The Marital Project: Beyond the Exchange of Men in Minangkabau Marriage

Author(s): Jennifer Krier

Source: American Ethnologist, Vol. 27, No. 4 (Nov., 2000), pp. 877-897
Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of the American Anthropological Association
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the maritalproject: beyond the exchange of
men in Minangkabaumarriage

JENNIFER KRIER

Previous discussions of Minangkabau marriage focus on how the "exchange

of men" poses an exception to Levi-Strauss'stheory that marriage can be uni-
versally described as the exchange of women, whom he views as the most su-
preme of social and natural valuables in all societies (1969:65). In keeping
with these discussions, I show that in some cases of Minangkabau marriage it
appears that men are exchanged as bearers of social value. I also move be-
yond the focus on marriage as the transaction and subjugation of value. In-
stead, I describe marriage as a process of social production in which hus-
bands and wives engage in strategic projects to secure social value over
time-in the form of claims to rank. Viewing marriageas a project or ongoing
process of production leads to a reappraisal of both Minangkabau gender re-
lations and anthropological notions about the nature and role of exchange.
Minangkabau husbands are not objects of value but empowered agents who,
along with their wives, struggle to create and manage rank differentiation
within their wives lineages. Ratherthan enhancing lineage cohesion, as L6vi-
Strauss's exchange theory would suggest, the exchange of men and the pro-
duction of value in Minangkabau marriage lead to lineage fragmentation.
[marriage,exchange, matriliny,gender, Minangkabau]

On the day of her marriageceremony (kandurikawin), I watched as Yeni stepped

out of her everyday clothing (T-shirtand jeans) and into the adat finery her lineage
elders had rented for this occasion.' Yeni wore an embroidered, red velvet tunic over
a sarong woven from golden and red silk threads (songket); her bobbed hair, pulled
tight and bound up in fragrantleaves, supported a golden headdress (sunteng).2Simu-
lated coral and gold bead necklaces (dukua kaban)were draped around her neck, and
her arms were covered up to the elbows in shining, brass plated bracelets (golang go-
dang). With each element of her dress, Yeni proclaimed her high rank. According to
adat, only brides who can trace their pure blood and high rank back to the village
founders (urang asli) may don this regalia. Such splendor was unimaginable when
Yeni's motherwas married;then, bridescould not rentwedding regaliaand were limited
to wearing ancestral heirlooms.
As Yeni dressed, the wives of Yeni's male lineage members (pasumanden)
helped each other place huge brass platters (talam), elaborately stacked with gifts of
ceremonial foods, upon their heads. One woman picked up an oddly shaped antique
basket (carano)-containing a kris, a man's sarong, and a man's suit-that would later
be offered by the bride's male elders to the male elders of the groom in exchange for
the groom himself. Two musicians, hired especially for the ceremony, began to beat
on small gongs (telempong), and a procession started. Yeni, with certain members of
her lineage and in-marriedfemale relatives leading the way, was followed by a small

American Ethnologist27(4):877-897. Copyright? 2000, American Anthropological Association.

878 american ethnologist

crowd of guests and onlookers. The men from Yeni's lineage followed behind (with
less fanfare but with an air of solemn importance), dressed in dark trousersor sarongs
and caps (pici).
When the procession reached the groom's house, the women brought the plat-
ters and gifts of rice to the kitchen while the men waited outside. The women were in-
vited to enter the groom's house, where they sat on the floor in a side room while the
bride and the men were escorted to the largest room in the house (anjuang). The
groom, Edi,(also decked out in rented finery with which he proclaimed his high rank)
sat, surrounded by his male elders (ninik-mamak)for a huge feast of slow-cooked
water buffalo stew, curried jack fruit, fried potato dumplings, and rice, inside a bril-
liantly colored tent (palaminan). "Welcome, please have a smoke," chanted Edi's
mother's brother (mamak), using memorized poetic phrases. After everyone smoked,
he recited, "Please have a drink."Then, when the women had cleared away the tea,
he added, "Please eat" and finally, "Have a sweet." One of Yeni's elders, chosen for
his skill in ritualspeech-making, uttered refined responses to each invitation, finishing
with, "Thankyou for your gracious hospitality." After the meal had been eaten and
cleared away, the man chosen to give the responses presented the brass platters and
the basket to the groom's male lineage members. Men from the groom's lineage emp-
tied the basket and examined each item closely, only to pack them up again and pass
the basket back to the bride's lineage members. Everyone listened intently as the
groom's mother's brother (mamak) protested, again in memorized ritual phrases, that
the contents were not adequate. The bride's lineage members made a great show of
placing several rupiah notes upon the basket, but the groom's relatives still refused to
accept the gifts. Finally, the bride's lineage members laid more money on the basket
and sent it back with a conventional entreaty:
We arealmostthere,
we havealmostarrivedatthe house,
we arealreadystandingin the yard.
Withthe good etiquetteof the elders,
withthe sweetwordsof the seniorwomen,
we call to the groomto enter...
After this request, the groom's side accepted the basket and the long, three-hour ex-
change of speeches and gifts ended. Women from both lineages tied Yeni's and Edi's
hands together and led them, in grand processional style, to the couple's new home at
Yeni's mother's house. The couple planned to returnto their apartment in the city a
few days later, but during their stay in the village they observed the Minangkabau
practice of matrilocal postmaritalresidence.3
The scene I have described is a spectacular example of the Minangkabau wed-
ding ceremony (barolek kawin) that marksthe climax of the months-long sequence of
exchanges and ceremonies making up the entire marriage ritual in Sidiam, West Su-
matra.4This specific example lays out the general pattern I observed in more than a
dozen differentweddings during my research in Sidiam. In all cases, it was clearly the
husband who was symbolically transferredto the wife's lineage. This theme was re-
peated in the smaller-scale ceremonies occuring before and after the day of barolek
kawin. The pattern is in keeping with discussions of marriage and affinity presented
by other anthropologists (see Blackwood 2000; Errington1984; Ng 1987; Pak 1986;
Tanner and Thomas 1985; Thomas 1977; Umar Junus 1964) some of whom dub Mi-
nangkabau marriage"the exchange of men" (Ng 1987; Pak 1986).5
It is importantto note, however, that in Sidiam not all lineages succeeded in ob-
taining the groomprice or special payment of money and ceremonial objects that
the marital project 879

Edi's lineage did. Villagers refer to this as uang urek selo (literally, "the money given
while sitting cross-legged"). As villagers put it, uang urek selo is offered only to line-
ages handing over grooms who have good seed (bibit baeik) and pure descent (katu-
runan asli) of high rank.While the wedding costume rental business makes it possible
for any lineage with cash to dress and display its brides or grooms in the accouter-
ments of high rank (headdress, kris, wedding tent, and musicians), such displays are
not enough to warrant the exchange of groomprice or guarantee the pure descent of
future children.
Sidiam Minangkabau see marriageas a transferof men and the immaterial sub-
stances of good seed and pure descent that produce rank differentiation in Minang-
kabau society. Yet, while Sidiam Minangkabau conceive ideologically of good seed,
pure descent, and high rank as essential, pre-existing values that are transmittedpas-
sively through men, careful analysis of marriages over time reveals that these imma-
terial values may be produced during or years after the marriage ritual itself. Moving
behind the overt symbolism of marriage as a contractual exchange, I explain how
Sidiam villagers make use of marriageas a type of social production. In the course of
both the Sidiam marriage ritual sequence and marital lives as they unfold over time,
one can see husband and wife strivingto create long-term value (in the form of claims
to high rank)and project it into the future.

beyond the exchange of men

Recent ethnographers (Morrison 1995; Ng 1987; Pak 1986; Peletz 1987, 1996)
have argued that the exchange of men in Minangkabau and other Malay societies is
an important exception to the claim that marriage universally consists of transferring
or exchanging women between groups led by men, creating enduring alliances be-
tween bride givers and bride takers and, in a later formulation, the worldwide subor-
dination of women (de Josselin de Jong 1952; Fox 1967; Goody and Tambiah 1973;
Leach 1961; Levi-Strauss1969; Rubin 1975). Levi-Straussacknowledges that the ma-
trilineal, matrilocal Minangkabau possess a "raresystem" (1969:115) in which the ex-
change of men ratherthan women cements alliances between groups; yet, he argues
that this case is not exceptional because it is not "the women who exchange the men,
but rathermen exchange men by means of women" (1969:115).6 Recent studies from
Indonesia and Malaysia focus on critiquing this assertion. Pak, Ng, Peletz, and Morri-
son present marriageas a transferof rightsover men organized by women who bene-
fit socially, politically, and economically from these rights. Challenging early kinship
theorists' portrayals of women as "pawns in the game of politics" (Leach
1969:284)-as "only one of the objects in the exchange, not as one of the partnersbe-
tween whom the exchange takes place" (Levi-Strauss 1969:115)-these scholars
stress women's active participation in the exchange of men and how the exchange
gives women power, autonomy, and social control (Pak 1986:623; Peletz 1987:463).
This emphasis on the autonomy of Minangkabauwomen complements a problematic
scholarly tradition that depicts Minangkabau men as marginalized, hen-pecked, and
sexually objectified (Kato1982; Loeb 1935).
Nevertheless, Peletz in particular goes to great trouble to illustrate that, while
cases of men exchange correct earlier assumptions about the universality of women
exchange and demonstrate that "in a good many societies women and women's
groups exercise far more autonomy and social control than the earlier literatureon
kinship, marriageand social structurewould have us believe" (Peletz 1987:463), they
do not demonstrate the subordination of men. His point that women, although they
exchanged men, experienced a "secondary status" in 19th-century Negeri Sembilan
880 american ethnologist

corrects "those who follow the general lines of Levi-Strauss's(1969) argument con-
cerning kinship and marriageas the ultimate locus of women's secondary 'status' vis-
a-vis men" (Peletz 1996:98).7 Following the work of Raymond Kelly (1993), Peletz
emphasizes that prestige differentials between men and women are not determined
by marriagealone and can be understood only in relation to an encompassing system
of prestige based on rankand descent (1996:98).
Inthis article, I ask how marriage itself links up with, and is a productive arena in
which to play out, the prestige systems of descent and rankthat encompass gender in
contemporary Minangkabau society. But while Peletz and other analysts of men ex-
change present marriage as a transaction in the form of a transfer of rights (Peletz
1987, 1996) or a reciprocal exchange that institutes alliances between lineages (Ng
1987; Pak 1986), my analysis is inspired by Strathernand other Melanesianists who
stress exchange as the production and transformationof social value (Fajans 1993,
1997; Munn 1986; Strathern 1988; Weiner 1993). In Melanesia, Strathernargues,
women are exchanged not as objects "who make babies," but as producers of chil-
dren-persons with whom the entire group must form new social relationships over
time (1988:315). Even though women are the objects of transactions made by men,
they "act as agents, as the pivot of relationships"(1988:330) in the sense that they, like
men, strategize to take advantage of the relationships produced as a result of having
been exchanged (Strathern1988:337).
Following Strathernand departing from the conventions of analyses of Southeast
Asian men exchange, my analysis of Minangkabau marriage rounds out a subject fo-
cused on by a wider group of anthropologists on the agency of the transactorsof ex-
change-women, in this case-with a close look at husbands as agents who, along
with their wives, struggle to produce and strategically manage rank differentiation
within lineages. Forthe sake of dramatic interest and clarity, I choose to focus on the
ongoing relationships between husband, wife, children, and in-laws within one fam-
ily and how groomprice exchanges, propertytransmissions, inheritance disputes, and
displays of violence are interwoven into the pursuit of rank over the course of three
generations. Honoring Bourdieu's (1977) directive to analyze marriagewithin a tem-
poral frame, I consider moments of exchange to be partof grand and ongoing projects
aiming to secure rank and propertyfor present and future descendants; these projects
are complexly affected by the events and relationships of the past.
Switching attention from men exchange as a transaction between lineages to
men exchange as one partof an ongoing project to produce rankwithin lineages over
time, my analysis highlights the way marriagesimultaneously makes the reproduction
of lineage possible while it introduces the differentiation that threatens lineage soli-
darity. This theme, rather standard in descriptions of African patrilineal systems, is
brought to light here by observing a Southeast Asian matrilinealsociety. Using an eth-
nographic case that is usually termed exceptional, my analysis of the Minangkabau
maritalproject highlights the tendency toward fission and fragmentationthat seems to
beset unilineal societies around the world.

background
I am basing this article on research I conducted during 16 months of field work
between 1990-91 in Sidiam, a village in the central highland region of West Suma-
tra.8 Sidiam is located along the slope of Mt. Sago, just above an extensive valley
where rich volcanic soil and a relatively large river make year round rice production
possible. This ruralvillage, consisting of about two thousand people-most of whom
are rice farmers-has much in common with other villages described in the voluminous
the marital project 881

literature on Minangkabau society. Villagers trace property and lineage identity

through women and form basic sociopolitical units based on matrilineal descent
groups. Minangkabau are devout Muslims; they refer to so-called customary or adat
law to settle most social conflicts, and they spend a great deal of time participating in
life-cycle and lineage rituals.
Scholars typically emphasize the egalitarian, nonhierarchical format of Minang-
kabau adat processes and social relations, a format that is purportedly reflected in
everything from the confederate rather than centralized structure of Minangkabau
polities to the consensus-oriented process of Minangkabau decision-making to the
matrilineal social organization that provides women with material resources, central
decision-making leadership roles (Tanner 1982; Tanner and Thomas 1985:54), and
prominent roles in affinal exchanges (of objects, money, and men) (Ng 1987; Pak
1986). These academic generalizations are usually echoed by local villagers, who
often glorify adat as an indigenous and paradigmaticform of state democracy.
In keeping with recent writings on power and gender in Southeast Asia, in which
scholars point out that practices of gender hierarchy and male prestige often under-
mine ideologies of complementarity and equality (Atkinsonand Errington1990; Ong
and Peletz 1995; Sears 1996), specialists have begun to challenge the emphasis on
Minangkabau egalitarianism, particularly in the area of gender relations (Blackwood
1995; Krier1995). My own work on the Minangkabau draws attention to the system
of hereditary rankingthat undermines the egalitarianismof gender and adat ideology.
While the Minangkabau of Sidiam often deny the importance-or even the exist-
ence-of social rankingwhen asked, I observed that they are attuned to rankdifferen-
tials at the level of the matrilineage, the descent line, and the individual. Many social
conflicts, such as land or inheritance disputes, are in fact competitive struggles over
rank claims. While Minangkabau ideologically conceive rank differences as pre-
social or essential, rank status is in fact highly malleable, and villagers can either lose
or raise their rank in a variety of ways. In this article, I make a central point that mar-
riage is a key arena in which to produce and project rankvalue over time.9
Descent line rank should not be considered an esoteric or anachronistic concern
of aged village traditionalists.Historians and anthropologists have shown that the Mi-
nangkabau rank system dynamically intersects with supralocal political affairs in
ways that give it greater articulation and impact on the negotiation of property and in-
heritance relations. The administrative procedures imposed on the Minangkabau by
Dutch colonial rulers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries emphasized, even
codified, concepts of lineage ranking and pure bloodlines by recognizing only men
who had high rank and ancestral titles as official members of the adat-based village
council (Dobbin 1983:49; Graves 1981:39).10 While the contemporary Indonesian
state has reduced the functions of the titleholders and has shored up the political and
financial power of state-approved elected officers and legislative bodies-such as the
village head (Kepala Desa) and the village council (Lembaga Musuara Desa), it still
recognizes the adat council (KerapatanAdat Nagari) as the appropriate legal forum
for settling property and inheritance disputes (Biro 1986). Under colonial administra-
tion, only titleholders are recognized as official decision-makers on the council. Thus
the Indonesian state also legitimates-and perhaps strengthens-contemporary vil-
lagers' concerns to prove high rank in order to get state-recognized authorityand con-
trol over property relations (see also Krier1995).
882 american ethnologist

lineage and rank in Minangkabau society

In Sidiam today, there are 70 matrilineagesthat are in turn made up of numerous
descent lines. Each matrilineage possesses propertysuch as rice fields, houses, ponds,
portions of forest or uncultivated land, and cash crop fields, in addition to a name or
title that is bestowed on an elected male lineage member. This titled male, or
panghulu, is the formal authority within the lineage, and lineage members as well as
lineage properties are referredto as the nieces or nephews (kemenakan)of, or the rice
fields (sawah) of, the panghulu. According to adat prescriptions, lineage properties
are jointly owned by lineage members, and the panghulu serves only as the symbol of
the lineage and the mediator of lineage disputes, ratherthan as an autocratic authority
figure. As suggested above, however, in practice men may use their panghulu office
to manipulate lineage propertyrelations to their own advantage (Krier1995).
In Sidiam, the 70 matrilineages (kaum)are organized into four clans (suku)within
which lineages are ranked on four levels. The highest ranked lineage groups claim the
most extensive ritual and social privileges and the best village properties within the
clan. The panghulu of these lineages is referredto as "kingof the clan" (panghulu rajo
suku). He sits at the pinnacle of adat mediation processes; disputes that cannot be set-
tled among lower-ranked lineage segments within the clan are brought to him.11In
Sidiam, there are three other lineage ranks that have progressively less extensive
rights, honors, and mediating authoritythan the lineages ranked above them.'2
According to the matrilineal rule, Minangkabau people inherit the lineage iden-
tity of their mother. Lineage descendants within each generation, however, do not
necessarily share the same rank.The creation of rankdifferentialswithin the lineage is
a result of social practices and ideologies specific to Minangkabau society.
First, Sidiam villagers, like other Minangkabau in West Sumatra, historically
practice a form of lineage adoption. According to legend, the Sidiam village was
originally settled by a group of high-ranked,titled men and their sisters who ventured
out from the central kingdom in Minangkabauterritorylocated in Pagaruyung.These
male and female original people (urangasli) founded a community and intermarried,
setting up a council of titled male elders to run the village affairs. Later, settlers or
newcomers (urang datang) to Sidiam were adopted by and became the nephews or
nieces (kemenakan) of the founding lineage groups, but as outsiders they lacked the
clean blood and pure descent of founding village males. The descendants of such
adopted individuals are considered to be of low rankand are referredto as "nephews
or nieces below the knee" (kemenakan di bahwa lutiek).
Second, Minangkabau beliefs about conception dictate that rank is decisively af-
fected by the father's, as well as the mother's, descent line or katurunan.Fatherstrans-
mit not only temperament (sifat), personality (pribadi), and moral (budi) traits, but
rank-impacting biogenetic substances to the children they conceive. Men of high
rank have good seed (bibit baeik) and produce children with white (darah putiah),
clean (darahborosih), or pure (darahmurni)blood. Only lineage members who have
clean blood from their fathers are considered to have clean (katurunanasli) or pure
descent (katurunanmurni) within their own lineage and to possess legitimate claims
to use or inheritance of the properties, privileges, and titles of the matrilineage estate.
Members lacking clean descent are denied the right to inherit titles, land, or houses
from high-rankinglineage members and are classed as kemenakan di bahwa lutiek by
the other villagers.13
The facts of lineage adoption and male transmission of rank lead to an important
feature of Minangkabau society: descent lines of different rank exist within lineages.
Because men of different rankpass these rankdifferences on to their children through
the marital project 883

their sperm or blood, every marriage constitutes the possibility of descent line rank
differentiation in the future. Sisterswho marrymen of different rank produce descen-
dants whose claims to lineage resources are not equally legitimate.

marriage and the transaction of good seed

In Sidiam, parents and lineage members of both sexes play active roles in decid-
ing and securing the marital match, but villagers point out that the impetus to arrange
a marriage lies with the parents of girls.14There are several reasons for this. First,
women are desirable as brides only between the ages of 15 and 25, whereas men may
marryat any age.15Second, while villagers evaluate both a boy and a girl in terms of
the potential economic assets they will bring to a match (a wife should be hard-work-
ing and have many rice fields; a husband should be able to make a living and provide
extra income), most villagers feel that the husband is primarily responsible for the
couple's financial well-being. Because a husband makes significant contributions of
labor power and cash, and because in cases of death or divorce any property a man
accumulates after marriage must be left to his wife and her children, villagers consider
marriagea financial asset to a girl's parents and a loss for a boy's parents.
While prospective bridegrooms are stringentlyevaluated for their economic con-
tribution to marriage, villagers also attempt to gauge their less tangible values. Be-
cause the husband's contribution of bodily substances in conception affects the rank
of future grandchildren, a girl's parents strive to find a prospective bridegroom with
clean blood (darah borosih) and good seed (bibit baiek). But how do they evaluate
these immaterial substances?
I first learned about how to assess a groom's seed through the many discussions I
had with Pak Adam during the wedding of his niece Yeni. "Whenever two kids want
to get married,"he instructed me, "you have to look at their descent (katurunan)first."
That is why, he explained, after his son Gusti proposed to a girl from a different vil-
lage, her parents showed up in Sidiam to investigate Gusti's descent line and individ-
ual rank. The bride's parents encountered many encouraging signs that Gusti's
mother had high rank. Forexample, her house was built in the style of a rumah bagon-
jong-with swooping eaves, elevated floors, and beams made from sacred forest
trees-and the house was located in the original village settlement (nagarinan lamo).
According to adat-prescriptions,only people with clean blood who can trace their de-
scent from the original founders of the village can inhabit such properties. The style
and location of house properties are external manifestations of the high rank of one's
matri-descent line. Ranji (genealogical charts) were also consulted; the ranji por-
trayed Gusti as a direct descendant of his lineage's titleholder-another indication of
the pure origins of his mother's descent line.16
Pak Adam pointed out, however, that matrilinealqualifications were not enough
to qualify Gusti as a groom with good seed and high rank.The father's lineage history
has great impact on the determination of an individual's descent line rank. Thus, a
prospective bridegroom must also be asked, "Where is your father's lineage house?"
(di ma rumah bako ang?). As Pak Adam put it, "When your daughter wants to marry,
you have to check and see who the father of her boyfriend [paca] is. You have to
know the boy's father's house, so that you can make sure that his blood is clean
[borosih]." Gusti's prospective in-laws were escorted to Pak Adam's hamlet where
they saw evidence of Pak Adam's clean blood and good seed in the forms of his matri-
lineal residence and his ranji.
Later,the parents of the girl came to Sidiam a second time-this time bringing
gold rings(maantaome) and a requestthatGustibecome theirson-in-law (urangsumando).
884 american ethnologist

A date was set, and the wedding occurred two months later. "You see," Pak Adam
told me proudly, "Gusti was given gifts [di japuik] because he is urang asli, because
he is a man of rank [urang bapangkat]." When Gusti's wife bore a daughter, his
mother-in-law adorned the child's wrists and ankles with golden bangles, an external
manifestation of the purityand rankof the baby's blood.
Though villagers say that prospective brides and grooms seek to marry mates
who are descendants of high-ranking lineages, this concern is particularlyimportant
for brides, since their male children will be eligible to inherit lineage titles only if the
father has clean blood or good seed. When high-ranking women marry men who
have good seed, they seek to insure that their sons will have legitimate claims to line-
age titles. The most popular bachelors in Sidiam today are bachelors who not only
have pure katurunan,clean blood, and good seed, but who have also achieved high
status (martabattinggi)through education or employment.

marriage payments
In his conjectural history of marriageexchange, Levi-Straussexplains the reasons
why a woman is perceived as "the supreme gift."Why is a woman viewed as "the su-
preme gift," (1969:65) "the most precious possession," (1969:62), or "a commodity
essential to the life of the group" (1969:36)? Levi-Strausssuggests that women are
"naturalstimulants"to men because they have an "essential value," a preculturalca-
pacity, like food, to satisfy the physical needs and desires of men (1969:33). Interest-
ingly, in the Minangkabau case, it appears that men are being exchanged as bearers of
essential value, and the father's contribution of blood and semen is culturally con-
strued as critical to the reproductionof the lineage. In cases where a woman marriesa
man with good seed, the groom's status as gift is clearly delineated with the ceremo-
nial presentation of marriage payments. In such cases, the bride's lineage must make
a payment of uang urek selo to the groom's male lineage elders (ninik-mamak)during
the main wedding ceremony. Parentsof a man of both good seed and extensive edu-
cation may demand an additional payment of fetching money (uang japuik) at the
time of engagement. Yeni's betrothed, Edi,who graduated from the regional state uni-
versity with an advanced degree, was offered five million rupiah (about U.S.$2,500 at
the time) by the parents of one prospective fiancee. Unlike uang urek selo, a sum that
is fixed according to the groom's individual rank,the amount of uang japuik is negoti-
ated by the groom, his parents, and the bride's parents.17
Younger villagers like Yeni disparage the practice of giving either groomprice or
fetching money, labeling it an ancient (kuno) and backward (kabalakang)adat prac-
tice. "Irefused to pay a single cent of uang japuik,"Yeni said of her eventual marriage
to the five million rupiah man. "Love can't be purchased with money!" On the other
hand, older women are proud to reportthat fetching money was offered to their hus-
bands' lineages, since such payments mark the good seed of their husbands and the
clean blood of their children.
Husbands with good seed and high educational status lend prestige to a bride
and her lineage. As one adat specialist put it, "Agroom with clean blood is highly val-
ued (sangat dihargai). He is the purchase (pamolian) of the bride's elders; he is given
fetching money (dijapuik)so that he will become a lineage member (kemenakan). Be-
cause he is a grand and elevated person (uranggodang, urang tinggi), he becomes the
glory of the lineage's elders." As discussed, husbands with good seed have pure de-
scent (katurunan asli) from high-ranked lineage ancestors and thus have legitimate
claims to their matriline's anscestral titles. Husbands with advanced education usu-
ally have good jobs as civil servants (pegawi negeri), and since civil servant husbands
the marital project 885

receive regular salaries, they have extra money to augment farming incomes, buy lux-
ury items, rebuild houses, and startbusinesses.
Previous scholars of Minangkabau marriage have focused on the immediate as-
sets that husbands bring to wives' lineages in their explanations of the meaning of
marriage payments. Ok Kyung Pak argues that the money and prestige objects that
change hands during the wedding ceremony serve as counterprestationsfor the gift of
the groom, who is esteemed as "a valuable or sacred item" (1986:602) by virtue of his
spiritual nature, his clean blood, and his high rank (see also Ng 1987:116-123). In
their respective works, Pak and Ng translate indigenous terms for affinally related
lineages; they translate sumanden as husband receivers and bako as husband givers.
Pak and Ng argue that ritual roles, seating patterns, and modes of dress all support an
interpretationthat sumanden are subordinate and indebted to bako.
Building upon Leach's argument that marriagepayments serve as a kind of "eco-
nomic or political compensation" for the gift of a spouse in stratifiedsocieties such as
the Kachin (1961:60), these interpretationsof Minangkabau marriagestress structural-
ists' insistence that marriageexchange functions to create enduring alliances between
groups by instituting formal and ongoing patterns of reciprocity. Various scholars
have attempted to present evidence of preferential marriages among the Minang-
kabau, but Sidiam villagers do not consistently practice either cross or parallel cousin
marriage. Villagers do distinguish between bako and sumanden groups, but affinal re-
lations do not constitute alliances that endure across generations.18
While it is hard not to see the presentation of uang urek selo as compensation for
the transfer of rights over men, their labor, and their seed, I would like to suggest an
additional function of marriage payments by returningto the marriageof Pak Adam's
son Gusti. The reader may remember that Pak Adam used Gusti's marriageas an ex-
ample of how and why a bride's parents assess the quality of a groom's seed and
blood. Using this example, Pak Adam stressed the fact that high rank is passed on via
a father's essential substances, but he also made it clear that Gusti's prospective in-
laws looked for proof of his high rank in his material possessions and privileges, such
as his ranjiand the style and location of both his mother's and father's houses and rice
fields. I suggest that marriage payments function to compensate and also to external-
ize or publicize the pure descent and high rankof the groom.
The importance of Gusti's receipt of uang urek selo as a staging or public per-
formance displaying his pure descent and high rank became clear to me when his
mother, Mak Tina, became involved in an extensive propertydispute. In this dispute,
Mak Tina claimed to be the legitimate heir to the land and title of her recently de-
ceased neighbor, the elderly and childless Juliana. Another villager protested that it
was his descent line, ratherthan Mak Tina's, that was historically closest to Juliana's
now extinct matriline;therefore, he claimed to be the legitimate heir. The dispute was
brought to the adat council KerapatanAdat Nagari (KAN),and the council decided
not to support Mak Tina's claim. Reviewing Mak Tina's lineage history, the council
discovered that her descent line was of low rankand that, as kemenakandi bahwa lutiek,
neither she nor her lineage mates or children had a legitimate claim to Juliana'sestate.
Mak Tina's dispute uncovered the secret history of her mother, who came from
an adopted, low-ranking descent line and lived "acrossthe river"(disoborangaie) in a
hamlet inhabited primarilyby adopted, newcomer lineages. Yearsago, Mak Tina's fa-
ther-a man of high rank, wealth, and political savvy-successfully negotiated to
lease land and a house in the middle of the village from his wife's high-ranked matri-
lineal relative, Juliana. As the years passed, people began to forget about his chil-
dren's impure descent line origins. By the time Gusti's wedding arrived,Mak Tina was
886 american ethnologist

able to pose effectively as a high-rank individual from a high-rankdescent line mar-

ried to a high-rank man. Many villagers-including Gusti's outsider in-laws-did not
penetrate the ruse. Gusti received uang urek selo and enjoyed all the ceremonial trap-
pings that accompanied its presentation. Later,during the dispute, Mak Tina used the
enactment of her descendant's high rank to contest the council's claim that she
should be classed as kemenakan di bahwa lutiek.
Sidiam villagers describe marriage as a transferof rights over men, their labor,
their property, their children, and their rank-impactingblood or seed. A man's seed is
an essential quality, determined by heredity, traceable on genealogies, and transmit-
ted to children in conception. A complicated unpacking of the connections between
Gusti's wedding and the property dispute reveals that, in some cases, good seed and
pure descent are not simply compensated for but are produced through the transfer
(or absence) of marriage payments. In Gusti's case, his mother used the event of her
son's receipt of a marriage payment to turn her lineage's ephemeral qualities into a
concrete, visible claim of rank at a strategic moment-years after the wedding itself.
In other words, marriage is not just a transferor transaction of present essential value
but also a project that produces value over time.
The transferof marriagepayments is just one of the moments in which Sidiam vil-
lagers produce claims to rank. In the next section of this article, I introduce two post-
nuptial events-the birth of children and the redeeming of pawned lineage prop-
erty-as importantmoments in the production of rankduringthe course of the marital
project.

children and the birth of rank

Defining sumanden and bako groups as husband takers and husband givers ob-
scures other dimensions of the gift (the seed or blood of the groom in addition to the
groom himself) passed from the groom's lineage to the bride's. "As sumanden," one
informanttold me, "you work hard to show respect to the people who gave you their
katurunan(descent), their bibit (seed)." Whereas some scholars argue that affinal rela-
tions are established at the wedding with the exchange of a man, I observed that it
was only with the birthof his first child that a husband's descent line established a re-
lationship of bako to the wife's descent line (Ng 1987; Pak 1986). Until that time, no
relationship was recognized between the two lineages other than a relationship be-
tween the wife and her mother-in-law (mintuo). Sidiam villagers' comments about the
symbols and practices of affinity indicate that villagers view the man's children, rather
than the man himself, as the object of exchange. Bako relatives are venerated not for
their gift of the groom, but ratherfor the gift of future high-rankingdescendants to the
wife's lineage.
Lineages establish their relationship as affines during a ritual known as turun
mandi (coming down to battle)that severs a newborn baby's ties from spirit influences
and celebrates his entrance into the human social world of kin relationships and obli-
gations. Though this ritual is sponsored by the infant's own matrilineage, it is the in-
fant's father's matrilineal relatives-his bako-that play the most importantperforma-
tive roles. The baby's bako relatives have the special privilege of bringingthe child to
its first public bath because, in the words of one informant,"It'stheir child too." Peo-
ple say that, "A bako relative holds the baby because the child gets his blood from his
bako." The turun mandi marksthe initiation of the bako's debt to the child. Fromtu-
run mandi to the child's marriage, bako relatives are responsible for bringing special
gifts to all of the various ritualsstaged on the child's behalf. The bako are not only hus-
band givers but also children givers to the wife's descent line.19
the marital project 887

While the symbolism of the wedding ritual suggests that men are handed over to
the lineage elders and therefore to the entire lineage, the turun mandi ritual clarifies
that only the wife's own children inherit her husband's seed. A man of good seed pro-
duces children of pure descent; these children hold greater legitimate claims to ances-
tral property and lineage titles than low-ranking members of the wife's descent line
do. Members of a titled male's descent line have greater control over their property
since titleholders settle village-wide propertyand inheritance disputes in the capacity
as members of the adat council. In 1990-91, only titled males were qualified to be
members of the adat council.
The birth of children can be productive for the bride's descent line. Birthtrans-
forms a high-ranked groom's good seed into high rank for his bride's child. The ge-
netic transmission of clean blood and good seed is not, however, enough to ensure
that as adults the children will reap the benefits of high rank. Husbands and wives
must work to project their children's rank claims. One of the main ways parents do
this is by redeeming pawned ancestral propertybelonging to the wife's lineage.

redeeming property and projecting high rank

Much of the literatureon Minangkabau marriageemphasizes the symbolic rever-
ence paid to the groom at the wedding ceremony. But villagers stress that the period
during which he receives privileges and treats in his wife's household-is pampered,
"treated like a king," and presented with favorite foods-is short-lived. In fact, the
conventional village view is that a husband is mettlesome and antagonistic toward his
wife's lineage members and thus becomes a potential source of trouble for intra-lineage
relations. "Once he arrives at his wife's kampuang (descent line neighborhood), a
husband's behavior is not reliable," an adat expert told me. "He refuses to be guided
by his wife's elders. He provokes them and stirs up trouble."20Many husbands re-
counted feelings of unease, even paranoia, during their first years of residence with
their wives. One informantsuffered from insomnia and spent nights creeping around
his wife's house searching for sorcerers and other evildoers. He was convinced that
someone was casting spells on him in order to frighten him away. "Ihad to watch out
for myself [jago diri; literally, 'guard one's self']," he told me. "Inthe old days, we hus-
bands were scared when we moved into our wife's house."
Sidiam villagers explained that the main source of tension between a husband
and his in-laws revolves around the expectation that a husband make substantial eco-
nomic contributions to his wife's household. After marriage,a husband is responsible
for plowing his wife's rice fields and for building houses for his married daughters.
Moreover, a husband is obligated to share his income and individually acquired prop-
erty (harto pancarian) with his wife as long as they are married. A wife retains full
rightsto a husband's acquired propertyafter he dies.
On the other hand, when an in-married man is very successful, another kind of
tension arises. A woman's descent line members are easily threatened by the eco-
nomic activities of new couples. Industriousyoung couples have an advantageous
opportunity to gain joint individual ownership of lineage property (harto pusako).
Many Sidiam husbands use their income to redeem (manabusi) previously pawned
plots of land. While in theory harto pusako propertycannot be permanently removed
from matrilineal control, it can be temporarily pawned (digadai) in times of need and
on the basis of mutual consent between all lineage members.21Persons who redeem
pawned lineage propertytransformit into their individual property (hartopusako ren-
dah); it can be reconverted to lineage property only if the lineage as a whole repays
the redeemer. If a lineage breaks apart, redeemed propertybelongs to the redeemer's
888 american ethnologist

descent line and all other claims are voided. Thus, when a woman uses her husband's
resources to redeem harto pusako, her lineage faces the possibility of losing access to
the land if the lineage fissions or fails to pay her back.
To begin with, I did not understand the connection between pawned land and
marriage payments, but this connection became clearer to me after I witnessed two
different disputes over redeeming pawned lineage land. These disputes illustratethat
holdings in land, like payments of uang urek selo and the birth of children, external-
ize, or make concrete, claims to rank. I learned that one of the main reasons husbands
help wives redeem land is to protect their children's future claims to high rank. The
following two cases illustratethis point.
Tek Lisa's dispute
Tek Lisa's husband Pak Nasri was a productive man; he received a salary as a
school teacher, and both he and Tek Lisawere good farmers. Having discovered they
could not have children, the couple poured their energy into making a living (mancari
nafkah). Pak Nasri's and Tek Lisa's financial success, however, made their relations
with Tek Lisa's lineage members tense. This tension came to a head one day when
Tek Lisa'smamak (mother's brotheror actually, in this case, her MMZDS),Mak Udin,
accused the couple of seizing his rice land (marampeh sawah). Having learned that
five years earlier Tek Lisa had used capital acquired with her husband to redeem land
pawned by his mother, Mak Udin accused Tek Lisa of willfully wresting away his
rightfulinheritance to a portion of the lineage estate (hartopusako) with the intention
of converting it into individually owned land (hartopusako rendah).
Tek Lisawas taken aback by Mak Udin's accusations and demands, particularly
since he served as the official lineage elder (mamak kapalo warih) of Tek Lisa's line-
age branch. A couple of months earlier, Mak Udin had played a crucial role in sup-
porting Tek Lisa's brother's claim to the lineage title (gala soko) vis-a-vis competing
claims by a related lineage branch informally headed by Mak Rizal. After weeks of
negotiation, Mak Udin persuaded the two branches to compromise, and both Tek
Lisa's brother and Mak Rizal's nephew (sister's son) were granted the title. The land
holdings and houses that comprised the lineage estate were split between the two
branches in accordance with current use rights.
Tek Lisa refused to compensate Mak Udin, saying she had rightfully redeemed
the land. Mak Udin expressed his distrust of Tek Lisa by refusing to accept food or
drinkfrom her. In Sidiam, refusing food constitutes a severe breach of etiquette and is
interpreted as a fear of being poisoned or bewitched. As hostilities brewed between
Tek Lisaand Mak Udin, a new scandal came to light. Tek Lisa learned from other vil-
lagers that the title that had been bestowed upon her brotherwas a subsidiary title to
that of Mak Rizal's nephew. Mak Rizal's nephew was the real panghulu, and he
would be the lineage's only voting representativeon the Sidiam adat council.
What is importantto note here is that claims to rankare often made via claims to
lineage land. Both panghulu titles and land externalize or make concrete claims to
rank. By maintaining her claims to redeemed land, Tek Lisa and her descendants
could continue to identify themselves as high-ranking descendants, although they
had no access to the real lineage title. Once Tek Lisa relinquished her claim to the
land, it could be redeemed by anyone in the major lineage, including Mak Rizal's
branch. Because Tek Lisa's lineage had split off from Mak Rizal's, neither she nor her
direct lineage could claim use rightsto that land from then on. This land was the only
piece of ancestral lineage land that Tek Lisahad access to; losing it could mean losing
the marital project 889

the only method Tek Lisa had for identifying herself and her descendants (her sister's
children) as high-ranking people.
Despite warnings that she might jeopardize her descendants' future claims to the
lineage estate, Tek Lisaopted to settle the dispute at the lineage level ratherthan bring
it before the adat council or raise the matterwith the police. She agreed to transferthe
land to Mak Udin provided that he pay her what she had spent redeeming the land.
Although she was advised not to relinquish access to this plot of lineage land in case
Mak Rizal's nephew claimed it as his residual property after Mak Udin died, Tek Lisa
was not afraidof the long-term outcome of her decision. Denying the likely possibility
that Mak Rizal's lineage branch would try to claim exclusive control of this property,
Tek Lisa confidently declared, "AfterMak Udin dies, the land will come back to me
and my siblings."

Mak Tina's dispute

Mak Tina, as I have already noted, also became involved in a land dispute and
pursued quite a different path to settle it. Like Pak Nasri and Tek Lisa, Mak Tina and
Pak Adam had entrepreneurial natures; they worked together at rice-farming when
they were first married and later augmented their income with Pak Adam's salary and
benefits during his stint as Wali Nagari (village head). They also invested their capital
in leasing rice fields from other villagers. By 1990-91, Mak Tina and Pak Adam were
two of the biggest landowners in Sidiam.
One of the people they leased land from was Mak Tina's elderly neighbor,
Juliana. This, Mak Tina told me, was part of their attempt to "help the destitute and
childless old woman." Mak Tina later re-leased the land to someone else and used the
income to build Juliana a new house. Mak Tina also gave Juliana shopping money,
fed her and bathed her when she was sick, and paid for her burial.
About six months after Juliana's death, Mak Tina, posing as Juliana's heir, at-
tempted to redeem the land she had leased from Juliana. The current holders had al-
ready agreed to release the land to Pak Wan, who also claimed to be Juliana's heir.
According to Pak Wan, Mak Tina was posing as an heir to Juliana's estate when she
was merely a holder of Juliana's pawned land. The dispute was eventually brought to
the Sidiam adat council.
Tek Lisaopted to settle her dispute within the lineage and Pak Nasri kept a reso-
lute distance from these affairs, but Mak Tina and Pak Adam joined forces to fight for
their claim. When Pak Wan and his family attempted to move into Juliana's empty
house, Mak Tina and her daughters rushed out of their own house and tore down
Juliana'scottage. Two months later, a relative of Pak Wan's arrivedto trim the hedge
and banana trees, again trying to claim the property. This time Mak Tina's daughter
ran outside, lunging for the boy's knife and threatening him with physical harm. The
police were summoned and villagers condemned the violent extremes Mak Tina and
her daughters went to in asserting their claims to Juliana's property. But no one was
willing to prosecute the wife of the former village head. Indeed, Mak Tina eventually
sought to bringthe law on her side. Blatantlyignoring the adat council's identification
of Pak Wan as the legitimate heir, Mak Tina chose to go to the considerable expense
of bringingthe case to state-governed regional court.
Pak Adam was involved throughout the dispute, discretely counseling Mak Tina
on how to proceed in her strategy of combating the council's decision or clarifying
adat prescriptions. Like Pak Nasri, PakAdam admitted that a husband is forbidden (di-
larang)from mixing in business related to his wife's lineage land claims; nevertheless,
during my frequentvisits to the family's house, I observed Pak Adam participatebehind
890 american ethnologist

closed doors. Most villagers, including Tek Lisaand Pak Nasri, were highly critical of
Mak Tina and Pak Adam's refusal to abide by the decision of the adat council. But
they understood the couple's motives: the couple was fighting for the sake of their
children. Mak Tina compared herself to Tek Lisa:"She is afraidto fight the adat coun-
cil, but I am brave because I have three children. " It seemed clear to all concerned
that Mak Tina's primary motivation in insisting on her right to redeem Juliana's
land-which would legitimize her claim to be Juliana's high-ranked heir-stemmed
not from an individual interestin economic gain or prestige but from a forward-looking
interest in improving the rank of her children and their descendants. Pak Adam par-
ticipated in the struggle to the extent he could because he shared his wife's concern
for their children's rank.

objects as agents

In contrastto Levi-Strauss,who denies that the exchange of men in Minangkabau

society has the potential to upset the rule of universal sexual asymmetry, some eth-
nographers stress the disempowering effects of marriage exchange and matrilocal
residence for men in Minangkabau society. For example, Katowrites, "All in all, the
position of a male in traditional Minangkabau society is a strange one in our eyes. He
does not have any property, although he may manage and expand it for his sisters and
his children. He does not really have a house or a place he can call his own"
(1982:60). Some of my male informantsexpressed similar sentiments. "The problem
with being an in-married male (urang sumando)," Pak Nasri told me, "is that you al-
ways face financial loss. You invest in your wife's ancestral property (harto pusako),
but then if she dies, it goes back to her lineage."
Yet in the case of Pak Adam, I also observed that a husband's investment in his
wife's property is an important way for him to exert agency over her and her chil-
dren's lineage affairs. Pak Adam figures as an importantagent ratherthan a passive or
alienated subordinate in his wife's matrilineage goings-on. By helping his wife re-
deem land of rank, he ensures that his children will be able to back up their claims to
high rankregardless of the cleanliness of their mother's and their own descent line.
In some ways, my analysis follows Peletz in pointing out the fact that wives
strategize to make use of a husband's labor power and productivity, his access to line-
age property, and his political position. Peletz describes marriage exchange among
19th-century Malays of Negeri Sembilan as "a mother's transferof claims and respon-
sibilities over her son to the son's wife and the latter's immediate [female] kin"
(1987:455). Yet my analysis stresses that marriage is also a project to create new so-
cial relations and that both husband and wife struggleto lay claim to the relationsthey
create.
Focusing on marriageexchange as the creation of relations ratherthan a transfer
of rights points to another kind of agency attributedby Sidiam villagers to the objects
of exchange. While a husband provides his wife with strategic means to attain and
project concrete claims to rank within her own descent line, he also introduces ten-
sion between his wife and other members of her descent line. These tensions can end
in lineage fission. Minangkabau marriage constitutes an exchange of future claims
traceable through and activated by men, ratherthan an exchange of men per say. Suc-
cessful, high-ranking husbands provide wives with crucial economic and symbolic
capital and play a major role in securing rank and property for future generations. In
this sense, Minangkabau husbands act as agents of internal differentiation who can
fundamentally transformpolitical relations within the lineages into which they marry.
the marital project 891

conclusion
Alliance theorists argue that marriageor the sexual pairing of men and women is
socially regulated for the purpose of establishing relations between groups. Marriage,
then, "provides the means of binding men together, and of superimposing upon the
natural links of kinship the henceforth artificial links of alliance governed by rule"
(Levi-Strauss1969:480). Exogamy and the prohibition of incest are the most basic
means-prescriptions such as cross-cousin marriage are more elaborate ones-to fa-
cilitate alliances between groups but also to "maintain the group as a group" (Levi-
Strauss 1969:479) or "to consolidate the internal bonds, the collective identity" of
each group participating in the marriageexchange (Butler1990:38).22
While providing a critique of Levi-Strauss'scharacterization of gender roles in
exchange, anthropologists' characterization of Minangkabau marriage as "the ex-
change of men" or a "transferof rights in men" (Ng 1987; Pak 1986; Peletz 1987), in
which groomprice serves primarily as compensation for gifts the grooms give, does
not lead to a deeper rethinking of marriage exchange theory. On the other hand,
viewing Minangkabau marriage as an ongoing project to transformintangible claims
of good seed into concrete statements of high rank adds a new element to the structu-
ralists' emphasis on marriageas a group-stabilizing alliance. Men exchanged in mar-
riage make possible the reproduction of the lineage, but they also introduce the inter-
nal differentiation of lineage identity. A high-ranked man produces clean-blooded
descendants whose claims to the lineage title and other lineage assets are more legiti-
mate than those of low-ranking descendants. If he is entrepreneurial, he also brings
his wife the opportunity to alienate ancestral property from matrilineal control. Be-
cause the signs and properties of rankwithin each lineage are limited, every marriage
becomes a potential threatto the rank claims of other descent lines in the village. As I
saw in the case of Gusti's family, marriage can be the precipitating event for lineage
segmentation. Mak Tina used Gusti's marriageto create a new identity for her lineage
and, in doing so, prevented other distant, low-ranked lineages from claiming the land
and title of the matrilineal estate. Attention to the productive efforts of husbands and
wives engaged in marital projects points to the fact that one of the primaryeffects of
Minangkabau marriage is the fragmentation ratherthan the concentration of lineage
identity and power.
My emphasis on the destabilizing effects of Minangkabau marriage resonates
with anthropological representations of matrilineal groups as unstable societies rid-
dled with, as Levi-Strauss would put it, "social and psychological conflicts"
(1969:118) or, in Schneider's words, "special problems in organization" (1961:20).
Levi-Straussand Schneider characterize these problems as those of male authority;
because of the universal "masculinity of political authority"(Levi-Strauss1969:11 7),
"a man cannot be alienated from his matrilineal descent group" (Schneider 1961:20).
I suggest that it is the husband's ability to make claims to matrilineal rank and to pass
on these claims to his children that explains why Minangkabau men cannot be (or
strategically are not) alienated from their matrilineal descent group. This analysis re-
veals that several social features that Schneider regardsas uncharacteristicof matrilin-
eal societies (such as sisters as foci of processes of segmentation, lineage fission
within two or three generations of matrilineal kinsmen, and ranked lineage segments)
figure prominently in Minangkabaueveryday life.
Ratherthan situating Minangkabau society in the literatureon matrilineal socie-
ties, as published ethnography tends to do, my discussion highlights several
themes-the lack of long-term alliances, the tendency to see affines as potential sor-
cerers, and the dynamic linkages between houses, blood, and rank-that are familiar
892 american ethnologist

to anthropologists from other (nonmatrilineal) contexts of study within Southeast Asia.

Far from being an exceptional case, Minangkabau marriage has much to reveal about
Malay and wider Southeast Asian kinship.

notes

Acknowledgments. Thanks are due to Rosemarie Bernard,John Borneman, Jane Fajans,

Lindsay French, Imran Manan, Michelle McKinley, Viranjini Munasinghe, Michael Peletz,
Steve Rubenstein, Mary Steedly, Stanley Tambiah, Amrih Widodo, and Nur Yalman for the in-
spiration and aid they gave me in thinking through this argument. Rob Cosinuke provided sup-
port and encouragement throughout.
1. Adat is a pan-lndonesian term usually translated as traditional custom or customary
law. Among the Minangkabau, adat comprises those practices and systems of knowledge that
are viewed as distinct from, though not contraryto, Islam.
2. Most Minangkabau reportthat people in different regions in West Sumatrahistorically
practiced different styles of wedding dress; for example, people told me that brides in Tanah
Datar wore a songket cloth headdress ratherthan the sunteng, and that the sunteng style was
originally practiced in coastal villages near Pariaman.Today, most brides rent finery ratherthan
wear heirlooms, and the sunteng is preferredfor its truly stunning visual effect. For more on the
history and practice of Minangkabauwedding dress, see Sjafnir1973.
3. Ethnographic studies of Minangkabau matrilineal organization, marriage, and resi-
dence are too numerous to cite in full, but for specific discussions on the implications of matril-
iny and matrilocality for gender, economic, and social relations, see Blackwood 1995; Kahn
1980; Kato 1982, Maretin 1961; Prindiville 1985; and Tanner 1974. Minangkabau matrilocality
and its implications for the general understanding of kinship systems are discussed in Gough
1961:564-566 and L6vi-Strauss1969:11 6-11 7.
4. For descriptions of the sequence of Minangkabau marital ritual exchanges see Krier
1994; Ng 1987; and Pak 1986. It is importantto note that included in this sequence of marital
ritual exchanges is the Islamic rite of marriage (manikah), usually performed at a mosque, in
which bride and groom are pronounced married by a religious official (see Krier1994:347).
While the manikah ceremony is considered the central wedding ceremony according to Mus-
lim law, it is the barolek kawin that is regarded as the central wedding ceremony according to
adat (local customary law). During the time of my fieldwork, divorce was officially obtained via
the state legal system. For a discussion of marriage and divorce in Islamic Southeast Asia, see
Jones 1994.
5. Fora problematic and unconventional account of Minangkabaumarriageas a "circular
connubium" of women, see de Josselin de Jong 1952.
6. Levi-Strauss bases his assertions about the Minangkabau on scanty ethnographic
sources, namely, upon one 1936 article written by F. C. Cole entitled "Family,Clan and Phratry
in CentralSumatra"(see Levi-Strauss1969:11 6).
7. The tendency to equate transacting or exchanging with an assertion of social domi-
nance is one of the most widely critiqued tenets of structuralistmarriageexchange theory. Crit-
ics from several disciplines agree that the premise that women participate in exchange
relationships only as objects and never as subjects of exchange is theoretically problematic as
well as ethnographically suspect (de Lauretis1984; Elshtain1981; Irigaray1985). Anthropolo-
gists have presented evidence from diverse ethnographic regions attesting to the fact that, de-
spite being exchanged, women use maritalroles to political and economic advantage in sibling
relationships or natal groups (Leacock 1981; Munn 1986; Strathern1984, 1988; van Baal 1975;
Weiner 1993).
8. Sidiam is a pseudonym.
9. Evelyn Blackwood (1995) also discusses rank differences within lineages in "Women,
Land and Labor:Negotiating Clientage and Kinship in a Minangkabau Peasant Community."
While her focus is on the implications of wage labor and other economic issues, her work also
substantiates my view of the importance of rank in Minangkabau society and of marriage as a
the marital project 893

long-term negotiation, by discussing a similar process of negotiation in making and keeping kin
in patron and client relationships.
10. While Abdullah describes the impact of colonial administration as an "erosion of the
balai [adat-based village council]" and a "decline of the panghulu's prestige" (1972:204),
Graves emphasizes the rigidification ratherthan the decay of local systems of rankand prestige
during Dutch colonial rule. She notes that "Dutch imposition of a rigid government hierarchy
on top of local society and their interference in local affairs in an effort to smother conflict
tended to prevent the free working of politics and to stifle social change" (1981:39). Forother
discussions on the interplay between colonial administration and Minangkabau adat-based
governance, see Kahn 1993 and Oki 1977.
11. In Sidiam there was, historically, another lineage level headed by the panghulu pu-
cuak (pinnacle panghula), who was regarded as the leader of all four clans. This lineage level
had the highest rankof all; it is now extinct.
12. Currently,the lineages with the highest rankare headed by a panghulu known as rajo
suku (king of the clans). The three successive lineage ranks are those of the panghulu k'ampek
suku (panghulu of the four clans), the panghulu kapalo kampuang (head panghulu of the neigh-
borhood), and the panghulu andiko. See Benda-Beckmann 1979; Blackwood 1997; de Josselin
de Jong 1952; Graves 1981; Ng 1987; and Pak 1986 for discussions of rankingsystems and their
appellations in different Minangkabau villages of West Sumatra.
13. Children of uncertain paternity are considered illegitimate and are stigmatized. One
barren informantwho longed for a child of her own refused to go to an adoption agency be-
cause, in her words, "people will ask, 'Where's your father's house?' and the child would have
nothing to say." As a consequence of the Minangkabau custom of lineage adoption, the adop-
tion of abandoned children is quite problematic.
14. Mothers are the matchmakers who identify good candidates and initiate discus-
sions-usually behind the backs of their children. The tricky task of persuasion is allocated to
the lineage members or friends with whom the child has close relationships. Writingabout simi-
lar patterns among the Kabyles, Bourdieu (1977:34-35) suggests that fathers and male lineage
members "officialize"the informal arrangements made by the women, either by authoritatively
persuading an uncertain youth to agree to a particularmatch or by serving as formal figureheads
in the negotiations that occur during a prenuptialceremony.
15. Villagers stated that youths who continuously postpone or avoid marriage lose their
desire for union altogether when they reach the age of 30. Moreover, older, unmarriedvillagers
reveal abnormally gendered behavior; for example, unmarriedwomen are prone to violent and
aggressive action and unmarriedmen are beleaguered by love magic. Another productive effect
of marriage is its inscription of appropriategender-differentiatedsexual and behavioral disposi-
tions.
16. Laterin this article, it becomes clear that the renderingof the genealogical connection
between Gusti and the titleholder represented on the ranji was a strategic presentation of the
facts.
1 7. Fetching money can be distinguished from dowry. Fetching money is meant for the
groom and his parents, while a dowry is usually handed over to the groom to enable him to es-
tablish a conjugal fund with which to support his family (see Goody and Tambiah 1973).
18. My understandingof Minangkabauaffinalrelationsis similarto thatof Benda-Beckmann,
who argues that marriage"does not establish socially defined relationships between constituent
social groups, but only temporary inter-household relationships and relationships between the
individual spouse and his or her spouse's political unit"(1979:106). In addition, Thomas argues
that "informantsdescribed marriage ties as devices for producing connection between house-
holds. Households and not largerunits are involved" (1977:92).
19. Similar points are made from different ethnographic contexts by Steedly (1993) and
van Baal (1975). The former, writing about the Karo Batak of North Sumatra, challenges pre-
vious conceptions of Karomarriage as "women exchange." Steedly says, "The transaction fre-
quently glossed as 'wife-giving' and 'wife-receiving' should be approached with some care . . .
what is given in maritalexchange is not the bride herself but the patronymic identification of her
children. The bride is not what is being transacted by these groups of men" (1993:183).
894 american ethnologist

20. See Korn 1941:310 for a discussion of Minangkabau expressions for good and bad
sons-in-law.
21. Both men and women can obtain use rightsto lineage land, but land allocated to men
always reverts back to being joint lineage property upon death. Women's use rights may be
passed from mother to daughter, but they are always subject to the possibility of reallocation by
the group-a decision made by the titled lineage head (panghulu).
22. "Exogamy,"says Levi-Strauss,"providesthe only means of maintaining the group as a
group, of avoiding the indefinite fission and segmentation which the practice of consanguine-
ous marriageswould bring about" (1969:493).

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acceptedJuly 26, 1999

final version submitted April 9, 2000

Jennifer Krier
Watertown, MA
Jenkrier@yahoo.com