The politics of motherhood in the Yoruba diaspora

Lorelle D. Semley explores the historical and political meanings of motherhood in West Africa and beyond, showing that the roles of women were far more complicated than previously thought. While in Kétu, Bénin, Semley discovered that women were treasurers, advisors, ritual specialists, and colonial agents in addition to their more familiar roles as queens, wives, and sisters. These women with special influence made it difficult for the French and others to enforce an ideal of subordinate women. As she traces how women gained prominence, Semley makes clear why powerful mother figures still exist in the symbols and rituals of everyday practices.

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Semley provides historical depth and historiographical sophistication to this study of Yoruba women in West Africa and the Atlantic World.

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'Mother Is Gold, Father Is Glass' is a wonderful contribution to the literature on gender, African women, French colonialism, and the African diaspora.December 2012

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[T]his is an engaging and informative book for scholars interested in African history and gender.

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Lorelle Semley's engaging study of the historical and symbolic power of motherhood (and fatherhood) in Ketu, a Yoruba town in the Republic of Benin, makes an important contribution to the study of gender and power in the Atlantic world.africa 2013

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Semley's work is a welcome addition to a growing literature on gender and the European encounter with African societies. September 2011

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By excavating [the] ambiguous, shifting space between the rhetoric of Yoruba women's power as queens and mothers, and the realities of women's vulnerability and subordination as wives and slaves, Semley's Mother Is Gold, Father Is Glass makes an original and important contribution to women's history generally and to Yoruba history specifically.54.2 July 2013