Nw. Townsend, MEN, MIGRATION, AND HOUSEHOLDS IN BOTSWANA - AN EXPLORATION OF CONNECTIONS OVER TIME AND SPACE, Journal of southern african studies, 23(3), 1997, pp. 405-420
Survey results indicate a very high proportion of female-headed househ
olds' in Botswana. Field research in a village in Botswana, however, r
eveals that the residential household is an inadequate, and misleading
, unit of analysis. Domestic groups are not necessarily co-resident, a
nd domestic arrangements are characterised by fluidity and adaptabilit
y. In particular, limiting investigation to the residential household
conceals a great deal of men's connections with and contributions to c
hildren. Extending investigation beyond the residential household reve
als links between men and children to whom they are related in a varie
ty of ways. Men may be related to household heads, and to children in
households, as sons, brothers, sons-in-law, maternal uncles, biologica
l and social fathers, cousins, and grandfathers. The patterns of men's
connections to children and households change systematically over the
course of their lives as they negotiate competing, overlapping, and s
ucceeding claims on their resources and labour These patterns are desc
ribed in tables showing men's connections to households, their marital
status, and their place of residence by age in 1973 and in 1993. Indi
vidual case studies illustrate the complexity of the lived experience
underlying these patterns. The costs and benefits of high fertility ar
e distributed more broadly than an image of the isolated female headed
household would suggest. Changing economic contexts, particularly the
decline in migrant labour to the mines in South Africa, relative decl
ine in the economic importance of small-scale cattle herding, and the
demand for wage labour within Botswana, are altering the structures of
opportunity for men, and are being reflected in changing patterns of
household formation and connection to children.