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International African Institute

The Hausa System of Social StatusAuthor(s): M. G. SmithSource: Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, Vol. 29, No. 3 (Jul., 1959), pp.239-252Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of the International African InstituteStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1157614 .

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[239]

THE HAUSA SYSTEM OF SOCIAL STATUS'

M. G. SMITH

TN this discussion of the forms of Hausa social placement I wish to direct attention to the important sociological problems connected with status distribution. The

Hausa afford excellent illustrative material for this purpose since their society, which lays great stress on status, is neither tribal nor modern but roughly midway between these extremes.

Social placement refers to the general position which an individual occupies in the society to which he belongs. A system of social status is meant only to imply that such particular placements tend to have a common basis and an hierarchical form. In studying status systems we try to discover the principles which regulate this ranking arrangement and to see how one status is related to another. We must therefore begin by isolating those conditions which are socially recognized status determinants. Next we must seek to determine their interrelations; and only then can we usefully consider the form, function, or meaning of the current status structure. Clearly, we cannot follow this procedure if we begin with definite assumptions about the form or nature of the status system under study. I shall therefore use this term merely to delimit a general area of inquiry and shall leave the problem of its defini- tion until later.

The Hausa are a large heterogeneous population, most of whom live in Northern Nigeria. They are Muhammadans, they live mainly by farming, and are organized into kingdoms of varying size. Their skill in trade and handicrafts is well known, but their society remains unfamiliar. I shall therefore discuss the various Hausa status conditions in more detail than might otherwise be necessary.

The capital city of each Hausa chiefdom or state is its economic and political centre, but outlying districts may have their own capitals at which the local chiefs, markets, and mosques are situated. In some cases these outlying districts were hereditary vassal chiefdoms of larger states. More commonly they were simply the subordinate local units of such states.

There are now perhaps about ten million Hausa in Northern Nigeria, where they occupy the north-west quadrant of the Federation. There are also many Hausa in adjoining French territory. Their eastern neighbours are the Kanuri or Beriberi, who formerly exercised suzerainty over Hausaland. To the south there are many small non-Muhammadan tribes, from which the Hausa formerly recruited slaves by tribute and force.

ETHNIC DIFFERENCES

Hausa is a linguistic term which distinguishes the Hausa-speaking Muhammadans from other major linguistic and cultural groups quite adequately; it is misleading in

I The substance of this paper was presented to the December. I am grateful to Professor R. H. Barback, 1958 Conference of the Nigerian Institute of Social Director of the N.I.S.E.R., for permission to publish and Economic Research which met at Ibadan last it here.



THE HAUSA SYSTEM OF SOCIAL STATUS

other contexts. Ignoring the offspring of slaves for the moment, the Hausa are really an association of two ethnic groups, the Habe and the Fulani. Each of these groups shares traditions of common origin with some other people who do not fully belong to Hausa society. The Habe have non-Muhammadan cousins who are known as

Maguzawa, or pagan Hausa, scattered through their territory. Those Fulani who now belong to Hausa society have nomad kinsmen called Bororo, whose way of life precludes their incorporation into any one state. With such diverse affiliations all around them, Habe-Fulani ethnic differences could hardly lack importance in Hausa society, but these ethnic differences are especially important for historical reasons.

Most Hausa states of Northern Nigeria now have Fulani rulers, and almost all these acknowledge the Sultan of Sokoto as their suzerain. The Fulani empire of Sokoto was established by a jihad or Holy War of 80o6-Io when Shehu dan Fodio, a Fulani religious leader, overthrew the Habe kingdoms and appointed Fulani lieu- tenants to govern them. Fulani domination over the Habe dates from this period, but a few Habe kingdoms managed to remain independent, despite territorial losses, until the Europeans arrived. These independent Habe states include Daura, Abuja, and Argungu in Nigeria and Maradi in Niger. These four states still have Habe ruling classes and differ from other Hausa societies accordingly. Wherever Fulani rule, Fulani is the dominant ethnic status; where Habe rule, this is not so.

In Hausa states with Fulani rulers Fulani often use the term Habe to denote all Muhammadan natives who are not Fulani. Occasionally they even speak of subordinate pagan tribes in this way. This usage of Habe denotes a residual category which includes Muhammadans of slave descent as well as those descended from the free Habe (s. Kado, f. Kaduwa) whom the Fulani conquered. In the four Hausa states with Habe rulers, ethnic designations are far more precise, and the Habe distinguish other groups, such as the Bugaje or Beriberi, besides themselves and Fulani.

Among both Fulani and Habe an individual derives his ethnic status from his father. Thus, the child of a Fulani father by a Gwari slave woman was a Fulani. Since the mother would normally be the man's concubine, the child would be born free, and, under Muhammadan law, the mother would also be free on her master's death. Habe have identical customs in this respect but, since their ethnic classifications are more specific, they avoid some of the problems which arise among Fulani.

In using the term Habe to denote non-Fulani Muhammadans, Fulani restate the distinction between rulers and ruled in ethnic terms. It follows that persons holding positions of authority are, or should be, Fulani in those states which Fulani rule. The

following data from Zaria illustrate the tendency for Fulani to monopolize office. In 1945 there were 589 Native Authority officials based on Zaria city. Of these 344 were classified as Fulani, 186 as Habe, and the remaining 59 were Southern Nigerians engaged in technical work. In Zaria Muhammadan Habe outnumber Fulani by two to one, but among these N.A. officials the reverse is true.

Even so there are several qualifications. Ignoring the Southerners, one-third of the N.A. staff were Habe, so that the rulers were by no means all Fulani. Yet, since the Fulani are regarded as rulers, many people in authority, although of different origin, tend to be classified as Fulani. Instances of this occur most easily in those families which have retained political prominence over two or more generations. Thus,

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despite its ethnic basis, the term Fulani has come to have a political reference like its antithesis, the term Habe.

Habe may also be assimilated to Fulani by affiliation through their Fulani mothers. Fulani women sometimes marry their kinsmen's Habe clients. They may then give their children their own lineage marks (zane). By assimilation to their mother's lineage these children are also assimilated to the Fulani ethnic group, and, even if they have marginal status, their children are simply Fulani.

Even in those Hausa states with Fulani rulers most of the Fulani population lack official position. Thus, even if most of the persons holding office are Fulani, most of the Fulani belong among the ruled. Despite popular usage, therefore, the term Fulani has widely differing political and ethnic references. The usage which ignores these differences produces a classification with uncertain status implications, and does not distinguish any recognizable social strata.

DESCENT AND LINEAGE

The same kind of qualifications apply to lineage or other descent groups. Among Habe and Fulani alike, political prominence and patrilineal descent go together; but the political history and present prospects of a unit determine the significance of descent within it as well as its form. This holds true of dynasties as well as other descent-groups. Under the rules of succession observed by Fulani and Habe alike, only the sons of a past ruler are eligible to succeed him. Despite certain lapses, this principle also governed eligibility for those subordinate offices of state which were hereditary in set lineages.

In the Habe state of Daura, most of the hereditary offices were held by slave lineages. In Fulani Katsina also, certain positions such as Turaki have been vested in slave lineages for generations; but the Fulani seem to have made less use of hereditary office in their government than the Habe. This Fulani reliance on open recruitment to office has made political competition more intense, and this, in turn, increased the splintering effect of differential rank-distribution in the Fulani lineage structure. The splintering process involves a progressive isolation of those politically successful descent-lines within each lineage or dynasty, and thus reduces lineage solidarities, the content of lineage membership, and the significance of lineage status. The status gradient produced by rank and lineage is finite and steep. Obscure descent-lines are generally forgotten after one or two generations, and even descendants of dynasties may lose royal status in this way. Thus the Suleibawa who formerly ruled Zaria are no longer counted among the dynasties of that state.

Under Muhammadan practice, inheritance normally involves the subdivision of estates. This leaves little room for corporate lineage property and facilitates the economic differentiation of descent-lines. Since office has always been the principal road to wealth among the Hausa, the economic differentiation of descent-lines goes hand in hand with their political differentiation; but offices vary widely in their levels of remuneration, and the descendants of an important official, therefore, occupy economic and political positions very different from their lineage cousins whose fathers held lesser rank or none at all. Since these differences accumulate over the generations, lineages include descent-lines of widely different social status. Accord- ingly, lineage membership has an uncertain status significance.

R

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THE POSITION OF SLAVES

After 1807 Daura was split into two kingdoms, one Habe and the other Fulani. In both these kingdoms the royal slaves held several important offices, and in Habe Daura many of these were hereditary positions. Both the Habe and Fulani rulers gave their daughters in marriage to the leading slave officials. The children of prin- cesses by their slave husbands were free members of the husbands' lineages, and were thus ineligible to hold slave titles. In i906, when the throne of Fulani Daura fell vacant, a new chief was selected and installed by the royal slaves without any free officials being consulted. In Habe Daura, during the last century, the slave officials were sufficiently powerful to have chiefs dismissed and appointed as they pleased.

Such slave officials clearly occupied a higher status than many free persons, including large sections of the royal lineage, and were wealthier and more powerful. Many had slaves of their own and freemen among their house-servants, while their children were both slave and free. Their authority extended to both status groups alike. When they committed abuses these had to be borne in patience, since these officials were agents of the chief. In reality their position was as near the converse of slavery as we can imagine; and, since the ruler was by far the largest slaveholder in each kingdom, these privileged royal slaves were a significant proportion of the slaves in any Hausa society. The position and privileges of other slaves also corre- sponded with those of their owners. For this reason there were no slave rebellions in Hausa society throughout the last century, despite considerable turmoil among the free population. Between i870 and i880, the Fulani rulers of Zaria appointed slave generals to command standing armies, as much through fear of internal revolt as for defence against invaders. The slaves were therefore often freer than the free.

The ratio of privileged slaves varied with the relative size of the free and slave sectors of Hausa society. These sectors also varied in relative size from state to state. In Zaria there were probably as many slaves as free persons. In Daura considerably less than one-quarter of the population could be classified as slaves. In Zaria important office was generally reserved for free persons. In Daura the rulers relied on their slaves more heavily. In both states, however, the majority of the slaves lacked the privileges of free persons, so that slavery also varied widely in its status connotations.

Purchased or captured slaves could be punished or disposed of by their owner as he pleased. The children of male and female slaves belonged to their mother's owners. Slave females were often taken by their owner as concubines. Slave marriages could be dissolved by slave-owners and had a special form: exchange (mutsaya). First- generation slaves were rarely Muhammadans, but their offspring were brought up in Islam and could neither be violently punished nor alienated by their owners. These second-generation slaves were linked to their owner's family by quasi-kinship, and used the ordinary language of kinship in address and designation. The prohibition on slave recruitment under British rule has left these relations intact, wherever ex- slave and master remain in contact. The ex-slave or his descendant is still the master's dimajo, while the master is ubangiji (father of the inheritance). Thus slavery has turned into serfdom, and the dimajai of today are described by their masters as talakawa (commoners), bayi (slaves), oryanuwa (kinsmen) according to context.

In one sense these dimajai are just as much slaves as ever dimajai were in the last

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century. In another they are free commoners like other talakawa, and at law they are now formally responsible for their own offences. Few are readily distinguishable from other Muhammadan Habe whose culture is now their own; but dimajai trace kinship mainly through their ubangii's family since their own ancestors rarely had other kin near by. Dimajai cannot trace agnatic descent beyond their father's father, and many cannot go back even that far. In consequence the dimajo regards his mother's owner as his closest kin, and these uterine affiliations produce an appearance of bilaterality in the kinship of master and slave alike. The intensity of this appearance varies with the relative frequency of such affiliations, and that varies, in turn, with the relative size of the slave population. Thus, bilateral linkages are more prevalent in Zaria than in Daura, for example. In addition, commoners also trace kinship through either parent, emphasizing maternal and paternal ties for different purposes. Lineage organization is virtually confined to the political elite and Muhammadan intelligentsia.

KINSHIP AND STATUS

The constant elements in this flexible kinship system are its terminology, its rigid rule of male precedence, its emphasis on polygynous virilocal marriage, on agnation as the basis of extended families, and on seniority by birth-order. Women and children are legal minors, but after their marriage women are social adults with important roles in family affairs. Special terms distinguish Ego's older siblings of either sex; but only his elder brother, father, or father's brother can exercise authority over him.

Seniority by birth-order is thus the normal basis of headship in extended families, and only men are eligible for such roles. Besides their legal incapacity to handle such issues as marriage or inheritance, the women born into any kinship group live with their husbands elsewhere as dependants. In each household or compound, the senior male is the head (mai-gida), but most households consist of only one man, his wife or wives, and children. The senior mai-gida of a group of agnates should live in the ancestral compound and act as its head; but agnates are often scattered, agnatic kinship is rather shallow, and the head of such an agnatic group receives no official recognition not already due to him as a compound head. Under Hausa political organization each compound head is formally responsible for his resident dependants, and junior males tend to be socially placed by reference to their compound heads. The emphasis on seniority by birth-order may be a decisive factor in limiting the depth and span of Hausa agnatic groups, since this status-scale has only a restricted range.

A kinship system is an order of interrelated statuses. These positions are defined in standard terms by rights and obligations. Sanctions of various kinds enforce the rules of this system and the distribution of authority within it is thus crucial for its form and continuity alike. Among the Hausa, kinship authority is distributed on the basis of sex, agnation, and seniority by generation and age. Between non-kin accurate age-reckoning is impracticable, and members of the same sex and generation are regarded as socially equivalent provided other things are equal, which is rarely the case. Age-placements are also modified by differences of economic or political position, or birth-status as slave or free. Thus age does not provide a general basis for the ranking of men in Hausa society. Neither does kinship, which includes significant matrilateral and patrilateral as well as bilateral ties.

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THE STATUS PLACEMENT OF CHILDREN

Among women and even more so among children, seniority by age regulates social placement far more consistently. Younger children must obey their seniors, including non-kin. In children's play-groups, such as magi or kallankuwa, leadership and authority are formally vested by titles in the older boys and girls, and youngsters of noble parentage must wait until they are old enough to hold these children's titles.

In these ways children adopt the age-principle observed among adults as the basis of their own social placements; but this imitation radically oversimplifies the adult status system and only among kin does it fit adult patterns exactly. Adult Hausa either ignore the social placement of children, or else they vaguely equate particular children with their fathers or compound-heads. Although the nobleman's child should, therefore, rank above commoners, these differences of parental status are often overlooked by adults as well as by children.

THE SOCIAL PLACEMENT OF WOMEN

The distinction between child and adult overrides all other status considerations

among Hausa. Children form an undifferentiated status group with its own rules and its own activities. The Hausa adult is or has been married. There is no concept of

celibacy in this society and no room for it. Young men and girls become adults

through the elaborate rite depassage of their first marriage. Until they wed they remain children, whatever their age. After obtaining a divorce young persons may choose to remain single. This condition is described as karuwanci (prostitution), and single persons of either sex are referred to as prostitutes (karuwai, s. karuwa). Hausa society treats marriage as the normal condition of adults and karuwai as deviants. Since karuwanci is only possible for adults, that is, for persons who have already married, the unwed youth or girl is doubly anomalous.

The differing legal capacities of men and women are matched by their differing political, economic, and kinship roles. The sum of these differences is sufficiently great to produce complementary sex-cultures which differ in content and form. Differences in the regulation of status among men and women have an important place in this cultural cleavage.

In Hausa polygynous marriage, the woman moves to her husband's home. Divorce is easy and frequent and has long been so. Within polygynous households co-wives are ranked in seniority by reference to their marriage-order to the common husband. Differences of marriage-order take precedence among co-wives over other differences such as age or parentage, but outside the household these other differences may have more significance than marriage-order.

The average Hausa woman probably makes three or four marriages before the

menopause. Men may well average even more, since polygyny is widespread. Under conditions of such marital instability spouses cannot share the same social status. Indeed, the status differentiation of co-wives by reference to marriage-order precludes their status identity with the common husband. Legally and politically, this identity is also impossible, since women are wards of men. Moreover, since divorce rates are high and spouses change frequently, marital careers are highly

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individual and variable; accordingly, a man and his wife or wives are not treated as status equivalents but sharply distinguished.

A man's sons and male dependants will be accorded a social position roughly similar to that which he holds; but his daughters cannot be treated in this way; and his wives are even more clearly distinguished from him. There are, in fact, two quite distinct status orders, one regulating the social placement of men, the other applying to women. Only within the special context of kinship are these two status orders interrelated systematically, and this social function of the kinship system partly determines its forms.

Among the females the criteria which govern social placement are those of generation, age, marriage-order to a common husband, ethnicity and descent, fertility, marital career, the position and prospects of offspring and, to a lesser extent, differences of wealth. Apart from the fact that women of senior generation normally have precedence, these status variables do not seem to be related in any simple consistent way. Thus, the commoner's wife or daughter is often the social peer or senior of the nobleman's. Since this female status-order is only related to the masculine system within the context of kinship, each sex should have its own exclusive patterns. Among women, this is found in the kawa and rana relationships. Kawvaye (s. kawa) are bond-friends and social equals, who establish their relations freely with considerable ceremonial. Although a woman may have several kawaye, she should discriminate in choosing them. The relation is marked by frequent exchange of gifts and visits and is highly formalized. Kawaye may differ widely in parental status but should be of similar age.

The two rana relations express status inequalities just as strongly as the kawa relation expresses equality. In the rana relation the patroness is known as the uwar rana or

yayan rana, which means the 'adopted' mother or elder sister respectively. Thus, kinship provides the model for status inequalities among women. The client is known as the kanwar rana of her patroness, that is, the ' adopted ' younger sister. When the patroness is an 'adopted mother', the clients' functions are mainly menial. She will thresh and grind grain for her patroness as required, and also carry out other manual tasks. When the patroness is an' adopted elder sister ', the client's servitude is mainly ceremonial, but she is obliged to consult her patroness on such matters as divorce, visits to magicians, marriage arrangements, the initiation of kawa relationships, and the like. From time to time, the client receives gifts from her patroness for the services she has rendered; and in either form of this relation she remains at the patroness's beck and call. It follows that a kanwar rana can only have one patroness, although a patroness may have two or more kanwar rana.

Since these female clientage relations serve immediate ends, they presuppose residence of the participants in a common locality. In contrast, kawaye belong to different communities more often than otherwise. This dispersal of kawaye is partly due to their movements on divorce and remarriage, but since women must take the greatest care not to establish bond-friendships with women who are clients of their bond-friends or who are linked to such clients by bond-friendship, kawaye are chary of forming several bond-friendships within their own community. In consequence, in no community do we find a neat division of women into two or more exclusive sets of bond-friends linked to one another by ties of clientage. Instead we find that

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individuals have near by only one or two bond-friends, and perhaps a client also, without further connexions. In this indeterminate field, such factors as generation, wealth, descent, marital career and children's position have a varying significance for status placement.

Since marriage is the only proper condition of Hausa women, it might seem that all female prostitutes share a common status below that of married women. This is not so. Hausa prostitutes (karuwai) fall into three socio-economic groups of differing status. Firstly, there are the attractive young women who depend for their income on

property rental, trade, or gifts from a select clientele of affluent men. Less attractive women, who maintain their independence by a combination of craft or retail earnings and gifts from their friends, would seem to form a second group. Both these two

groups are to be found in the large towns, where karuwai congregate despite their

periodic dispersal by the local rulers. Karuwai who lack an urban clientele and other means of livelihood, normally marry or go on tour in the rural areas, living in brothels run by local women, who are officially responsible to the village-chiefs. These peripatetics form the third group of karuwai.

Hausa have ambivalent attitudes towards prostitution. It is formally disapproved, since all women should be married. On the other hand, many married men court

prostitutes with offers of marriage, and many married women declare their envy of the

prostitutes' independence. The relative success with which individual karuwai maintain or maximize this undefined independence provides the basis of their status placement and differentiation. The straitened circumstances of the peripatetics are evidence of their failure, and they are more likely to accept marriage offers than any other class of karuwai. Hausa disapproval of prostitution or female independence varies according to its fruit; and the Hausa equivalent of our film-stars enjoys a corresponding position.

Since Hausa marriage varies in form, and marriage is the normal adult condition, marriage form affects the social placement of Hausa women. Hausa marriages can be classified as full purdah (auren kulle), incomplete purdah or partial wife-seclusion (auren tsare), and no seclusion at all, this last form being known as aurenjahilai (the marriage of the ignorant). Purdah has high prestige, aurenjahilai has little. Purdah wives depend on others for the household wood and water supplies. Husbands seek to provide these requirements by means of compound-wells or house-servants (yaran gida, barori). Occasionally a purdah wife depends on her kanwar rana for these services. Only women whose marriages do not involve seclusion can thus become kanwar rana; but the patroness may also practise an equally free form of marriage. Among women purdah confers prestige rather than status. It has clearer implications for the social placement of husbands. This is not surprising, since it is men who decide what form the marriage shall take, and they are responsible for its economic main- tenance. Kawaye may practise quite contrary marriage forms.

The organization of status placement among women is not only quite independent of the male status order but also much less important for the structure of Hausa

society, being both less systematic and less complex. Marriage places women in an indeterminate kinship position. Wives are neither full members of their husband's family nor of that into which they were born. Although relations of consanguinity are lifelong, and marriage is impermanent, the rule that women should always be married gives marriage precedence over descent among them.

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THE RULERS AND THE RULED

Besides the differences already mentioned, the masculine status order embraces two important principles which are not found in the status placement of women. These are the principles of rank and occupational class, which I shall now discuss in that order.

One of the first things of which a stranger is told in Hausaland is the importance of the distinction between the sarakuna (chiefs) and masu-sarauta (officeholders) on the one hand, and the talakawa (subjects, commoners) on the other. The rulers exercise authority over the ruled and therefore have higher status. The distinction between rulers and ruled accordingly divides Hausa society into two clearly defined social strata, the one subordinate to the other. As we have seen, the same basic idea is sometimes expressed in ethnic terms.

This classification is based on political position, and has a clear status reference. It is useful but has several defects. It applies to women only indirectly, since they are wards and political minors. It treats officials as a homogeneous status group, when they are highly differentiated and span the entire range of Hausa status. It treats subjects and commoners as synonymous, when many subjects are of noble descent, and many officials are commoners. It ignores the important status distinction between those who hold office on hereditary grounds (karda) and those who are freely selected (shigege). It ignores the distinctions between formally appointed officials and others, between those with territorial office of various kinds and others, between officials with considerable authority and their subordinates, between free and slave-born officials, between royal officials and others, between free and slave-born talakawa, between royal subjects and others. In short, it presents an illusory antithesis which breaks down under examination.

Hausa official systems are virtually coextensive with their societies; they are anything but exclusive in their membership. Apart from the numerous dismissed officials in every state, each important office has a complement of unofficial agents, known as fadawa, through whom the officeholder rules. Most of these fadawa lack official positions, but they belong with the rulers, none the less. So do all dismissed officials whose birth or past position is notable. In many cases dismissed officials occupy a higher social status than current officers, and so do aristocrats and some others who have never held office at all.

Because these official systems are coextensive with Hausa societies, officeholders include persons drawn from all significant status levels; and in so far as the society is highly differentiated, offices and their holders are also status-differentiated. Thus, only princes can seek the throne, only slaves are eligible for slave offices. Only aristocrats may compete for those offices which have come to be theirs, only the members of learned families are eligible for the legal and religious positions. The majority of fadawa are commoners, but their status varies with the rank of the official they serve. In this way it sometimes happens that the client of a man who has never held office may outrank the agents of some officials. The official system reflects the status differentiations current in Hausa society, but it can neither relate these to one another consistently, nor supply an invariable principle of social classification. Indeed the official system is quite marginal to the status placements of women, and having

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been in more or less rapid change in several states over the last 6o years it is neither as uniform nor as consistent as it may seem.

During the last century most Hausa chiefdoms levied occupational taxes. Crafts- men, traders, farmers, and other producers were subject to special taxes which were collected by officials appointed separately from each category. Thus, there was a chief of the blacksmiths with his assistants, a chief of the weavers, and so on. In Fulani chiefdoms, these occupational offices were mainly filled by Habe; and in all Hausa states, they were quite clearly subordinate, being charged with tax collection and the organization of supplies wanted by the chief. When the British reorganized Hausa taxation and abolished these special rates, the order of occupational office simply lapsed, but the occupational groups on which they were based remained unaffected. This shows the error of defining social units in purely political terms.

THE SYSTEM OF OCCUPATIONAL CLASSES

Although agriculture is the basic Hausa industry, large numbers of men are engaged in craft and trade. These occupations are often hereditary; children learn their fathers' skills and follow their occupations. Hausa describe such hereditary occupations as karda, and contrast them with those which are freely chosen by individuals. The latter are known as shigege, and the dichotomy is applied to political office as well as other economic pursuits. Karda enjoys higher status than shigege as well as greater prestige. The karda distinction and status ranking indicate an occupational order in which most men follow in their fathers' footsteps and in which mobility is quite low. Even today this is still true of Hausa society, and the superior status of karda simply expresses the general preference for social continuity and for stability in the status order.

The prevalence of karda implies the existence of a set of closed occupational groups recruited by agnatic descent. Excluding migration, each group will, therefore, con- tain a number of descent-lines. Hausa describe the relations between these groups in two ways. Those categories, which have close links, form an occupational cluster, for instance, weavers, dyers, and needlemen who deal with cloth, or officials, merchants, and savants, who have common interests. Occupational groups are also ranked in order of status (daraja), with the masu-sarauta (officials), the mallams and wealthy merchants at the top, and the butchers, matweavers, drummers, praise-singers, and buglers at the bottom.

It might seem that this principle of occupational classes provides the Hausa with a single comprehensive basis for social stratification. This may in fact be so, despite its many important deficiencies. Besides the categories just mentioned, there are farmers, potmakers, blacksmiths, barber-doctors, commission agents, long-distance traders (fatake), builders, dyers, needlemen, weavers, tanners, woodworkers, matmakers, and leather-workers of various kinds. The number of groups is too great to form a series of independent social strata and, except in large cities such as Kano, the groups are too small in size. There is in fact a limit to the number of strata which can be structurally or functionally significant in any given society. However high we set this limit, the number of Hausa occupational groups is well above it; and this ignores the status distinctions between karda and shigege, as well as the awkward Hausa practice of pursuing several occupations simultaneously.

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Even when members of a single society attempt to rank these occupational groups, disagreements result; and these disagreements are even greater when we compare rankings made by members of different Hausa societies. Even so an impressive consensus obtains. All classifications place officials, mallams, and merchants at the top, in that order, and put musicians and butchers at the bottom. None includes female specialisms, of which there are many. At either extreme of these status scales, there is a tendency towards class-endogamous marriage; but this is modified by other factors, including traditional marriage alliances between occupational groups which now occupy quite different positions on these scales, for example, the mallams and blacksmiths.

On the basis of such consensus as exists we can distinguish, as do the Hausa, three or four social 'classes'. Sometimes the higher officials and chiefs are regarded as constituting an upper 'class' by themselves, sometimes they are grouped with the mallams and wealthier merchants into a larger upper class. The lowest 'class' generally distinguished includes the musicians, butchers, house-servants and menial clients, porters, and the poorer farmers who mostly live in rural hamlets. The great majority of the farmers, traders, and other craftsmen would, therefore, belong to the Hausa 'middle-class'.

This model is consistent with several important patterns of Hausa society. It embodies the popular distinction between the poor (matsiyaci), the moderately prosperous (madaidaici), and the rich or powerful (attajirai or sarakuna). It probably accords with the distribution of purdah and its two Hausa alternatives. It also provides a framework which fits the complex system of male clientage. By inference or direct classification, we should place the menial clients and house-servants (barori) in the lowest of these social classes, their patrons or masters in the highest. Clients who live in their own home and remain economically independent of their patrons would then belong to the moderately prosperous middle-class. This form of clientage is known as mutumci, which means manhood or self-respect. Of course, it is quite likely that some mutumci clients also have patrons in the middle-class.

The limitations of this three- or four-class model of Hausa society are many and various. It ignores the status placement of women entirely. It ignores the widespread practice of occupational combinations. It ignores the status difference between karda and shigege. It ignores the factors of ethnic difference, descent, seniority, and household headship, and the difference between freeborn and slave. It entirely ignores the way in which these variables are related to one another or to the occupational system which is treated as here dominant. In addition, this model assumes that officials form a homogeneous status group, which is certainly not the case. In treating the members of each occupational group as status peers it ignores those distinctions between old and young, karda and shigege, slave-born and free, rural and urban, rich and poor, which do not escape attention in Hausa society. Moreover, this classification is less precise than appears. Opinions vary about the composition of the middle and lower classes. Some would place blacksmiths, matmakers, woodworkers, and some barber-doctors in this lower class, together with the specialists in non-Islamic forms of magic. Others assign these a middle-class status, separately or together. The basic weakness of this model is the assumption on which it rests, namely, that all other things are equal. Given their number and variety, this can rarely be so.

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CONCLUSION

These data serve to distinguish two Hausa status orders, the male and the female. Despite their differences they have certain common characteristics, though they remain mutually independent. There are several status variables within each order, and neither is dominated by any single factor, nor are the relevant factors within each related to one another consistently. Neither order contains clearly defined social strata, despite their tendency towards hierarchic ranking.

Hausa men would probably agree with these comments on the female status system, but would deny their validity with regard to their own. Omitting the over-simple dichotomies of Fulani and Habe or free and slave-born, there remains the model of Hausa society as a system of three or four occupationally distinguished strata. This model has great practical value for Hausa, despite its many deficiencies. It is at once a description of their society, a guide to behaviour, and a normative frame. It says that society has this form, and therefore this is the proper behaviour. The sheer com- plexity of the status structure demands some simplified guide; the models developed to meet this need are, therefore, ideological rather than analytic, and the criterion by which they should be judged is that of utility rather than accuracy or completeness. The system of occupational classes which Hausa adopt is a good working model of their society because it is a reasonable approximation. Are the most elaborate current analyses of stratification in Western society anything more? Or is the model of a segmentary lineage system an accurate description of that type of status order? I would suggest, on the basis of these Hausa data, that over-simplification is an essen- tial feature of all useful models of status structures. The completely accurate account would be too unwieldy for general use and too analytic to have much normative value. But a status model is not only an approximate description of the social structure. It is value-laden simply because it deals with status values. It is a socially essen- tial framework of ideology. The simpler the society, the greater the general consensus about the appropriate model and the clearer its normative value: the more complex the society, the greater the number of competing models and the weaker their normative values. Members of any complex society must have some reasonable image of their society which can serve as a guide in different situations. This guiding image generally emphasizes status, because relative social positions are usually decisive determinants of interpersonal behaviour. The status model is thus structural in its base and normative in its reference. Since it is difficult to make a single model which gives full expression to both these principles, no status model is ever structurally accurate or a code of all social norms.

The occupational model of Hausa society omits the status placement of women entirely. We have seen that Hausa marriage precludes the status identification of spouses and that Hausa women are legal and political minors. Being sharply differentiated from men, they have a different status order. We cannot, therefore, agree with Talcott Parsons's view that stratification is coextensive with society.' Hausa society contains two independent status orders, neither of which is clearly stratified.

These Hausa data illuminate the structural prerequisites of a comprehensive system I Talcott Parsons, 'A revised analytical approach to the theory of social stratification', in R. Bcndix

and S. M. Lipset (eds.), Class, Status, and Power, Glencoe, Illinois: Free Press, I953, pp. 92-I28.

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of social classes or stratification, such as Lloyd Warner seeks in America and Talcott Parsons claims to be universal.x Such systems assume legal and political equality of the sexes, bilateral kinship, lifelong monogamy, neolocal family organization, high rates of occupational mobility, and the dominance of one or other of the current status variables. Unless these kinship conditions are present and the sexes enjoy legal equality, the exclusive status equality of spouses cannot develop and a single inclusive

system of stratification is thus ruled out. But even in such conditions, stratification

presupposes the hierarchic organization of status variables, together with scope for

positional change. It is perhaps in this respect that the contrast between the Hausa and American status systems is most revealing. The American stress on occupation in status placement makes individual achievement primary and defines social mobility in occupational terms. The Hausa system of occupational status is almost the exact reverse. It is almost wholly ascriptive in its orientation, since its units are closed descent groups between which all movement is disapproved. In short, occupational criteria vary in meaning and status significance according to the structure of the occupational group. In Hausaland the occupational status model owes its currency to the fact that it incorporates such ascriptive factors as descent and ethnicity.

The sharp difference between status and prestige among Hausa is also instructive. The Hausa status model, like segmentary status models, is positional, quite independent of the numerous prestige classifications which Hausa make. As a positional model it is a useful guide to social behaviour. The general tendency to equate status and prestige in complex modern societies, such as Britain or the U.S.A., may perhaps indicate the lack of general consensus for any simple positional model which may serve as a general guide to social behaviour. Our inability to develop or operate such a model for our own society should not blind us to the distinction between prestige and status in others.

Resume

LE SYSTPiME DE STATUT SOCIAL CHEZ LES HAOUSSAS

LES Haoussas fournissent un excellent exemple de l'importance sociologique des distinctions basees sur le statut social, car leur societe est intermediaire entre celle d'une tribu et la societe moderne. Ils consistent en une association de deux groupes ethniques, les Habe et les Fulani. La plupart des etats haoussas de la Nigeria Septentrionale ont des souverains fulani, et partout ou les Fulani gouvernent leur statut est dominant, mais ou les Habe gouvernent, il n'en est pas ainsi, et les designations ethniques sont plus precises. Chez les Fulani, et aussi chez les Habe, un individu tire son statut ethnique de son pere et l'importance poli- tique marche de pair avec la descendance patrilocale. Les esclaves royaux etaient charges autrefois de fonctions importantes dans les royaumes habe et fulani et leur statut etait plus eleve que celui de beaucoup de personnes libres. Actuellement, on ne peut guere distinguer

les esclaves des autres Habe musulmans, sauf qu'ils associent leur parente principalement a celle de la famille de leur maitre.

Les classes sociales des hommes et des femmes ont certaines particularites communes, mais elles sont neanmoins mutuellement independantes. Ni l'une ni l'autre ne comprend de couches sociales bien definies, en depit de leur tendance a se classer hierarchiquement. Les epouses ne sont ni des membres ai part entiere de la famille au sein de laquelle elles

1 L. Warner et al., Social Clasr in America, Chicago, 1949; and Parsons, loc. cit.

2 5 I



252 THE HAUSA SYSTEM OF SOCIAL STATUS

sont nees, ni de celle dans laquelle elles se marient, et elles sont considerees comme des mineures, juridiquement et politiquement. Parmi les femmes, et surtout parmi les enfants, la superiorite de l'age determine, dans une tres grande mesure, le rang social. Les jeunes gens et les jeunes filles, quel que soit leur age, restent des enfants jusqu'a ce qu'ils se marient.

Le statut social de l'homme incorpore deux principes importants qui ne se trouvent pas dans celui des femmes, c'est-a-dire les principes de rang et de categorie professionnelle. Un rang hierarchique, suivant la profession, fournit un bon schema du fonctionnement de la societe haoussa comme systeme de trois ou quatre couches sociales se distinguant d'apres les professions de leurs membres. Ce systeme est d'une grande valeur pratique malgre ses nombreuses insuffisances et sert comme description de la societe haoussa et peut servir de guide a un juste comportement. Une comparaison avec les systemes qui existent en Grande-Bretagne ou aux Itats-Unis, avec leurs tendances a etablir un parallele entre le statut d'une part, et le prestige et le succes personnel individuel d'autre part, montre que le systeme haoussa est presque exactement a l'oppose, car ses unites constituent des groupes de descendance fermes entre lesquels tout deplacement est critique.



international african institutefulani is the dominant ethnic status; where habe rule, this is not...

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