“The Native Court Way”: Disputes over Marriage, Divorce, and “Adultery” in Colonial Courts in Abeokuta (Southwestern Nigeria), 1905–1945

“The Native Court Way”: Disputes over Marriage, Divorce, and “Adultery” in Colonial Courts in Abeokuta (Southwestern Nigeria), 1905–1945

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Academic Unit

College of Arts and Sciences

Publication Date

8-2023

Document Type

Article

Abstract

This article examines surviving native court records from 1905–1957 in Abeokuta, Southwest Nigeria, to argue that what constituted marriage, marital rights, and sexual access to wives was changing readily in this period of socioeconomic and political change. In this period, Britain established the native court system, stressing African and British judges, to apply rigid ideas of native law and customs concerning marriage. Men and women—husbands, wives, lovers, fathers, uncles, aunties, brothers, sisters, and in-laws—approached the native courts to negotiate conflict over marriage, divorce, seduction, adultery, and child custody. Rather than administering rigid legal judgements of what constituted legitimate marriage, judgements rendered by these courts provided maneuverability, specifically for women to negotiate and contest marital status and relations.

Publisher

Michigan State University Press

Journal Title

Journal of West African History

Volume

9

Issue

1

ISSN

2327-1876

Beginning Page Number

27

Last Page Number

56

“The Native Court Way”: Disputes over Marriage, Divorce, and “Adultery” in Colonial Courts in Abeokuta (Southwestern Nigeria), 1905–1945

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