Gender Roles

Gender roles in the !Kung society are not defined with any sense of rigidity; women can be hunters while men can be gatherers and the exact opposite can be true as well. Children generally have the choice to choose whichever way they want to provide sustenance to the community. In politics, both men and women discuss the ways the tribe is to be governed, as there is no central political group. Marriage tends to exist between men in their twenties and women in their teens. Women are traditionally the caregivers of the children, functioning in collective mothering much of the time, spending much of the day sitting around talking while they watch their children play. Women, in fact, do actually provide the majority of sustenance to the community, by either hunting or gathering as they choose. Women even tend to bring children with them while they go on their foraging expeditions, adding to their heavy load. Men have learned to domesticate animals, keeping livestock such as cattle.

Above: Communal care-giving typical of the !Kung women

Source:
Draper, Patricia, "Institutional, Evolutionary, and Demographic Contexts of Gender Roles: A Case Study of !Kung Bushmen" (1997). Anthropology Faculty Publications. Paper 4. http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/anthropologyfacpub/4