Textbook A Life Cycle Approach To Treating Couples From Dating To Death 1St Edition Anne K Fishel Ebook All Chapter PDF

A Life Cycle Approach to Treating
Couples From Dating to Death 1st

Edition Anne K Fishel
Visit to download the full and correct content document:
https://textbookfull.com/product/a-life-cycle-approach-to-treating-couples-from-dating-
to-death-1st-edition-anne-k-fishel/
More products digital (pdf, epub, mobi) instant
download maybe you interests ...
Ageing of Infrastructure: A Life-Cycle Approach 1st

Edition Frank Collins
https://textbookfull.com/product/ageing-of-infrastructure-a-life-
cycle-approach-1st-edition-frank-collins/
An Innovative Approach to Understanding and Treating

Cancer Targeting Ph from Etiopathogenesis to New
Therapeutic Avenues 1st Edition Tomas Koltai
https://textbookfull.com/product/an-innovative-approach-to-
understanding-and-treating-cancer-targeting-ph-from-
etiopathogenesis-to-new-therapeutic-avenues-1st-edition-tomas-
koltai/
Carbon Footprint and the Industrial Life Cycle From

Urban Planning to Recycling 1st Edition Roberto Álvarez
Fernández
https://textbookfull.com/product/carbon-footprint-and-the-
industrial-life-cycle-from-urban-planning-to-recycling-1st-
edition-roberto-alvarez-fernandez/
Guidelines for Inherently Safer Chemical Processes A

Life Cycle Approach 3rd Edition Ccps
https://textbookfull.com/product/guidelines-for-inherently-safer-
chemical-processes-a-life-cycle-approach-3rd-edition-ccps/
Dating Advice For Men A Dating Guide On How To Be A
Better Man Attract The Women You Want Have A
Spectacular Relationship And Get More From Life dating
playbook confidence self confidence Levi King
https://textbookfull.com/product/dating-advice-for-men-a-dating-
guide-on-how-to-be-a-better-man-attract-the-women-you-want-have-
a-spectacular-relationship-and-get-more-from-life-dating-
playbook-confidence-self-confidence-levi-king/
Denying Death An Interdisciplinary Approach to Terror

Management Theory Lindsey A. Harvell
https://textbookfull.com/product/denying-death-an-
interdisciplinary-approach-to-terror-management-theory-lindsey-a-
harvell/
Guide to Software Development Designing and Managing

the Life Cycle Langer
https://textbookfull.com/product/guide-to-software-development-
designing-and-managing-the-life-cycle-langer/
Building Green Software: A Sustainable Approach to

Software Development and Operations 1st Edition Anne
Currie
https://textbookfull.com/product/building-green-software-a-
sustainable-approach-to-software-development-and-operations-1st-
edition-anne-currie/
INDIAN FORESTRY A Breakthrough Approach to Forest

Service K. Manikandan
https://textbookfull.com/product/indian-forestry-a-breakthrough-
approach-to-forest-service-k-manikandan/
EBOOKS A Life-Cycle Approach to
FISHEL
FOR THE PSYCHOLOGY COLLECTION
HEALTH
Treating Couples
Anthony Chambers and Corinne Datchi, Editors
LIBRARY From Dating to Death
Anne K. Fishel
Create your own
Many therapists believe couple therapy is the most difficult—more
Customized Content
than individual or family therapy. Dr Fishel will change your mind about
Bundle—the more
this! In clear language, she makes simple the complex relationships of
books you buy,
couples without robbing them of their texture or quality. This book is for
A Life-Cycle
the greater your all professionals who want to understand how to strengthen the bond
discount! between intimate partners.
—Susan McDaniel, PhD. 2016 President of the American
THE CONTENT
• Nutrition and
Dietetics Practice
Psychological Association
In this exceptional book, Fishel draws on her years of experience and

Approach to
Treating Couples
accumulated wisdom to produce an informative, reassuring, and practical
• Psychology
A Life-Cycle Approach to Treating Couples

reference that should be on the desk of every couple’s therapist.
• Health, Wellness,
—Martha B. Straus, PhD, author, Treating Trauma in Adolescents:
and Exercise
Development, Attachment, and the Therapeutic Relationship
Science
• Health Education A Life-cycle Approach to Treating Couples draws on 30 years of clinical
work and a rich body of research about life-cycle theory to offer couple
From Dating to Death
THE TERMS therapists a guide to helping couples traverse six developmental
• Perpetual access for stages—dating and commitment; transition to parenthood; midlife

a one time fee couples; launching and retiring couples; late-life couples; and relation-
• No subscriptions or ship endings. For each stage, the author offers clinical vignettes as well
access fees as questions and strategies for the clinician to pursue. In this clear and
• Unlimited authoritative book, Fishel provides examples and research about clients
concurrent usage who are diverse in their marital status, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity,
• Downloadable PDFs SES, and health.
• Free MARC records
Anne K. Fishel, PhD is an associate clinical professor of psychology at
For further information, the Harvard Medical School and the director of the family and couple
a free trial, or to order, therapy program at Massachusetts General Hospital, where she trains
contact: child and adult psychiatry residents and psychology interns in family
sales@momentumpress.net and couple therapy. She is the author of two previous books: Home for
Dinner: Mixing Food, Fun, and Conversation for a Happier Family and
Healthier Kids (2015) and Treating the Adolescent in Family Therapy:
A Developmental and Narrative Approach (1999).
Anne K. Fishel
ISBN: 978-1-94664-614-9
A Life-Cycle Approach to
Treating Couples
A Life-Cycle Approach to
Treating Couples
From Dating to Death

Anne K. Fishel
MOMENTUM PRESS, LLC, NEW YORK

A Life-Cycle Approach to Treating Couples: From Dating to Death
Copyright © Momentum Press, LLC, 2018.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any
means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other
except for brief quotations, not to exceed 400 words, without the prior
permission of the publisher.
First published in 2018 by

Momentum Press, LLC
222 East 46th Street, New York, NY 10017
www.momentumpress.net
ISBN-13: 978-1-94664-614-9 (paperback)

ISBN-13: 978-1-94664-615-6 (e-book)
Momentum Press Psychology C

ollection
Cover and interior design by Exeter Premedia Services Private Ltd.,

Chennai, India
First edition: 2018
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America.

Abstract
Every couple can be located on a developmental time line, from first dates
to final good-byes, and compared to the millions of other couples who
have faced similar developmental challenges. Clinical knowledge about
life-cycle stages serves as a reference point for the couple therapist, much
as diagnoses do for the individual therapist.
Based on 30 years of couple therapy experience, Dr. Fishel, a Harvard
Medical School professor, offers a practical guide for therapists at any
stage of their own professional development. The author includes case
examples and research findings about clients diverse not only in sexual
orientation, but also age, race, ethnicity, class, and health.
The book focuses on the six major life-cycle changes that couples
typically traverse, from dating to death.
• Stage one is about dating, partner selection, and the decision

to make a long-term commitment.
• Stage two focuses on the couple’s transformation during the
transition to parenthood.
• Stage three is about midlife couples when there are increased
work and parenting demands as well as care-giving of aging
parents.
• Stage four is about late midlife couples who may be launching
children, heading for retirement, and becoming grandparents.
• Stage five focuses on late-life couples, facing issues of aging,
mutual dependency, and generational role changes.
• Stage six is about death as an endpoint to marriage, with a
focus on illness, legacy, and saying good-bye.
For each stage, the author shares scientific research, common presen-
tations and rich case examples, followed by developmentally-informed
questions and topics for couple therapists to pursue.
Keywords
cohabitation, conflict, couple therapy, couples at end of life, couples in
later life, couples at midlife, death, divorce, empty nest, family of o rigin,
vi Abstract
gay couples, gender differences, grandparents, illness, late midlife cou-

ples, launching children, lesbian couples, LGBTQ couples, life-cycle
transitions, life-cycle, loss, marriage, midlife couples, parenting, post-
retirement, retirement, same-sex couples, sexual functioning, sexual
intimacy, sexuality, stages of development, transition to parenthood
Advance Praise for
A Life-Cycle Approach
to Treating Couples
A seamless integration of elegant theory with in-the-office pragmatism,
Dr. Fishel’s graceful prose accomplishes the impossible task of making
a text all things to all practitioners. Her comprehensive synthesis of the
field’s evidence into developmental stages, combined with a diligent
anticipation of diversity among individuals and circumstances main-
tain the high utility that has defined all of Dr. Fishel’s writings. The
work is a most convenient framework for inquiry and intervention, giv-
ing as much attention to the when of relationships as to the who that
comprise them.
—David Rubin, MD, Director,
Massachusetts General Hospital Psychiatry Academy;
Director of MGH Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Residency Program
In her beautifully written portrait of the life cycle of couples, Anne Fishel
has woven together research, memorable examples from her clinical
practice and helpful suggestions for practitioners into a truly helpful
guide. I was particularly impressed by her ability to approach couples in
an accepting, nonpathologizing way. Any family therapist who reads this
book will find him or herself better equipped to meet and help couples of
any age on their marital journey.
—Michael Thompson, PhD,
co-author of Raising Cain
Anne Fishel has provided us with a rich, comprehensive, and evocative

look at therapy for couples at different stages of the life cycle. She uses
what is known from research and from vivid vignettes to provide help-
ful questions for therapists to pose to partners at each stage of life that
viii ADVANCE PRAISE
will enrich their conversations and connections with one another. This
volume will be invaluable for psychologists, psychiatrists, social w
orkers,
and those who train professional therapists to work with couples. I d
aresay
it would also be eye-opening and helpful to couples themselves, who will
surely find themselves in many of its rich examples.
—Carolyn Pape Cowan, PhD, Adjunct Professor of Psychology
Emerita, University of California, Berkeley; Coauthor of When Partners
Become Parents: The Big Life Change for Couples
In this exceptional book, Fishel draws on her years of experience and

accumulated wisdom to produce an informative, reassuring, and practical
reference that should be on the desk of every couple therapist. Organized
logically and sequentially within a normalizing developmental frame-
work, each of the carefully crafted chapters provides useful contextual
information, vivid case examples, clinical strategies, some great questions
to ask in session, and additional resources for understanding and inter-
vening with distressed couples. This sensitive and timely text includes
information for treatment with clients diverse not only in sexual identity,
but also age, race, ethnicity, SES, health, and physical ability. Psychother-
apists of all persuasions and all degrees of experience will find this a fasci-
nating and welcome addition to the literature on working with couples.
—Martha B. Straus, PhD, Professor of Clinical Psychology, Antioch
University New England, and author of Treating Trauma in Adolescents:
Development, Attachment, and the Therapeutic Relationship
With this book, Anne Fishel has contributed a major advance to our
understanding of couples and the practice of couple therapy. Her life-
cycle perspective places the clinical at the center of the couple’s world, and
her many compelling case examples and relevant questions offer prag-
matic help for navigating the challenging terrain of couples therapy. This
is a book that complements the work of all couples therapists regardless
of their preferred models.
—Douglas C. Breunlin
Program Director, Master of Science in Marriage and Family Therapy
Clinical Professor, Department of Psychology, Northwestern University
Contents
Acknowledgments��xi
Chapter 1 Applying the Life-cycle Perspective to Couple

Therapy��1
Chapter 2 Transition to Being a Couple: Dating, Partner
Selection, and Making a Long-Term Commitment��17
Chapter 3 Transition to Parenthood: Expanding the Dyad��39
Chapter 4 Midlife Couples: Increasing Demands of Work,
Parenting, and Care-giving��57
Chapter 5 Late Midlife Couples: Launching Children,
Heading for Retirement, Becoming Grandparents��73
Chapter 6 Post-Retirement and Late-Life Couples: Aging,
Dependency, and Role Changes��89
Chapter 7 Illness and Death��103
References��119
About the Author��137
Index��139
Acknowledgments
My heartfelt thanks to friends and colleagues at Massachusetts General
Hospital who have supported my teaching and enhanced my understand-
ing of couples’ relationships over many years. In particular, I am grateful
to the members of the decades-long MGH Reflecting Team, where I have
spent hundreds of hours discussing couple therapy and learning from
a very knowledgeable and generous team: Carol McSheffrey, LICSW;
David Rubin, MD; Ellen Godena, LICSW; Pat Giulino, LICSW; Ginny
Sigel, LICSW; Marie Herbert, LICSW; Nicole Simi, PhD; Julia Coleman,
MD; Cindy Moore, PhD; Juliana Chen, MD; Shiri Cohen, PhD; Lisa
Montanye, LICSW; and Abby McDonald, LICSW.
I am also very grateful to those clinicians who allowed me to inter-
view them about their particular areas of expertise and who also pro-
vided perspectives on the manuscript: Bob Waldinger, MD, shared his
knowledge about late-life couples, based on men and women who par-
ticipated in the Harvard Study of Adult Development, which he directs;
Paula Rauch, MD, and Cindy Moore, PhD, offered their deep stores of
clinical experience about end-of-life-issues, based largely on their work
at MGH’s P arenting At a Challenging Time program, which Dr. Rauch
founded and directs, and where Dr. Moore is the Associate Director; Leah
Rosenberg, MD, a palliative care and hospice specialist at MGH, shared
her wisdom about easing patients’ suffering at end of life; Caroline Mar-
vin, PhD, and Larry Rosenberg, PhD, senior clinicians in private practice
with decades of couple therapy experience, talked with me about their
work with same-sex couples. Eva Schoenfeld, PhD, Chris McElroy, PhD,
Nancy Bridges, LICSW, Beth Harrington, PhD, Sue Wolff, MD, and
Corky Becker, PhD have offered invaluable insights about couple work.
Several other therapists offered essential feedback on various c hapters
of this book. I am so appreciative of the thoughtful and incisive c omments
from Juliana Chen, MD; Melinda Morrill, PhD; Laura Prager, MD; and
Abigail Judge, PhD.
xii Acknowledgments
Special thanks to three people who helped me track down articles

during a wide-ranging literature search. Martha Stone, MS, the librarian
at MGH’s Treadwell Library, and my research assistants, Cara Lucke and
Shay Haregnesh, went over and beyond in their efforts to find articles for
this book.
I am very appreciative of initial feedback from Corinne Datchi, PhD,
about the scope and focus of the book. I felt honored to have my former
student, and now esteemed colleague, Anthony Chambers, PhD, offer
a close reading of the entire book. He has certainly made the prose flow
more smoothly and has greatly improved the content of the book.
I am very grateful to the hundreds of couples whom I have had the
privilege to work with and learn from. If I know anything about the life
cycle, it is from witnessing your lives.
Most of all, I want to thank my husband, Chris Daly, who is always
my first and most trusted reader. He is unstinting in his encouragement
and gentle with his criticism. Together we have traversed much of the
life cycle together, from dating to the launching of our two adult sons.
Although I know that there are special times in the stages that lie ahead,
I’d really like to go back and relive all the stages again with him. To para-
phrase the French writer Andre Maurois—a happy marriage is a long
conversation that you wish would never end.
CHAPTER 1
Applying the Life-cycle

Perspective to Couple
Therapy
To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose, under
heaven.
—The Book of Ecclesiastes
If I were young again, I’d pay attention to that little-known dimension

A taste of endless time.
Just like water—it runs right through our fingers,
But the flavor of it lingers—Like a rich, red wine.
—Chris Smithers, Leave the light on
As therapists, we hear an abundance of stories, information, and anguish

shared by couples during an initial evaluation and even more so, in
therapy. This outpouring of data is a challenge for couple therapists to
organize and render into a coherent framework for treatment. A life-cycle
perspective locates every couple on a developmental timeline that starts
with courtship and ends at death, divorce, or a relationship break-up,
and offers context and a compass for what may feel like a confusing and
cluttered landscape. Once the stage of development has been identified,
a particular couple can be compared to the millions of other couples who
have faced similar challenges at that same stage of development. Couple
therapists, guided by the research on different life-cycle stages, can find
their footing as they explore the challenges of a particular couple.
The couple’s clinician can use the research on each stage of develop-
ment in much the same way that the clinician trained in individual ther-
apy uses research on diagnostic disorders. If, for example, an individual
2 A LIFE-CYCLE APPROACH TO TREATING COUPLES
patient complains of low energy and a sad mood, a clinician will bring
to bear all that is known about depression and ask questions accord-
ingly—about feelings of worthlessness and guilt, disturbances in sleep
and appetite, and difficulty concentrating. Most likely, every individual
experiencing depression will not respond affirmatively to all of these que-
ries, but the panel of questions will direct the therapist to explore a wide
swath of experiences common among depressed individuals.
A couple therapist, with a focus on relationships rather than on indi-
viduals, does not rely on diagnostic categories like depression or anxiety.
Instead, the couple therapist will compare a couple who presents at a par-
ticular stage of development with large groups of other couples who have
been studied at that same stage. So, for example, when interviewing a
couple with an infant, a couple therapist will ask about increases in fight-
ing and decreases in sexual activity, as these behaviors have been identi-
fied as common features of thousands of couples making the transition
to parenthood. A particular couple with a newborn may not endorse all
the same experiences found in studies, but questions, rooted in research,
will help orient the therapist to ask about a baby’s temperament, sleep,
and eating behavior, as well as to normalize disruptions in the couple’s
relationship. These questions can offer respectful, normative explanations
of a couple’s challenges. For example, “Most couples experience a decline
in their sexual relationship in the first two years after becoming parents.
How has this adjustment gone for you?” If a couple responds that they
have transcended the normative expectations of this transition by avoid-
ing fights about who is doing what and are having frequent and satisfying
sex, it is an opportunity to inquire about their strengths and resources
that have made this possible. If, on the other hand, they describe having
the worst fights of their lives, the couple therapist can normalize the fights
as a developmental event and offer suggestions for making the fights less
toxic and damaging.
What Is the Life-cycle Perspective?

The notion that there are universal, predictable stages in human develop-
ment has long been a cornerstone of the field of child development, as
evidenced in the widely accepted writings of Erikson (1951) and Piaget
Applying the Life-cycle Perspective to Couple Therapy 3
and Inhelder (1969). It is a somewhat newer idea that adults continue

to develop past college years (Dawber, 1980; Friedman & Martin, 2011;
Levinson, 1978; Sheehy, 1976; Vaillant, 2012) and newer still that rela-
tionships in a family follow a developmental arc (McGoldrick, Preto, &
Carter, 2016; Carter & McGoldrick, 1989).
One longitudinal study of 80 years duration (and still ongoing) has
focused on both the individual lives of men, and later, on their marital
relationships. The study is composed of two groups of men. The first
is the Grant study, which began in 1938 as an attempt to study opti-
mum health and potential by focusing on privileged and healthy men at
Harvard: They were sophomores at the start, and now many are in their
90s. The second group, the Glueck cohort, made up of young men from
low-income urban neighborhoods in Boston, was added in 1940.
Writing about this research, Vaillant (2012) cautions that “stage is a
metaphor.” While one can see clearly delineated stages in how the embryo
develops, adult development is not nearly so step-wise and predictable. In
particular, the life trajectories of both the privileged and the low-income
men revealed that childhood experiences did not reliably predict what
happens in the future. Lives did not unfold smoothly from strong, posi-
tive early experiences through happy mid-life and onward to a satisfying
old age.
Those looking at resilience over the cycle also note the absence of lives
progressing in lock-step from a negative start to a disastrous end nor from
a charmed childhood to a ripe and happy old age. Rather, people have
many opportunities to turn their lives around when a good marriage, or
gratifying work, or the advent of parenthood can disrupt what seemed
like a negative march through time (Walsh, 2016). Drawing on longi-
tudinal studies, Werner and Smith (2011) also found that difficult early
experience did not doom later-life trajectories. Rather, a supportive mar-
riage or satisfying work could interrupt a negative start to life and catalyze
a more positive spiral. This view suggests that stages do not need to be
completed successfully before moving on to the next, but rather that each
stage offers another chance at altering a couple’s narrative.
Relationships have a beginning, middle, and end. Time is the river
that flows through all couples’ relationships. But rivers, like relationships,
get dammed, form oxbows, make detours, circumvent obstacles, shoot
over waterfalls, settle as swamps, and pick up and deposit detritus and
sediment as they meander, so their journey is never a straight shot. Just as
a river rushes, or meanders toward the ocean, so time propels every couple
through terrain with recognizable landmarks. Time, or biological aging,
has an impact on all aspects of a couple’s life—work, sex, health, conflict,
connection, and caregiving. There are six major life-cycle stages that
couples typically traverse from dating to death, divorce, or separation.
These stages are rooted in a westernized view of relationships and may
look different across cultures and across historical periods (McGoldrick,
Carter, & Preto, 2016; Carter & McGoldrick, 1989).1
• The first one begins with opening up to a stranger, falling

in love, often cohabitating, and deciding to commit to a
future together. The central task of this stage of courtship
and commitment is for each member of the couple to separate
enough from families of origin so that the couple can make
decisions jointly.
• The second stage is the couple’s transformation from a dyad to
a triad, with the addition of a baby where work and relation-
ship needs are renegotiated, and the couple makes room for
a new person.
• Stage three is about maintaining the couple’s bond at midlife
as work commitments deepen, increased flexibility is required
in parenting adolescent children, and aging parents may
need caregiving.
• The fourth stage, now the longest adult stage, begins with
children’s leaving home and ends with the start of the couple’s
retirement.
• In the fifth stage, retirement, grandparenthood, and aging are
the focus; couples’ tasks include maintaining their connec-
tion in the face of health problems, adjusting to more time
together, and finding meaning as time runs out.
1
I am grateful for the seminal and ground-breaking work on life-cycle stages put
forth by Monica McGoldrick, Nydia Garcia Preto, and Betty Carter over the last
three decades.
• The sixth stage centers on the loss of the relationship through

death, divorce, or separation.
This trajectory is, of course, not the only one that couples take, and
not all couples traverse all these stages. Other transitions—like migration,
traumatic losses, and disability—may be much more formative than these
developmental ones. There are also many variations of life experience for
couples who stay together on a long developmental arc. Three variations
are particularly important in clinical practice. First, the inclusion of
parenting in stages two, three, and four of the life-cycle stages requires
that clinical attention also be provided to represent the experience of the
many couples who will choose not to have children, but who stay mar-
ried over the same period of time as couples with children. Second, the
legalization of same-sex marriage (Supreme Court, 2015) is so recent that
there is scant longitudinal data on long-term same-sex marriages, so we
must wait for research data on how the developmental stages may differ
or overlap with those of heterosexual couples. In the meantime, clinical
knowledge and an emerging body of research on same-sex marriages can
offer guidance about same-sex couples. Divorce and remarriage is a third
normative variation over the life span. In the last 30 years, divorce has
supplanted death as the endpoint for the majority of marriages. This shift
has prompted some couple therapists to regard divorce as a normative
life-cycle event that may be positive or negative (Pinsof, 2002).
Life-cycle theory posits that couples experience the most stress at the
transition points, as one stage turns into another, and often as family
members are added, as in marriage and the transition to parenthood, and
lost, as during the launching stage and at the death of a spouse. When
moving from one stage to the other, the organization of the couple must
change. It is not, however, merely the transitioning from one stage to
the other that creates strain on a relationship. If, in addition, there is an
accumulation of stressors that coincides with a transition point, as when
a couple is expecting a first child at the same time that the husband’s
mother is diagnosed with metastatic cancer, and the couple has to relocate
to a new city without any supports, they may struggle. A transition point
can also be exacerbated if it resonates with difficulty encountered in a
previous generation at a similar stage of life, as when an expectant couple
grew up in families where there were miscarriages or deaths of children.

This couple may anticipate the transition to parenthood with an extra
burden of anxiety and apprehension.
At the core of this life-cycle perspective is the notion that family rela-
tionships shape our identities, with each generation connected to the ones
behind and ahead. The generations are mutually influencing and inform-
ing of one another so that is not only that parents guide their children’s
development, but it is also the case that children’s unfolding lives rever-
berate in the life choices made by their parents and grandparents. Take,
for example, the way that adolescents’ burgeoning sexuality and dreams
about their open-ended futures may inspire their middle-aged parents to
take stock of their more limited time that lies ahead.
There are two other dimensions of time that are critical to an under-
standing of life-cycle theory. First is the historical context of each cohort
of couples who is experiencing a particular life-cycle transition, as people
born at a given time will share certain opportunities and sociopolitical
experiences (Elder & Giele, 2009). Consider, for example, the cohort
differences of same-sex couples born in 1990 who came of age seeing
gay marriage legalized, compared with couples born in 1950 when gay
and lesbian identities were often regarded as signs of mental illness, and
sodomy laws could be used to criminalize individuals. When lesbian and
gay teens were recently surveyed about their attitudes toward marriage
and parenting, 92 percent of lesbian youth and 82 percent of gay youth
stated that wanted to be in a long-term monogamous relationship within
the next 10 years (D’Augelli, Redina, Grossman, & Sinclair, 2007), while
more than half of these same young men and women stated that it was
very or extremely likely that they would be raising children. These attitudes
among current lesbian and gay youth stand in stark contrast to the clos-
eted and constricted attitudes of similar youth in the 1950s whose best
hopes for marriage and a family were to hide their identities and enter a
heterosexual marriage.
The second dimension of time is the subjective one that all humans
experience, an internal clock that tells whether one is traversing a given
life stage at the expected time and provides an awareness of how much
time one has left. Bernice Neugarten, a psychologist, is credited with
identifying the notion that we each have a sense of what is a normal
time to accomplish different stages of the life-cycle (Neugarten, 1979).
Comparing ourselves to friends, siblings, work colleagues, and parents,

we have an idea of when is the best time to move in with a partner, marry,
have a child, settle on a career, or retire. This sense of timeliness is histor-
ically constructed, contextualized by the experience of our families and
by our particular cohort. So, for example, a pregnant medical student in
her late 20s may feel on time in terms of her family’s expectations, and
in step with 21st century culture in general, but early compared with
her cohort of medical students, who are largely postponing childbearing
until completing their medical education. For another couple, having a
child in their early 30s will feel late compared with their parents’ histories
of starting families in their early 20s. Neugarten made the observation
that life-cycle transitions are made more difficult when they happen off
cycle. For example, it is not children’s leave-taking at midlife that creates a
developmental crisis, but rather children’s not leaving home when they are
expected to do so, consistent with cultural norms or familial expectations.
According to the socioemotional selectivity theory, one’s chronological
age shapes an individual’s choices of present and future goals (Carstensen,
Isaacowitz, & Charles, 1999; Charles & Carstensen, 2009). People who
are young and healthy tend to view the future as open-ended, prioritizing
goals of gaining knowledge that can be deployed for future pursuits, while
older people are more present-focused. Younger people are also more like
likely to have a larger network of friends, than older people, who tend to
focus on a smaller cohort of friends and families (Fung, Carstensen, &
Lang, 2001). When time horizons are shorter, due either to old age or ill
health, people tend to emphasize emotion and meaning and to pay selec-
tive attention toward positive rather than negative stimuli. When couples
occupy two different perceptions of time, either because of a wide age
difference or because one partner is facing a life-threatening illness, time
itself can be an area of conflict.
Clinical Example: Not Age but Stage of Development
When Daphne and Martin2 first came for couple therapy, I was initially
struck by their sartorial dissimilarities—Martin was not afraid of color, from
2
This case, as all others throughout the book, has been deidentified in order to
protect the identity of my clients.
his boldly patterned socks to his bright orange shirt and green vest, while
Daphne was dressed head to toe in black. Next, I noticed another contrast,
and one that they warned me not to be judgmental about—a 40-year age
difference. At 33, Daphne, a Euro-American woman, had just finished her
graduate degree in art history and was looking for a job, while Martin, a
72-year-old Jewish artist and writer, was still working full-time with no plans
to retire. There were more developmental asymmetries: Martin was at the
height of his career and Daphne was just starting out; Martin had four chil-
dren and several grandchildren, while Daphne was uncertain about whether
she wanted to have any children; Martin had accumulated wealth, two
houses, and an art collection, while Daphne was still living in graduate school
housing; M artin was keenly aware of limited time and wanted to focus just
on those projects and people whom he knew were interesting and compelling,
while Daphne wanted to explore many new friendships and travel. Focusing
on their developmental tasks, biological clocks, and relative sense of future
time as points of difference gave a way to talk about their relationship. This
focus also led us to look squarely at the power differences that their different
developmental locations reveal. Age, parent status, money, and professional
standing are power issues as well as developmental ones.
Daphne described her challenges in the relationship this way: “I feel like
I’m fitting in to his life, his house, his family. If I weren’t here, he’d be making
the same decisions about his life. I’m not having an impact. He can’t hear me
unless I get angry and upset. I have spooned myself around his life. Being with
him means that his relationship with his children will always be stronger than
with me. The balance is off.” Martin talked about the guilt he felt, inviting
Daphne to share a life that would likely leave her widowed and childless when
she was in her middle-age years. He was unwavering about his wish not to
have a second family in his 70s.
And still, there were commonalities between them and ways their emo-
tional needs were interlocking. They both had childhoods where they were left
on their own, by parents with mental illness. Daphne had developed a strategy
of not relying on anyone, but found that Martin was steady and trustworthy,
the first man she could turn to for help and reassurance. This was the first time
she did not worry about finances; consequently, she experienced a freedom to
experiment with career options, and artistic pursuits, that she had yearned for
as an adolescent and young adult. Martin, for his part, had always been the
caretaker in his previous relationships, but with Daphne, Martin felt he could
be vulnerable and expose his feelings in a way he could not when he was the
sole provider of four children and adhering to more old-fashioned 1950s style
versions of masculinity.
Daphne and Martin worked hard in couple therapy for over two years.
Both felt that this was the most intimate relationship of their lives—they
deeply loved and felt cherished by the other. Martin wanted to marry Daphne
and told her so, but their developmental issues proved insurmountable. Some
of these issues pertained to their different perspectives on time. Like many older
individuals, Martin often wished to let go of their conflicts and focus instead
on the positive aspects of their relationship, while Daphne was more interested
in engaging in and working through conflict. Also congruent with those in late
life, Martin wished to spend time with Daphne and a small group of friends
and family he knew and loved already, while Daphne, with a more expansive
future, was far more interested in making new friends, having adventures,
and novel experiences. Most profoundly, their developmental differences piv-
oted around Daphne’s wish to live on her own, so that she could develop
her career out from under Martin’s powerful shadow and decide whether she
wanted a child. With much sadness, some regret, and deep affection, they
parted ways.
Changing Social Forces Have Affected Life-cycle Stages

The length, definition, and even existence of different stages of the life
cycle are shaped and influenced by larger social and historical forces.
For example, over the last 100 years, the extending of life expectancy
and the shrinking of family size have created the longest stage of adult
development. Americans are living 30 years longer than they did 100
years ago. In 1900, life expectancy was 47 years, while today, about 75
percent of the population lives beyond their 65th birthday (Skolnick,
2013). The launching or empty nest stage is now the longest stage in adult-
hood, whereas it used to be the shortest one. When a woman had a large
family, having a last child when she was in her 40s, she or her husband
would likely die before they reached the empty nest stage. With couples
now having fewer children, completing child-bearing earlier, and living

longer, this stage, which begins when children leave home and ends with
retirement, can be 20 or more years (see Chapter 5).
Definitions of marriage have experienced major revisions and edits
over the last few decades. Most significant for Americans has been the
legalization of same-sex marriage recognized in June 2015 by the U.S.
Supreme Court. Leading up to this vote was Massachusetts’ legalization
of same-sex marriages in 2004, with 36 more states and the District of
Columbia following suit by March 2015. As of 2015, 40 percent of all
same-sex couples are married, while cohabiting and divorce rates are sim-
ilar to those of different-sex couples (Gates, 2015). As many as 2 to 3.7
million children have an LGBT parent, but only about 200,000 are being
raised by same-sex couples. In Chapters 2 through 7, clinical guidance
will be offered for therapists working with same-sex couples navigating
the different stages of the life cycle. These suggestions have been gathered
from the author’s clinical experience, interviews with couple therapists
who work primarily with LGBT couples, and from the growing research
in this area. Special attention will be paid to the observations of research-
ers and clinicians in Massachusetts working with same-sex couples who
have had the opportunity to have the longest legal marriages.
Legalization of same-sex marriage is not the only major shift in the
marital landscape. The age at which men and women marry for the first
time has increased significantly over the past 30 years. From 1980 to
2016, the median age of first marriage for men rose from 24.7 to 29.5,
and for women, from 22.0 to 27.4 years of age (U.S. Census, 2016).
Not only are young men and women postponing marriage, but also more
young adults are choosing cohabitation over marriage. Marriage rates are
at an all-time low. Between 1980 and 2016, the proportion of married
men has declined from 63 to 53 percent, and for married women, from
59 to 51 percent (U.S. Census Bureau, 2017). And, it is not just marriage
that is being postponed. Many women are delaying childbearing due to
educational opportunities or difficulties finding a partner, with higher
rates of infertility as an unintended consequence.
While many couples struggle with unwanted childlessness due to
infertility, there are growing numbers of couples who choose to remain
childfree. In 2006, 20 percent of women ages 40 to 44 had never had
a child, compared to half that number in 1976 (Dye, 2008; Osborne,

2003), numbers that include women who are childless both voluntarily
and involuntarily. Married couples who choose not to have children do
so for a variety of reasons: they may want to remain more mobile, with
ample time and flexibility to invest in their careers; they may want to
maintain a more intimate marriage; they may feel unsuited to parenthood
or feel worried that they will pass along a difficult genetic loading; others
may postpone childrearing decisions to a time when biological reproduc-
tion is no longer an option. Regardless of whether by choice or by default,
childless couples tend to be better educated, more likely to be urban-
dwellers, and less likely to be religiously affiliated (DeOllos & Kapinus,
2002; Keizer, Dykstra, & Jansen, 2008). Over many studies, researchers
have found that couples without children experience similar or higher
levels of wellbeing at most stages of the life cycle than couples who
are parents (Koropeckyji-Cox, Pienta, & Brown, 2007; Nomaguchi &
Milkie, 2003; Pudrovska, 2008; Umberson, Pudrovska, & Reczek, 2010;
Wenger, Dykstra, Melkas, & Knipscheer, 2007; Zhang & Hayward,
2001). In general, couples who did not choose to be childless were less
happy and more depressed than those who were voluntarily childfree.
In addition, g ender and marital status have an impact on w ellbeing. For
example, childlessness had the biggest negative impact on those who were
widowed, particularly among men (Zhang & Hayward, 2001).
Postponement of marriage and childbearing, increased numbers of
couples not having children, more couples cohabitating with and with-
out children, and legalization of same-sex marriage are only some of the
changes to current living arrangements. We are also seeing more gen-
der equity in modern marriages. Most married women work outside the
home, contributing to a rise of shared decision-making as a cultural value.
There has been a dramatic increase in dual-earner couples, such that 70
percent of couples with children under the age of 18 are dual earners,
up from one-quarter in 1960 (Pew Research Center, 2015). It is not just
women who are contributing to the gender rebalancing of home and work
roles. The number of stay-at-home fathers has doubled over the last 30
years (Livingston, 2014), while men in general are playing a more active
role in childrearing. In the last two decades, fathers have more than dou-
bled the time spent on household chores and tripled the time spent with
children (Parker, 2016). Several studies suggest that couples in egalitarian

marriages experience higher marital quality (Amato, Booth, Johnson, &
Rogers, 2007; Frisco & Williams, 2003; Kamp Dush & Taylor, 2012).
There are, however, gaping class divides that undermine this picture
of increased equity. Highly educated women are more likely to marry
than less educated women. Of those with a college education, 88
percent of women aged 33 to 44 are married, and their divorce rate is
17 percent in the first 10 years. By contrast, 79 percent of women in the
same age bracket with less than a high school diploma have married, and
the divorce rate for them in the first decade of marriage is 50 p ercent
(McGoldrick, Carter, & Preto, 2016; Stevenson & Wolfers, 2007).

Low-income couples are more likely to move in with each other quickly,
have children at an earlier age, and move on if the relationship does not
work out. Children living in cohabitating or single-parent families are
two to three times more likely to be living in poverty than children living
in married families. It is ironic, indeed, that as marriage becomes more
equitable for some, the class divide around marriage and divorce rates
grows more pronounced.
The intersection of race and marriage reveals that there are significant
differences in marriage rates among White, African–American, Hispanic,
and Asian couples. For couples who married for the first time between
2006 and 2010, the chance of a 20-year marriage is nearly 70 percent for
Asian women, but only 36 percent for Black women and 50 percent for
both White and Hispanic women (Wang, 2015).
Over recent decades, marriage rates have dropped much more precip-
itously for African–Americans than for Whites. In 1960, 78 percent of
African–American households included a married couple, while 40 years
later, the rate had plummeted to only 16 percent (Pinderhughes, 2002).
By stark comparison, the marriage rate decreased much less dramatically
from 74 to 56 percent among White couples during that same period.
When children are included in the family calculus, the racial divide is
also obvious. About three-fifths of African–American children will grow
up in a single-parent family as compared with only one-quarter of White
children (US Census Bureau, 2017).
These racial disparities are not reflected in attitudes toward marriage.
Blacks and Whites value marriage similarly, and Blacks are significantly
more likely than Whites to disapprove of divorce. Despite these beliefs,

rates of singlehood are high among African–Americans, in part due to a
male shortage that is attributable to higher rates of poverty, incarceration,
and drug use (Chambers & Kravitz, 2011; McKinnon, 2003; Teachman,
Tedrow & Croder, 2000). Added to these factors is higher unemployment
among African–American men, a deterrent to marriage.
Family composition has also changed over the past 30 years. Fewer
than half of the children under the age of 18 years live with two married
parents, and about 40 percent live with single or cohabitating parents
(Livingston, 2014). Increasingly, marriage and parenting are becom-
ing uncoupled. Adding to the complexity of family life is the number
of Americans living in multigenerational households, which doubled
between 1980 and 2012 (Fry & Passel, 2014). As a consequence of later
marriage rates and longer educational paths among higher-income young
adults, as well as declining employment and wages among many lower-
income young adults, 25 percent of adults ages 25 to 34 lived with their
parents in 2015 as compared to only 11 percent in 1980.
Divorce Is as Common an End to Marriage as Death

In 1900, two-thirds of marriages ended within 40 years as a result of one
partner’s death. The year 1974 was a watershed as it marked the point
at which marriages were more likely to end in divorce than in death
(Hagestad, 1988). Spikes in divorce occur at predictable points during
the life-cycle, with the largest one after five to seven years of marriage,
and another at 15 to 17 years of marriage (Gottman & Levensen, 2000).
Recent surveys suggest that, while divorce rates among younger couples
are declining, the divorce rate among couples in their 50s and older dou-
bled between 1990 and 2010 (Brown & Lin, 2012). This spike may be due
to a cohort effect of Baby Boomers who were responsible for the increased
divorce rate in the 70s continuing their patterns of high marital instabil-
ity in subsequent marriages (Kennedy & Ruggles, 2014). Or, the rise in
divorce in older individuals may represent changing social and historical
forces, such as a longer life expectancy that makes a many-decade marriage
too heavy a burden, or increased gender equity that allows more women
the freedom to leave a marriage with her own income and retirement
benefits. In any case, if half of divorces occur within the first seven years
of marriage, another quarter of all divorces occur in couples who are 50
or older. Divorce rates are inextricably linked to class, as well as to age.
For college-educated women, there is almost an 80 percent chance of still
being married after two decades, while for women with a high school edu-
cation or less, their chances are only 40 percent (Wang, 2015).
Clinical Example: The Use of a Developmental Reframe
The developmental lens not only provides context and orients the cou-
ple therapist to common challenges but can itself be an intervention. By
introducing a previous stage of life that was skipped over, a developmental
reframe can shift a couple from blaming one another toward adopting a
dyadic and nonjudgmental view of their current difficulties.
When Maria and Ralph, an African–American couple in their early 30s,
came to a Boston-area clinic, they complained of feeling like siblings, the kind
who squabble and then go their own way. Married for five years, they had two
daughters, Anna age 5 and Sophia age 2. Although the reason they gave for
their clinic visit was their older daughter’s second expulsion from a pre-school
due to biting other children, other difficulties—more typical of couples who
are older and have been married for decades—came tumbling out. They met
seven years earlier, shortly after the death of Maria’s mother. Not long after
that, Maria was diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer for which she was
treated with radiation, chemotherapy, and surgery. During cancer treatment,
the couple moved in with one another and only a month later, Ralph’s mother,
following a fall that was the first symptom of Alzheimer’s, moved in and con-
tinued to live with them until her death a year ago.
The couple sought a diagnosis for their daughter, and they wanted help
managing her temper outbursts at home. As their therapist, I was torn between
focusing on their current problem and wondering how their shaky start as a
couple might be interfering with their difficulties collaborating as parents.
As part of my feedback after the first few sessions, I offered a developmental
reframe. “It is no wonder that you are feeling more like siblings than like
partners as you face a parenting challenge with Anna. It sounds like life threw
crisis after crisis at you, like the death of a parent, a serious medical illness,
and the care-taking of an ill parent that most couples don’t have to deal with
right out of the gate. Because you had to deal with challenges more typical of
older couples who already know each other well, you skipped an important
developmental stage—creating an identity as a couple.
“In addition to figuring out a good plan for helping Anna, I’d like to
suggest that we do some time travel in here. Let’s go back to the developmental
stage you missed out on and take some time to have conversations you might
have had if you hadn’t had to race ahead. For example, ‘Where do you want
to live?’ ‘How do you resolve disagreements?’ ‘Who are your friends?’ ‘What
role, if any, does religion or spirituality play in your lives?’ ‘What rituals, like
dinner or holiday get-togethers, are important to you?’ ‘What do you like to
do together when you have leisure time?’ ‘What is important to you as you
envision a future together?’ These are just a few topics that we might discuss.”
The developmental reframe is a normalizing intervention that recasts
a current problem as indicating that a couple bypassed an important
earlier stage or has gotten stuck at a prior stage. With Maria and Ralph,
their current distant and contentious relationship was interfering with
their ability to collaborate on a parenting plan for their elder daughter.
By offering an empathic explanation for their difficulties—that they got
derailed in developing their relationship by having to take on respon-
sibilities more typical of an older couple—they were offered a way for-
ward that sidestepped any assignments of blame. This developmental
reframe also gave an entry point to talk about the losses they experienced
together, and how their caretaking of each other had shaped their current
relationship.
In the coming chapters, the developmental perspective will next be
applied to each stage of a couple’s lifespan. Starting with courtship and
the decision to marry or commit to one another, we will explore the
research on the transition to marriage with an eye to better understanding
this opening act. We will look at common presentations for therapy and
make suggestions for questions and interventions that a couple therapist
can offer to help couples as they initially embark on a life together.
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
CHAPTER IX
AMONG THE YAOS
Chingulungulu, August 20, 1906.
The greatest service Matola has hitherto rendered me is the

arrangement of a few evening meetings with the women of his
village, whom he has at last succeeded in inducing to venture into the
lion’s den. Knudsen and I have just finished our frugal evening meal,
and Knudsen is as usual chatting with his friend Daudi (David), the
native preacher, while I am seated at my table, working up my notes
for the day. Daudi belongs to the Universities’ Mission, was educated
at Zanzibar, and prefers speaking English to me. There is not much
to be got of him from my point of view, as his ideas have been greatly
modified by Christianity. To-night the east wind, which on other
occasions has threatened, in spite of all precautions, to put out our
lamp, is not blowing, for a wonder; and the “Tippelskirch” sheds its
rays undisturbed on our novel surroundings. My cigar, also, has an
excellent flavour; and everything breathes comfort and satisfaction,
when, approaching almost inaudibly over the loose sandy soil on
which even our thick European boots make little or no noise, Matola
appears and takes his seat on his accustomed box. He is followed by
some thirty women and girls, most of them with babies on their
backs, the majority of whom are peacefully asleep, though some keep
gasping and groaning, within the supporting cloth. The whole
company squats down on the floor between us, closely huddled
together. I get Knudsen, who speaks Yao fluently though not
grammatically, to explain what I want, viz., songs and stories—and
then wait to see what will happen. For some time nothing happens—
except that a half-grown boy, who has slipped in with the rest, begins
to relate a long fable; but he speaks so quickly that it is impossible to
follow him. Of course he cannot dictate his story slowly enough for
me to take it down. This is a very common experience—the people
sing and speak into the phonograph with enviable readiness, but are
helplessly perplexed when asked to dictate the words slowly. Indeed
this could hardly be expected of them. We decide to reserve the boy
for another opportunity and once more there is silence. Then arises,
first very shyly, but soon gaining confidence and volume, a woman’s
clear voice. Presently the chorus joins in, and alternates with the solo
in regular turns for a considerable time:—
Chakalakāle, mwāna jua Kundúngu, mwắnja kwa tāti, “Anānyile litála kwa tati
Kunampūye.” Nikwā́ola ku litīmbe, kuwalimāgắ Chenampūye. Newáije ku mūsi
kwa atati wao. Nigómbaga uti nekugawíraga musi. Nekutamăgá.[26]
The meaning of this is:—
“Chakalakale, a child of God, went away to his father. Show me the
way to my father’s—to Kunampuye. He went to the river-bed where
Chenampuye was hoeing. He came to the village to his father. Then
there were guns fired and a village was assigned him to live in. And
he lived at home.”
So far all has gone smoothly ... the song has come to an end.
Matola, Daudi, Knudsen and I have with no little trouble established
the authentic text, and the translation has been satisfactorily
accomplished; but unfortunately I have to relinquish the idea of
getting a phonographic record of the not unpleasing air. After my last
failures at Lindi, due to the heat, which softened the recording
cylinders, I tried my luck later on at Masasi, but the results there
were with hardly any exceptions quite unsatisfactory. The softness of
the cylinder is no disadvantage in recording, on the contrary, it
enables the needle to make a deeper impression, but the
impossibility of reproduction makes it difficult to check the text
when afterwards dictated.
There is not much to remark about the foregoing song. I was at
first doubtful of the rendering given of mwana jua kundungu, but
Matola and Daudi both insisted on explaining it as “a child of God.”
What is understood by that expression here it is impossible to say;
perhaps it denotes a rebel, as further north, in Usagara and Ukami,
and on the Rufiji, the leaders of the Majimaji have in fact assumed a
title of somewhat the same import. The prefix ku in the name
Kunampuye is the same as che—both are about equivalent to “Mr.”
or “Mrs.”
TWO MAKUA MOTHERS
At last we have finished writing down and translating the text. The
mothers have watched us in complete silence—not so the babies, who
all seem to suffer from colds, and breathe noisily in consequence.
The assertions made in so many works on Africa, as to the happiness
of the native in early childhood, do not stand the test of reality. As
soon as the mother gets up after her confinement, which she does
very soon, the infant is put into the cloth which she ties on her back.
There it stays all day long, whether the mother is having her short
woolly hair dressed by a friend, enjoying a gossip at the well, hoeing,
weeding, or reaping in the burning sun. When she stands for hours
together, pounding corn in the mortar, the baby jogs up and down
with the rhythmic motion of her arms, and when she is kneeling
before the millstone grinding the meal into fine white flour, or
squatting by the hearth in the evening, the rosy morsel of humanity
never leaves its close and warm, but not altogether hygienic nest. The
rosiness does not last long. No provision in the way of napkins being
made, the skin soon becomes chapped and deep cracks are formed,
especially at the joints, and the terrible African flies lay their eggs on
the eyelids of the unfortunate little ones, neither father nor mother
ever raising a hand to drive them away—they never dream of making
this effort for their own benefit! No wonder that the little eyes, which
in the case of our own children we are accustomed to think of as the
most wonderful and beautiful thing in organic nature, should be
bleared and dim. Fungoid ulcers (the result of “thrush”) are seen
protruding in bluish white masses from nose and mouth. The
universal colds are the consequence of the great difference of
temperature between day and night. The parents can protect
themselves by means of the fire and their mats; the child gets wet, is
left lying untouched and uncared for, becomes chilled through, and
of course catches cold. Hence the general coughing and sniffing in
our baraza.[27]
A FRIENDLY CHAT
The women having noticed that the first number on the

programme is finished, the same solo voice as before begins once
more, softly and not unmelodiously. “Seletu, seletu, songo katole,
tung’ande songo katole.” This song, too, alternates between solo and
chorus, like the previous one. I already know enough Yao to translate
the two words, songo katole; their meaning, “Bring the songo”
(snake) makes me curious as to that of the rest. And rightly so, for
how anyone can invite a person to bring up this, the most poisonous
reptile in East Africa, whose bite is instantly fatal, is at present a
mystery. I restrain my curiosity, however, till I have heard the next
song, which might be considered as merely a continuation of the
first, as the air is the same, and the only difference is the
introduction of another animal—the lion. The words are as follows:—
Solo: Seletu seletu, simba katole.
Chorus: Seletu seletu, simba katole.
Solo: Seletu seletu, simba okoto.
Chorus: Seletu seletu, simba okoto.
I have a good ear, but unfortunately have had no musical training

whatever, and have never regretted this so much as I do now, here in
the interior of Africa, especially now that my phonograph is hors de
combat. This would not have mattered so much, had I been able to
enter the simple melody at once in my note-book, but, as it is, I shall
have to dispense with a record altogether. In both these songs the
line sung by the solo performer is repeated by the whole chorus, and
this alternation goes on for an indefinite time, till the performers are
tired out.
In both cases, the words when translated are simple enough:
(1) Seletu, seletu, the songo snake, bring it here and let us play,
bring it here, the songo snake.
(2) Seletu, seletu, the lion, bring him here—seletu, seletu, the lion is
beautiful.
That is all. I think the admiration here expressed for two creatures
very dangerous to the natives is to be explained as a kind of captatio
benevolentiæ rather than as the outcome of any feeling for nature or
of artistic delight in the bright colours of the serpent or the powerful
frame of the lion. Both children and grown-up people are more
concerned about the songo than about any other creature; it is said
to live among the rocks, to have a comb like a cock and to produce
sounds by which it entices its prey.[28] It darts down like lightning on
its victim from a tree overhanging the path, strikes him on the neck,
and he falls down dead. The natives have described the whole scene
to me over and over again with the most expressive pantomime. It is
quite comprehensible that this snake should be feared beyond
everything, and, considering similar phenomena in other parts of the
world, it seems quite natural that they should try to propitiate this
terrible enemy by singing his praises as being eminently fitted to take
part in the dance. Precisely the same may be said of the lion.
Now things become more lively. “Chindawi!” cries one, to be
rendered approximately by “I’ll tell you something!”[29] and another
answers “Ajise!” (“Let it come.”) The first speaker now says, “Aju,
aji,” and passes her right hand in quick, bold curves through the air.
I do not know what to make of the whole proceeding, nor the
meaning of the answer, “Kyuwilili,” from the other side. The dumb
shyness which at first characterized the women has now yielded to a
mild hilarity not diminished by my perplexed looks. At last comes
the solution, “Aju, aji,” merely means “this and that,”[30] and the
passes of the hand are supposed to be made under a vertical sun
when the shadow would pass as swiftly and silently over the ground
as the hand itself does through the air. Kyuwilili (the shadow), then,
is the answer to this very primitive African riddle.
“Chindawi!”—“Ajise!”—the game goes on afresh, and the question
is, this time, “Gojo gojo kakuungwa?” (“What rattles in its house?”) I
find the answer to this far less recondite than the first one
—“Mbelemende” (the bazi pea), which of course is thought of as still
in the pod growing on a shrub resembling our privet. The ripe seeds,
in fact, produce a rattling noise in the fresh morning breeze.
But for the third time “Chindawi!”—“Ajise!” rings out, and this
time the problem set is “Achiwanangu kulingana.” I am quite
helpless, but Matola with his usual vivacity, springs into the circle,
stoops down and points with outstretched hands to his knees, while a
murmur of applause greets him. “My children are of equal size” is the
enigma; its unexpected solution is, “Malungo” (the knees). We
Europeans, with our coldly-calculating intellect, have long ago lost
the enviable faculty of early childhood, which enabled us to personify
a part as if it were the whole. A happy fate allows the African to keep
it even in extreme old age.
By this time nothing more surprises me. A fourth woman’s voice
chimes in with “Ambuje ajigele utandi” (“My master brings meal”).
The whole circle of faces is turned as one on the European, who once
more can do nothing but murmur an embarrassed “Sijui” (“I do not
know”). The answer, triumphantly shouted at me—“Uuli!” (“White
hair!”)—is, in fact, to our way of thinking so far-fetched that I should
never have guessed it. Perhaps this riddle may have been suggested
by the fact that an old white-headed native does in fact look as if his
head had been powdered with flour.[31]
Now comes the last number of a programme quite full enough
even for a blasé inquirer.
“Chindawi!”—“Ajise!” is heard for the last time. “Pita kupite akuno
tusimane apa!”[32] The excitement in which everyone gazes at me is if
possible greater than before; they are evidently enjoying the feeling
of their superiority over the white man, who understands nothing of
what is going on. But this time their excess of zeal betrayed them—
their gestures showed me clearly what their language concealed, for
all went through the movement of clasping a girdle with both hands.
“Lupundu” (a girdle) is accordingly the answer to this riddle, which
in its very cadence when translated,—“Goes round to the left, goes
round to the right, and meets in the middle”—recalls that of similar
nursery riddles at home, e.g., the well-known “Long legs, crooked
thighs, little head, and no eyes.”
Matola himself came forward with an “extra” by way of winding up
the evening. His contribution runs thus:—“Chikalakasa goje
kung’anda, kung’anda yekwete umbo,” which is, being interpreted,
“Skulls do not play” (or “dance”); “they only play who have hair (on
their heads).”
The difficult work of the translator is always in this country
accompanied by that of the commentator, so that it does not take
long to arrive at the fact that this sentence might be regarded as a
free version of “Gather ye roses while ye may,” or “A living dog is
better than a dead lion.” I, too, turning to Matola and Daudi, say
solemnly, “Chikalakasa goje kung’anda, kung’anda yekwete umbo”
and then call out to Moritz, “Bilauri nne za pombe” (“A glass of beer
for each of us”).
The drab liquor is already bubbling in our drinking vessels—two
glasses and two tin mugs. “Skål, Mr. Knudsen”; “Prosit, Professor”—
the two natives silently bow their heads. With heartfelt delight we let
the cool fluid run down our thirsty throats. “Kung’anda yekwete
umbo” (“They only play who have hair on their heads”).... Silently
and almost imperceptibly the dark figures of the women have slipped
away, with a “Kwa heri, Bwana!” Matola and Daudi are gone too,
and I remain alone with Knudsen.
Our manuals of ethnology give a terrible picture of the lot of
woman among primitive peoples. “Beast of burden” and “slave” are
the epithets continually applied to her. Happily the state of things is
not so bad as we might suppose from this; and, if we were to take the
tribes of Eastern Equatorial Africa as a sample of primitive peoples
in general, the picture would not, indeed, be reversed, but very
considerably modified. The fact is that the women are in no danger
of killing themselves with hard work—no one ever saw a native
woman walking quickly, and even the indispensable work of the
home is done in such a leisurely and easy-going way that many a
German housewife might well envy them the time they have to spare.
Among the inland tribes, indeed, the women have a somewhat
harder time: the luxuries of the coast are not to be had; children are
more numerous and give more trouble; and—greatest difference of
all—there are no bazaars or shops like those of the Indians, where
one can buy everything as easily as in Europe. So there is no help for
it; wives and daughters must get to work by sunrise at the mortar,
the winnowing-basket, or the grinding-stones.
At six in the morning the European was tossing restlessly in his
narrow bed—tossing is perhaps scarcely the right expression, for in a
narrow trough like this such freedom of movement is only possible
when broad awake and to a person possessing some skill in
gymnastics. The night had brought scant refreshment. In the first
place a small conflagration took place just as I was going to bed.
Kibwana, the stupid, clumsy fellow, has broken off a good half of my
last lamp-glass in cleaning it. It will still burn, thanks to the brass
screen which protects it from the wind, but it gives out a tremendous
heat. It must have been due to this accident that at the moment when
I had just slightly lifted the mosquito-net to slip under it like
lightning and cheat the unceasing vigilance of the mosquitoes, I
suddenly saw a bright light above and behind me. I turned and
succeeded in beating out the flames in about three seconds, but this
was long enough to burn a hole a foot square in the front of the net.
Kibwana will have to sew it up with a piece of sanda, and in the
meantime it can be closed with a couple of pins.
Tired out at last I sank on my bed, and dropped into an uneasy
slumber. It was perhaps two o’clock when I started up, confused and
dazed with a noise which made me wonder if the Indian Ocean had
left its bed to flood this plain as of old. The tent shook and the poles
threatened to break; all nature was in an uproar, and presently new
sounds were heard through the roaring of the storm—a many-voiced
bellowing from the back of the tent—shouts, cries and scolding from
the direction of the prison, where my soldiers were now awake and
stumbling helplessly hither and thither in the pitchy darkness round
the baraza. A terrific roar arose close beside my tent-wall. Had the
plague of lions followed us here from Masasi? Quick as thought I
slipped out from under the curtain and felt in the accustomed place
for my match-box. It was not there, nor was it to be found elsewhere
in the tent. Giving up the search, I threw myself into my khaki suit,
shouting at the same time for the sentinel and thus adding to the
noise. But no sentinel appeared. I stepped out and, by the light of the
firebrands wielded by the soldiers, saw them engaged in a struggle
with a dense mass of great black beasts. These, however, proved to be
no lions, but Matola’s peaceful cattle. A calf had been taken away
from its mother two days before; she had kept up a most piteous
lowing ever since, and finally, during the uproar of the storm, broke
out of the kraal, the whole herd following her. The two bulls glared
with wildly-rolling eyes at the torches brandished in their faces,
while the younger animals bellowed in terror. At last we drove them
back, and with infinite trouble shut them once more into the kraal.
The white man in the tent has fallen asleep once more, and is
dreaming. The nocturnal skirmish with the cattle has suggested
another sort of fight with powder and shot against Songea’s hostile
Wangoni. The shots ring out on both sides at strangely regular
intervals; suddenly they cease. What does this mean? Is the enemy
planning a flanking movement to circumvent my small force? or is he
creeping up noiselessly through the high grass? I give the word of
command, and spring forward, running my nose against tin box No.
3, which serves as my war chest and therefore has its abode inside
the tent opposite my bed. My leap has unconsciously delivered me
from all imaginary dangers and brought me back to reality. The
platoon fire begins again—bang! bang! bang!—and in spite of the
confused state in which the events of the night have left my head, I
am forced to laugh aloud. The regular rifle-fire is the rhythmic
pounding of the pestles wielded by two Yao women in Matola’s
compound, who are preparing the daily supply of maize and millet
meal for the chief’s household.
I have often seen women and girls at this work, but to-day I feel as
if I ought to give special attention to these particular nymphs, having
already established a psychical rapport with them. It does not take
long to dress, nor, when that is finished, to drink a huge cup of cocoa
and eat the usual omelette with bananas, and then, without loss of
time I make for the group of women, followed by my immediate
bodyguard carrying the camera and the cinematograph.
I find there are four women—two of them
imperturbably pounding away with the long,
heavy pestle, which, however, no longer
resembles cannon or rifle fire, but makes
more of a clapping sound. Matola explains
that there is now maize in the mortars, while
in the early morning they had been pounding
mtama and making the thundering noise
which disturbed my repose. This grain is
husked dry, then winnowed, afterwards WOMAN POUNDING
AT THE MORTAR.
washed and finally placed in a flat basket to
DRAWN BY SALIM
dry in the sun for an hour and a half. Not till MATOLA
this has been done can it be ground on the
stone into flour. Maize, on the other hand, is
first husked by pounding in a wet mortar, and then left to soak in
water for three days. It is then washed and pounded. The flour will
keep if dried.
After a while the pounding ceases, the women draw long breaths
and wipe the perspiration from their faces and chests. It has been
hard work, and, performed as it is day by day, it brings about the
disproportionate development of the upper arm muscles which is so
striking in the otherwise slight figures of the native women. With a
quick turn of the hand, the third woman has now taken the pounded
mass out of the mortar and put it into a flat basket about two feet
across. Then comes the winnowing; stroke on stroke at intervals of
ten and twenty seconds, the hand with the basket describes a
semicircle, open below—not with a uniform motion, but in a series of
jerks. Now one sees the husks separating themselves from the grain,
the purpose served by the mortar becomes manifest, and I find that it
has nothing to do with the production of flour, but serves merely to
get off the husk.
The winnowing is quickly done, and with a vigorous jerk the
shining grain flies into another basket. This is now seized by the
fourth woman, a plump young thing who has so far been squatting
idly beside the primitive mill of all mankind, the flat stone on which
the first handful of the grain is now laid. Now some life comes into
her—the upper stone passes crunching over the grains—the mass
becomes whiter and finer with each push, but the worker becomes
visibly warm. After a time the first instalment is ready, and glides
slowly down, pushed in front of the “runner” into the shallow bowl
placed beneath the edge of the lower stone. The woman draws
breath, takes up a fresh handful and goes to work again.
This preparation of flour is, as it was everywhere in ancient times,
and still is among the maize-eating Indians of America, the principal
occupation of the women. It is, on account of the primitive character
of the implements, certainly no easy task, but is not nearly so hard on
them as the field-work which, with us, falls to the lot of every day-
labourer’s wife, every country maid-servant, and the wives and
daughters of small farmers. I should like to see the African woman
who would do the work of one German harvest to the end without
protesting and running away.
NATIVE WOMEN PREPARING MEAL. (POUNDING, SIFTING,

GRINDING)
The care of the household is not unduly onerous. The poor man’s
wife in our own country cannot indeed command a great variety of
dishes, but her housekeeping is magnificence itself compared with
the eternal monotony of native cooking—millet-porridge to-day,
maize-porridge to-morrow, and manioc-porridge the day after, and
then da capo. It may be admitted that the preparation of this article
of diet is perhaps not so simple as it seems. I might suggest a
comparison with the Thuringen dumpling, which takes the
inspiration of genius to prepare faultlessly—but surely the most
stupid negress must some time or other arrive at the secret of
making ugali properly. Knudsen, in his enthusiasm for everything
genuinely African, eats the stuff with intense relish—to me it always
tastes like a piece of linen just out of the suds. The operation is
simple enough in principle—you bring a large pot of water to the boil
and gradually drop in the necessary meal, stirring all the time. The
right consistency is reached when the whole contents of the pot have
thickened to a glassy, translucent mass. If a European dish is wanted
for comparison, we need only recall the polenta of Northern Italy,
which is prepared in a similar way, and tastes very much the same.
I am glad to say that my own cook’s performances go far beyond
those of the local housewives, though his ability—and still more,
unfortunately, his willingness—leave much to be desired. Omari’s
very appearance is unique—a pair of tiny, short legs, ending in a kind
of ducks’ feet, support a disproportionately long torso, with a head
which seems as if it would never end at all; the man, if we may speak
hyperbolically, is all occiput. He is a Bondei from the north of the
colony, but of course calls himself a Swahili; all the back-country
Washenzi do, once they have come in contact with the Coast
civilization which is so dazzling in their eyes. Omari is the only
married man among my three servants; he says that he has four
children, and speaks of his wife with evident awe. She did not,
indeed, let him go till he had provided liberally for her support, i.e.,
induced me to open an account of seven rupees a month for her with
the firm who do my business at Dar es Salam.
I have put my three blackamoors into uniform khaki suits,
whereupon all three have appointed themselves corporals of the
Field Force, by persuading the tailor to sew a chevron in black, white
and red on their left sleeve. They are inexpressibly proud of this
distinction, but their virtues, unfortunately, have not kept pace with
their advancement. At Masasi I had to begin by applying a few
tremendous cuffs to stimulate Omari’s energy. This corrective has
proved inefficient in the case of the other two, as they will move for
nothing short of the kiboko. If each of the three had to be
characterised by a single trait, I should say that Omari is superstition
personified; Moritz, crystallized cunning; and Kibwana, a prodigy of
stupidity; while a mania (which has not yet entirely disappeared) for
coming to me at every spare moment to demand an advance, is
common to all three. All three, of course, make their exit in the same
hurried manner. If in forming my ethnographical collections I had to
deal entirely with people like my cook, I should not secure a single
specimen. The fellow displays an amulet on his left arm—a thin cord,
with, apparently, a verse from the Koran sewn into it. I remarked to
him, in an off-hand way, “Just sell me that thing!” He protested
loudly that he could not and would not do so, for he would infallibly
die the moment it left his arm. Since then I have been in the habit of
amusing myself by now and then making him an offer for his
talisman; on each successive occasion he raises the same outcry. And
as for his drawing! At Lindi, he once brought me the map of his
native country, charted by himself on a piece of greasy paper. No one
could make head or tail of it, except perhaps the devil whose
presentment he brought me the following day, drawn on the reverse
of the same piece of paper. Omari’s Prince of Darkness has no less
than four heads, but only two arms and one leg—at least such is the
verbal description he gives me; his drawing, like his map, is an
inextricable chaos of crooked lines. My carriers are artists of quite
another stamp. What spirit, for instance, is shown in a drawing by
Juma, usually the most phlegmatic of mortals, intended to represent
a troop of monkeys attacking a plantation—his own shamba in point
of fact. But we shall have to come back later on to the
draughtsmanship of the natives.
One provoking trick played me by my cook was connected with my
supply of coffee. I had brought two large tins with me from Dar es
Salam, each holding from six to eight pounds of the best Usambara
quality, one roasted, the other unroasted. According to all human
calculations, one tin should have lasted, even allowing the maximum
strength to my midday cup, at least several months, so that I was
quite taken aback when my chef came to me in the middle of the
fourth week with the laconic announcement,
“Kahawa imekwisha” (“The coffee is
finished”). A strict investigation followed.
Omari insisted that he had used two spoonfuls
a day for me. I told Moritz to open the second
tin and measure out with the same spoon the
MONKEYS quantity which, on his own showing, he
ATTACKING A
PLANTATION. DRAWN
should in the worst case have consumed. This
BY JUMA was done without appreciably diminishing the
quantity in the huge canister. Upon this I told
him to his face that he had used part of the
coffee himself, and sold part of it to his friends the soldiers.
“Hapana” was his only answer. The only way to escape this
systematic robbery is by daily measuring out the necessary quantity
with one’s own hands, but this takes up far too much of the time so
urgently required for work. This necessity for ceaseless supervision
was proved to me, moreover, by another incident. Kibwana and
Moritz usually take it in turns to be on the sick list, and sometimes,
in fact, frequently, both are incapacitated at the same time, usually
by fever. Moritz, a few days ago, declared himself about to die—but
not here at Chingulungulu: dying is so much easier at Lindi. Nils
Knudsen, with his soft Viking heart, compassionated the poor boy to
such a degree that I was at last morally compelled to make use,
although it was not regulation time, of my clinical thermometer: my
model medicine chest, I may remark, only contains one of these
useful instruments. The patient—at the point of death—registered
normal. Moritz, this time, recovered with astonishing rapidity.
On another occasion, however, he was really ill, and I allowed him
to make himself a large jug of my cocoa in the morning. Full of
forebodings, I went across to the kitchen, at his breakfast-time, and
not only found him revelling in comfort, but also the whole of my
party being regaled by the cook in the most generous way with the
contents of one out of my eight tins. Can one be expected to refrain
from using the kiboko?
The local amusements not being carried on at my expense are
decidedly more enjoyable than the above. The beer-drinkings here
take place, not, as at Masasi, in the morning, but in the afternoon.
Moritz must have a flair for festivities of this sort, since, whenever he
acts as guide in my afternoon strolls in search of knowledge, we are
sure to come upon a mighty company of tippling men, women, and
children. The love for strong drink seems thus to be pretty strongly
developed, though there is this year no special occasion to serve as
an excuse for drinking at Matola’s. The most prominent of such
occasions here in the south is the unyago, the ceremony of initiation
into manhood and womanhood, of which I have heard again and
again, from men as well as from youths, though so far I have not set
eyes on the least trace of such an arrangement. At present I do not
even see the possibility of personally witnessing the proceedings,
which, by all one hears, seem to be extremely complicated. I am
determined, however, that it shall somehow come to pass.
The reason why there is no unyago this year at Chingulungulu lies
in the arrangement by which each village keeps the festival in turn—
probably on account of the expense, which is no trifle. Besides the
enormous quantity of pombe drunk at the many dances, huge
supplies of provisions are required for the visitors who come far and
near to attend the celebration; and finally, calico has to be bought at
the Coast, both for the new garments in which the initiated are to
appear after the ceremony, and for the fees to their instructors, male
and female. I have no greater wish than to get a thorough insight into
this custom of all others, since, so far as I am acquainted with the
literature relating to Africa, this part of the sociological field is still
almost if not entirely untilled.
Meanwhile, the men amuse themselves and me in other ways.
Even before I left Masasi, I saw the people running together with the
cry, “Sulila amekuja!” (“Sulila has come!”), and a great crowd
collected round a man who was evidently a stranger. This man is, to
begin with, remarkable for the fact that, though stone blind, he
wanders all over the southern part of East Africa in perfect safety. It
is true that he had a companion, but this man, so far from being his
guide, walked behind him, carrying the bard’s professional
paraphernalia. Sulila, who belongs to the Yao tribe, is, in fact, a
professional singer. He offered of his own accord to give a
performance for my benefit and had completed his preparations in a
twinkling. The implements of his craft are simple enough. He has his
band formed afresh on the spot when wanted: six or eight men come
forward, squat down in a square, each lays down before him a log
stripped of the bark and about as thick as one’s arm, takes a stick in
each hand and awaits the signal to begin. The master in the
meantime has adorned himself with the utmost splendour, attaching
to his knees and ankles sets of rattles which consist of hard-shelled
fruits as large as moderate-sized apples, strung on leather thongs.
Round his waist he wears a kilt composed of whole skins and strips
of skins of various wild animals—wild cats, monkeys, leopards—and,
finally, his head is decorated and his face shaded by the mane of a
zebra or some large kind of antelope, looking like a barbaric crown.
THE BLIND BARD SULILA OUTSIDE THE BOMA AT MASASI
Sulila has taken his place in the centre of his band, holding his
stringed instrument in his left hand, and its bow in his right. This
instrument is a monochord with a cylindrical resonator cut out of a
solid block of wood, the string, twisted out of some hair from the tail
of one of the great indigenous mammals, is fastened to a round piece
of wood. Instead of rosin, he passes his tongue over the string of his
bow, which he then lifts and applies to the string, bringing out a
plaintive note, immediately followed by a terrible bellow from Sulila
himself and an ear-splitting noise from the “xylophones” of the band.
Strictly speaking, I am inclined to regret having come out on a
scientific mission: there is an inexpressible delight in seeing this
strange artist at work, and every diversion caused by the working of
the apparatus means a loss of enjoyment. Sulila is really working
hard—without intermission he coaxes out of his primitive instrument
the few notes of which it is capable, and which are low, and quite
pleasing. Equally incessant is his singing, which, however, is less
pleasing, at least for Europeans. His native audience seem to accept
it as music par excellence, for they are simply beside themselves with
enthusiasm. Sulila’s voice is harsh, but powerful; it is possible that its
strength to some extent depends on his blindness, as, like a deaf
man, he is unable to estimate the extent of the sound-waves he
produces. He takes his words at such a frantic pace that, though my
ear is now somewhat accustomed to the Yao language, I can scarcely
distinguish one here and there.
But the most charming of all Sulila’s accomplishments is the third,
for he not only plays and sings, but dances also. His dance begins
with a rhythmic swaying of the knees, keeping time to the notes of
his fiddle, while, with the characteristic uncertainty of the blind his
face turns from side to side. After a time the swaying becomes deeper
and quicker, the dancer begins to turn, slowly at first, and then more
rapidly, at last he revolves at a tearing speed on his axis. His bow
tears along likewise, his voice sets the neighbouring bush vibrating,
the band hammer away like madmen on their logs—it is a veritable
pandemonium, and the public is in raptures.
As already stated, I could not help secretly regretting the
impossibility of giving myself up unreservedly to the impression of
these performances, but the duty of research must always be the
predominant consideration. The hours spent over the camera,
cinematograph, and phonograph, involve more hard work than
amusement. This cannot be helped, but, if some of the results turn
out satisfactorily, as has fortunately happened in my case, all
difficulties and discomfort are abundantly compensated.
It is not easy to get phonographic records of the voice, even from
natives who can see. You place the singer in front of the apparatus,
and explain how he has to hold his head, and that he must sing right
into the centre of the funnel. “Do you understand?” you ask him on
the conclusion of the lecture. “Ndio” (“Yes”), he answers, as a matter
of course. Cautious, as one has to be, once for all, in Africa, you make
a trial by letting him sing without winding up the apparatus. The
man is still shy and sings too low, and has to be encouraged with a
“Kwimba sana!” (“Sing louder!”). After a second trial—sometimes a
third and fourth—the right pitch is found. I set the apparatus, give
the signal agreed on, and singer and machine start off together. For a
time all goes well—the man stands like a column. Then something
disturbs his balance. He turns his head uneasily from side to side,
and there is just time to disconnect the apparatus and begin
instructions again from the beginning. This is what usually happens;
in many cases undoubtedly it was vanity which induced the singer
coquettishly to turn his head to right and left, saying as plainly as
words could have done, “See what a fine fellow I am!”
With Sulila the case is much worse. He is so in the habit of moving
his head about that he cannot stop it when standing before the
phonograph, and the first records made of his voice are terribly
metallic. With the swift impulsiveness which distinguishes me, and
which, though I have often found cause to regret it, has repeatedly
done me good service in this country, I now make a practice of
seizing the blind minstrel by the scruff of the neck the moment he
lifts up his leonine voice, and holding his woolly head fast as in a
vice, regardless of all his struggles; till he has roared out his
rhapsody to the end. Most of the songs I have hitherto heard from
Yao performers are of a martial character. Here is one which Sulila
sang into the phonograph at Masasi on July 24:—
Tulīmbe, achakulungwa! Wausyaga ngondo, nichichi? Watigi: Kunsulila(1)
kanapagwe. Jaiche ja Masito; u ti toakukwimi. Wa gwasite(?) Nambo Wandachi
pajaiche, kogopa kuona: msitu watiniche; mbamba syatiniche; mbusi syatiniche;
nguku syatiniche; kumala wandu putepute; nokodi papopu; kupeleka mbia
syakalume. Gakuūnda(?) Mtima wasupwiche: Ngawile pesipo Luja. Kunsulila
ngomba sim yaule kwa Bwana mkubwa: Nam(u)no anduwedye atayeye mapesa
gao. Sambano yo nonembesile.[32a]
The meaning of this is:—
“Let us be brave, we elders. They asked: What is a war? They say:
‘Mr. Sulila is not yet born.’ Then comes (the war) of the Mazitu; guns
are fired; then they ran away. But the Germans came; it was
dangerous to see; the bush was burnt, the ants were burnt, the goats
were burnt, the fowls were burnt—the people were finished up
altogether; the tax came up (they had) to bring a hundred jars (of
rupees). They were not satisfied. (Their) heart was frightened. Mr.
Sulila telegraphed to the District Commissioner: ‘He may skin me to
make a bag for his money.’ Now I am tired.”
The tribes in the south-eastern part of our colony are very
backward as regards music; they have nothing that can be called
tune, and their execution never gets beyond a rapid recitative. In
both respects, all of them, Yaos, Makua and Wanyasa alike, are far
behind my Wanyamwezi, who excel in both. Only in one point the
advantage rests with the southern tribes—the words of their songs
have some connected meaning, and even occasional touches of
dramatic force. This is remarkably illustrated by Sulila’s song.
The Mazitu have made one of their usual raids on the unsuspecting
inhabitants of the Central Rovuma district. Which of the many
sanguinary raids on record is meant cannot be gathered from the
words of the song, it may be one of those which took place in the
eighties and nineties, or the recent rising—probably the latter, since,
so far as I am aware, there was never any question of taxes in the
previous disturbances. In this case, moreover, it is not so much a
war-tax that is referred to, as the payment of the hut-tax introduced
some years ago, which has during the last few months been paid in at
Lindi with surprising willingness by people who had been more or
less openly disaffected. This may be looked on as a direct
consequence of the prompt and vigorous action taken by the
authorities.
The interference of the Germans marks a turning point in the
fighting of the natives among themselves. The feeling that more
serious evils are coming upon them is expressed in terms of their
thought by speaking of the destruction of all property. First the bush
is burnt, and all the ants in it destroyed, then comes the turn of the
goats, which here in the south are not very numerous, though the
fowls, which are the next to perish, are. Finally, many people are
killed—Sulila in his ecstasy says all. Now come the conditions of
peace imposed by the victorious Germans: a heavy tax in rupees,
which must be paid whether they like it or not. In the eyes of those
immediately affected the sum assumes gigantic proportions, they
become uneasy and contemplate the step which, here in the south
may be said to be always in the air—that of escaping the
consequences of the war by an emigration en masse. Then appears
the hero and deliverer—no other than Sulila himself. In the
consciousness of his high calling, he, the poor blind man, proudly
calls himself “Mr. Sulila”[33] He sees his country already traversed by
one of the most wonderful inventions of the white strangers—the
telegraph wire. He telegraphs at once to the Bwana mkubwa, that
his countrymen are ready to submit unconditionally,—they have no
thought of resistance, but they have no money. And they are so
terrified that the Bwana might if he chose skin them to make a bag
for the rupees—they would not think of resisting. This is the end of
the song proper—the last sentence, “Now I am tired,” is a personal
utterance on the part of the performer himself, fatigued by the
unwonted mental effort of dictation.
Here at Chingulungulu there are several such minstrels. The most
famous of them is Che Likoswe, “Mr. Rat,” who, at every appearance
is greeted with a universal murmur of applause. Salanga has a still
more powerful voice, but is so stupid that he has not yet succeeded in
dictating the words of one song. If I could venture to reproduce my
records I could at once obtain an accurate text, with the help of the
more intelligent among the audience; but I dare not attempt this at
the present temperature, usually about 88°. I will, however, at least,
give two songs of Che Likoswe’s. One of them is short and
instructive, and remains well within the sphere of African thought,
that is to say, it only contains one idea, repeated ad infinitum by solo
and chorus alternately.
Solo:—“Ulendo u Che Kandangu imasile. Imanga kukaranga”
(“Mr. Kandangu’s journey is ended. The maize is roasted”).
Chorus: “... Ulendo u Che Kandangu....”
Che Likoswe’s “get-up” and delivery are very much the same as
Sulila’s, except that, in conformity with his name, he sings, fiddles
and dances still more vivaciously than his blind colleague, who is
also an older man. He is, moreover, extremely versatile—it is all one
to him whether he mimes on the ground, or on tall stilts—a sight
which struck me with astonishment the first time I beheld it. The
song itself, of course, refers to a journey in which he himself took
part. The most important incident from the native point of view is,
that all the maize taken with them by the travellers was roasted—i.e.,
consumed, before the goal was reached. Mr. Rat’s other song is much
more interesting; it has an unmistakable affinity with Sulila’s war-
song, and gains in actuality for me personally, because it is

Textbook A Life Cycle Approach To Treating Couples From Dating To Death 1St Edition Anne K Fishel Ebook All Chapter PDF

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Textbook A Life Cycle Approach To Treating Couples From Dating To Death 1St Edition Anne K Fishel Ebook All Chapter PDF

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

A Life Cycle Approach to Treating

Couples From Dating to Death 1st

Ageing of Infrastructure: A Life-Cycle Approach 1st

An Innovative Approach to Understanding and Treating

Carbon Footprint and the Industrial Life Cycle From

Guidelines for Inherently Safer Chemical Processes A

Denying Death An Interdisciplinary Approach to Terror

Guide to Software Development Designing and Managing

Building Green Software: A Sustainable Approach to

INDIAN FORESTRY A Breakthrough Approach to Forest

In this exceptional book, Fishel draws on her years of experience and

A Life-Cycle Approach to Treating Couples

From Dating to Death

MOMENTUM PRESS, LLC, NEW YORK

Copyright © Momentum Press, LLC, 2018.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

First published in 2018 by

ISBN-13: 978-1-94664-614-9 (paperback)

Momentum Press Psychology C

Cover and interior design by Exeter Premedia Services Private Ltd.,

First edition: 2018

Printed in the United States of America.

• Stage one is about dating, partner selection, and the decision

gay couples, gender differences, grandparents, illness, late midlife cou-

Anne Fishel has provided us with a rich, comprehensive, and evocative

In this exceptional book, Fishel draws on her years of experience and

Chapter 1 Applying the Life-cycle Perspective to Couple

Special thanks to three people who helped me track down articles

Applying the Life-cycle

If I were young again, I’d pay attention to that little-known dimension

As therapists, we hear an abundance of stories, information, and anguish

What Is the Life-cycle Perspective?

and Inhelder (1969). It is a somewhat newer idea that adults continue

• The first one begins with opening up to a stranger, falling

• The sixth stage centers on the loss of the relationship through

grew up in families where there were miscarriages or deaths of children.

Comparing ourselves to friends, siblings, work colleagues, and parents,

Clinical Example: Not Age but Stage of Development

Changing Social Forces Have Affected Life-cycle Stages

now having fewer children, completing child-bearing earlier, and living

a child, compared to half that number in 1976 (Dye, 2008; Osborne,

children (Parker, 2016). Several studies suggest that couples in egalitarian

more likely than Whites to disapprove of divorce. Despite these beliefs,

Divorce Is as Common an End to Marriage as Death

Clinical Example: The Use of a Developmental Reframe

Chingulungulu, August 20, 1906.

The greatest service Matola has hitherto rendered me is the

TWO MAKUA MOTHERS

The women having noticed that the first number on the

I have a good ear, but unfortunately have had no musical training

NATIVE WOMEN PREPARING MEAL. (POUNDING, SIFTING,

THE BLIND BARD SULILA OUTSIDE THE BOMA AT MASASI

You might also like

Chapter 1 Applying the Life-cycle Perspective to Couple