Anthropologist M. Priscilla Stone typing field notes in Plateau State, Nigeria, carefully watched by two Kofyar children and one monkey. Stone and her collaborators collected records of agricultural work by Kofyar farmers, providing a detailed picture of how a successful indigenous African farming system operates. Her recent work shows that, rather than the sharp differences expected between the agricultural work of men and women, there is a significant sexual division of labor only during key points in the agricultural cycle. This unusual database also showed women to have much greater access to communal labor for their private plots than was expected. Some of her research into agriculture and the sexual division of labor appeared in: M.P.Stone, G.D.Stone, and R.M.Netting (1995) The Sexual Division of Labor in Kofyar Agriculture. American Ethnologist 22:165-186.

HOME PAGE