229-135-3}}, Vol. 1, p. 477.  (This Akan article was written by Kofi Abrefa Busia, formerly professor of Sociology and Culture of Africa at the University of Leiden, Netherlands.)</ref>

"The principles governing inheritance stress sex, generation and age – that is to say, men come before women and seniors before juniors." When a woman's brothers are available, a consideration of generational seniority stipulates that the line of brothers be exhausted before the right to inherit lineage property passes down to the next senior genealogical generation of sisters' sons. Finally, "it is when all possible male heirs have been exhausted that the females" may inherit.<ref name=com.au />

Each lineage controls the lineage land farmed by its members, functions together in the veneration of its ancestors, supervises marriages of its members, and settles internal disputes among its members.<ref>Owusu-Ansah, David (November 1994). http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field%28DOCID+gh0048%29, "Ghana: The Akan Group". This source, "Ghana", is one of the Country Studies available from the US Library of Congress. Archived https://archive.today/20120710173040/http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+gh0048) on 10 July 2012.</ref>

The political units above are likewise grouped into eight larger groups called ''[[abusua]]'' (similar to [[clan]]s), named Aduana, Agona, Asakyiri, Asenie, Asona, Bretuo, Ekuona and Oyoko.  The members of each ''abusua'' are united by their belief that they are all descended from the same ancient ancestress. Marriage between members of the same ''abusua'' is forbidden. One inherits or is a lifelong member of the lineage, the political unit, and the ''abusua'' of one's mother, regardless of one's gender and/or marriage. Note that members and their spouses thus belong to different ''abusuas'', mother and children living and working in one household and their husband/father living and working in a different household.<ref name=2001book /><ref name=encyBr />

According to this source<ref name=com.au>ashanti.com.au (before 2010). http://ashanti.com.au/pb/wp_8078438f.html, "Ashanti Home Page: The Ashanti Family unit" Archived https://web.archive.org/web/20070626101235/http://www.ashanti.com.au/pb/wp_8078438f.html on 26 June 2007.</ref> of further information about the Akan, "A man is strongly related to his mother's brother (wɔfa) but only weakly related to his father's brother. This must be viewed in the context of a [[polygamous]] society in which the mother/child bond is likely to be much stronger than the father/child bond. As a result, in inheritance, a man's nephew (sister's son) will have priority over his own son.  Uncle-nephew relationships therefore assume a dominant position."<ref name=com.au />

Certain other aspects of the Akan culture are determined [[patrilineally]] rather than matrilineally. There are 12 patrilineal [[Ntoro]] (which means spirit) groups, and everyone belongs to their father's Ntoro group but not to his (matrilineal) family lineage and ''abusua''.  Each patrilineal Ntoro group has its own surnames,<ref>de Witte (2001), p. 55 shows such surnames in a [[family tree]], which provides a useful example of names.</ref> taboos, ritual purifications, and etiquette.<ref name=encyBr />

A recent (2001) book<ref name=2001book /> provides this update on the Akan: Some families are changing from the above ''abusua'' structure to the [[nuclear family]].<ref name="de Witte 2001, p. 53">de Witte (2001), p. 53.</ref> Housing, childcare, education, daily work, and elder care etc. are then handled by that individual family rather than by the ''abusua'' or clan, especially in the city.<ref>de Witte (2001), p. 73.</ref> The above taboo on marriage within one's abusua is sometimes ignored, but "clan membership" is still important,<ref name="de Witte 2001, p. 53"/> with many people still living in the ''abusua'' framework presented above.<ref name=2001book />