Inheriting Community: Social Identity Common Property among Digo of Kenya

Abstract

"This paper will focus on the expression of identity and social continuity through the inheritance of land among the Digo who live on the coastal hinterland of Kenya. The Muslim Digo, one of nine peoples who make up the Mijikenda, express social continuity through concepts of matrilineal kinship and the continuation over time of matri-clans. Digo beliefs and practices concerning land emphasize clan identity and membership more than individual ownership. In their endeavor to control access to land, colonial and independent government policies have had contradictory and unacknowledged consequences among the Digo. At the same time, conversion to Islan has changed the way property is inherited. These changes in control of access to land, as well as power and authority in other aspects of Digo society, disrupted notions of kinship, law and identity with gendered implications. Through the process of negotiations and settlements of inheritance the Digo set out to challenge not only the authority of government land policy, but what it means, within Digo society, to be Digo AND Muslim. As such, conflicts in inheritance can be read as attempts to coopt legal structures in fights within and with out a community over defining community and belonging, with common property lying at the heart of the argument. This paper will explore the role of common property in social identity and how common property is perceived as identities change, with a special focus on the effects on women's ownership and access to land."