Elite Malay Polygamy: Wives, Wealth and Woes in Malaysia 9781785339912

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Elite Malay Polygamy

Fertility, Reproduction and Sexuality General Editors: Soraya Tremayne, Founding Director, Fertility and Reproduction

Studies Group and Research Associate, Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Oxford. Marcia C. Inhorn, William K. Lanman, Jr Professor of Anthropology and International Affairs, Yale University. Philip Kreager, Director, Fertility and Reproduction Studies Group, and Research Associate, Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology and Institute of Human Sciences, University of Oxford. For a full volume listing please see back matter.

ELITE MALAY POLYGAMY Wives, Wealth and Woes in Malaysia

Miriam Koktvedgaard Zeitzen

berghahn NEW YORK • OXFORD www.berghahnbooks.com

First published in 2018 by Berghahn Books www.berghahnbooks.com © 2018 Miriam Koktvedgaard Zeitzen All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without written permission of the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Zeitzen, Miriam Koktvedgaard, author. Title: Elite Malay polygamy : wives, wealth and woes in Malaysia / Miriam Koktvedgaard Zeitzen. Description: First edition. | New York : Berghahn Books, 2018. | Series: Fertility, reproduction and sexuality ; volume 41 | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018008914 (print) | LCCN 2018010253 (ebook) | ISBN 9781785339912 (ebook) | ISBN 9781785339905 | ISBN 9781785339905 (hardback; alk. paper) Subjects: LCSH: Polygamy--Malaysia--Kuala Lumpur. | Polygamy-Religious aspects--Islam. Classification: LCC HQ981 (ebook) | LCC HQ981 .Z45 2018 (print) | DDC 306.84/23095951--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018008914 British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library ISBN 978-1-78533-990-5 hardback ISBN 978-1-78533-991-2 ebook

Contents

Introduction: Polygamous Anxieties

1

Chapter 1. Stories

17

Chapter 2. Elites

32

Chapter 3. Islam

48

Chapter 4. Secrets

64

Chapter 5. Blame 78 Chapter 6. Husbands 93 Chapter 7. Wives

108

Chapter 8. Desires 122 Chapter 9. Co-wives 137 Chapter 10. Sharing 151 Chapter 11. Children 166 Chapter 12. Families 181 Chapter 13. Rivals 195 Chapter 14. Magic 211 Chapter 15. Divorce 225 Conclusion: To Be or Not to Be Polygamous

240

Bibliography 255 Index 269

Introduction Polygamous Anxieties

Aisyah’s Story about Rejecting Polygamy Aisyah, fifty-seven, is monogamously married, and completely rules out polygamy; she would never accept it in her marriage. She is emancipated, educated and economically secure, facts clearly influencing her robust rejection of polygamy. Aisyah explained her position succinctly: There are two types of women: those who say that if it is in the Qur’an it must be accepted, since they would see criticism of polygamy as criticism of the ‘ultimate’, so they feel they cannot criticize polygamy even though they may not be for it. And then there are women who are independent and think on their own, and do not accept it. It is often very religious people; for example, religious leaders in kampungs [villages], who will practise it, because they see it as sanctioned by Islam, and to emulate the Prophet. Whereas people like me, with a head, who can think independently, we will say to our husband you must choose between your wives, and we will leave if he does not choose or chooses the second one.

Aisyah sees polygamy as basically incompatible with a marriage based on partnership and mutual respect and love. In polygamy a husband must suddenly divide his love and attention between several women, in effect cutting them off from sharing in significant parts of his life when he is with his other family. Aisyah has ‘yet to meet a woman who is happy in a polygamous marriage’, and suggests that the only situation where a woman might find some peace of mind in polygamy is if she cannot have children, and accepts it if her husband wants children.

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Elite Malay Polygamy

Personally, Aisyah has never feared facing polygamy. Firstly because of her conviction that it is not acceptable, and secondly because she knew she could take care of herself and her children if her husband took another wife and she left him: ‘I was not particularly worried about leaving my husband for several years when I took my degree (abroad) with respect to polygamy, since it is his right to take another wife and he could do that anytime.’ Aisyah is aware that her privileged position allows her to outright reject polygamy, yet she is unforgiving towards the men who let their ‘strong desires’ rule them: ‘All men go around thinking they are “MBAs”. Many men marry a second wife because at the back of their minds they feel they are married but available.’

Beginnings This is a book about Malay Muslim polygamy, as it unfolded some years ago among the urban elites of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s bustling federal capital. Polygamy’s prominence in the narratives of the urban elite Malay women I worked with led me to focus on this particular subject; it was not an a priori interest that drove me to explore it. It was rather the compelling undercurrent running through the many stories the women told me about polygamy – that they may be forced to expect and accept polygamy as Muslims, but that they mostly condemn and reject it as women and wives. It could be felt in the conflicted sentiments between their personal and their religious convictions with regards to polygamy. It could be felt in their condemnation of what they considered men’s manipulation of Islam and their false management of polygamy, a falseness reflected in the many secret secondary unions, which first wives often discovered in traumatic and humiliating ways. That intense undercurrent fuels this ethnographic account of urban elite Malay polygamy. Kuala Lumpur was my interlocutors’ main daily reference point for business and leisure. Some of them lived in the city, while others lived in the surrounding urban and suburban areas of Selangor, one of Malaysia’s thirteen states. Kuala Lumpur is a Federal Territory (Wilayah Persekutuan), one of three in the country, and generally (and henceforth) referred to as K.L. Twenty-five years ago, when I first visited K.L., I believed that polygamy was not only rare, but fast dying out with modernity. Coming back some years later, just before the turn of the twenty-first century, to conduct fieldwork

Introduction3

among urban Malay women as part of my Ph.D. studies in social anthropology at University of Cambridge, England, my focus was on ‘modern’ Malay lifeways in Kuala Lumpur, with all the global influences of contemporary urban life. Yet I was admonished early on by Hussein, the husband of one of my main interlocutors Rokiah, that: ‘you cannot study Malays in K.L., they are all Western, educated, … they are too extreme. … Real Malay culture is not found in K.L., it is all corrupt from Western influence’. Presented with such a ‘fatal impact thesis’, lamenting local cultural demise in the face of Western expansion and domination (Sahlins 1999), I was all the more determined to conduct my fieldwork in K.L. Polygamy was the last thing I expected to find there. The subject came to me through sheer force of presence. Elite women’s constant reference to polygamy, from freely exchanged gossip to formal interviews, alerted me to this major but at the time ethnographically under-explored theme in urban elite Malay women’s lives. The suggestion that polygamy was uncommon, in the then-current ethnographies on rural Malays of modest means, did not seem to apply to urban Malays of substantial means. The women I worked with all believed that polygamous marriages had gained prominence, either in actual numbers or in public awareness, among their peers, and acted according to this belief. It was a belief rife with anxieties, irrespective of whether there was in fact a numerical increase in polygamous marriages. As Blackburn (2004: 136) notes on the lack of precise data on polygamy rates in Indonesia, ‘for many women the actual incidence of polygamy is irrelevant: its sheer existence and social sanction is enough to make them feel insecure about marriage’. Among the urban elite Malay women I worked with, the psychological impact of polygamy far outweighed its statistical presence in their lives. In Malaysia, the right to polygamy is based on Islam, which conditionally allows a man up to four wives. This right is regulated by the Islamic Family Law codes, administered by the state religious departments and implemented by the Syariah (Islamic law) courts. In K.L., the current Islamic Family Law is Islamic Family Law (Federal Territories) Act 1984 (Act 303), with a number of amendments (henceforth IFL (FT)).1 Those of my interlocutors who were resident in the state of Selangor were held accountable to the Selangor Islamic Family Law. In Malaysia, Syariah law is applicable only to Muslims, hence only Muslims are allowed to be polygamous in Malaysia.2 As in Indonesia, it is difficult to get accurate data on polygamous marriage rates in Malaysia: the Department of

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Elite Malay Polygamy

Statistics only publishes non-specific marriage numbers and there are no central federal marriage registers. Estimates range from 2–3 per cent of marriages being officially registered as polygamous, up to 5–6 per cent of marriages, if unregistered and non-court approved polygamous marriages are taken into account (Abdullah, Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015: 144; Peng 2011: 153–54).3 The small numbers make it easy to dismiss polygamy as a rare occurrence. One does not have to live in K.L. very long to discover that the perceived, if not practised, reality appears very different among urban elite Malays. Modernity has not eradicated polygamy in Malaysia, as I had originally assumed. Modernity may be understood as an assemblage of grand narratives, shared stories that create a history of progress and emancipation set against a premodern past (Lyotard 1984). Malay modernity is an ongoing process, not a modernity imposed on Malaysia by external or Western forces, but rather a localized, historically contingent development, building on centuries of cultural creativity and hybridity (Mee and Kahn 2012). In contemporary Malaysia, modernity is for many Malays coupled with a focus on performing a Muslim identity within a global Islamic discourse (Frisk 2009; Hoffstaedter 2011; Peletz 2002). ‘Traditional’ Malay polygamy, itself a product of adaptations to changing circumstances over time, has adapted to this global Islamic discourse and offers today’s polygamous practitioners new benefits from reworked forms. There are contemporary urban elite Malays who accept polygamy as Muslim marriage compatible with a modern cosmopolitan lifestyle, while others reject it as a primordial custom incompatible with modern Muslim life. Some engage in polygamy because it serves a need or has particular value for them, not because it is necessarily seen as ‘authentic’ Muslim marriage. Others, like many of my interlocutors, can find no place for it in their personal lives, yet acknowledge it as a marriage form available to Muslims. Polygamy is also gaining public prominence, in principle and in practice, as various religious leaders, Islamic organizations and prominent polygamists cast the practice of polygamy as the practice of Islam. Yet whatever people’s perceptions of polygamy, its prominence establishes it as a marker of Malay Muslim modernity, however understood. Polygamy as Malay Muslim modernity incorporates both cosmopolitanism and primordialism, and shapes the formulation and articulation of Malay Muslim cultural identity; they are interconnected rather than distinct cultural processes (Kahn 1998: 5). As there can be no homogenous Malay cultural identity – all

Introduction5

cultural identity formulations and expressions are negotiated and contested – there will be many ways to be a modern Malay Muslim today. Some elite Malays will practise polygamy, some will not. The elite women I worked with mostly felt oppressed by polygamy in their lives (Siraj 2001). This feeling of oppression was in large part due to what they considered men’s false management of polygamy. I am not suggesting that polygamy is inherently oppressive to Malay women (Omar 1994; Solway 1990). Polygamy becomes oppressive through the actions and sentiments of its practitioners. Polygamy and patriarchy – men’s systematic domination of key structural and ideological resources and positions – are often bedfellows (Inhorn 1996, 2012). Polygamy, contrary to prevailing notions, was and is not common in Muslim communities, yet in many minds, polygamy and Islam are inextricably linked. It makes the subject of Muslim polygamy very sensitive as well as divisive. Western focus on polygamy and veiling (hijab), another controversial practice involving Muslim women, constitute stereotypical associations between Islam and Muslim women. Some Malay Muslims practising polygamy may indeed parallel women wearing veils as a political and religious statement. The parallel is apt, because veiling and polygamy are both typically seen as primary sites of Muslim women’s oppression, particularly in non-Muslim contexts. Yet Muslim women may voice their support for these actions as Muslim actions (Ahmed 1992; Blackburn 2004; Bowen 2003; Brenner 2012; Hassim 2017; Mernissi 1991; Mondal 1997; Wichelen 2007; Yamani 2008). The nexus of elite Malay polygamy within a modernity narrative is at the intersection of class, religion, culture, ethnicity, and, fundamentally, gender. These domains of meaning in relation to polygamy will be explored in order to understand women’s narratives about polygamy. In this ethnographic account, I will focus on seventeen urban elite Malay women from whom I collected life histories. I will arrange their stories so as to address some of their concerns, as well as these domains of meaning, in relation to polygamy. The seventeen women’s cumulative experiences and perspectives on polygamy reflect some of the general insights on polygamy that I collected among Malay elites. While their narratives form the book’s backbone, it is based on the experiences and perspectives of the numerous people I have talked to in Malaysia over the last twenty-five years. Of the seventeen women, seven women are or were polygamously married: Rashidah (45) is a first wife; Fauziah (60) and Maznah (56) were first wives but are now divorced; Zuriah

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Elite Malay Polygamy

(42), Noor (40) and Nazriah (35) are second wives; and Salbiah (51) is a third wife. Five women grew up in polygamy or experienced it as children: Rokiah (56), Zainab (49) and Aminah (38), all now monogamously married, and Raihana (43) and Zarena (26), both unmarried. Three women are monogamously married: Aisyah (57), Asmah (56) and Katijah (42), and two women are unmarried: Halima (36) and Kartini (29). A Note on Terminology In the text, I use the term polygamy, because it is the term used in daily conversation and legal texts in Malaysia. Technically, Malays practise polygyny, a plural marriage in which a man is married to more than one wife at a time. In the text I generally only refer to the first and second wife, because it is most common for a man to have only two wives. Elite Malay men may have three or four wives, which is uncommon among non-elites. I refer only to second wives to avoid having to write ‘second or subsequent wife’.

Polygamous Anxieties Challenging relations of gender are woven into the very fabric of elite Malay polygamy, because there is a fundamental inequality in men being able to marry several spouses simultaneously, whereas women can only marry one spouse at a time.4 As Woodcroft-Lee (1983: 186) observed many years ago, looking at Indonesian journals and ‘agony-aunt’ letters, ‘[t]he greatest impediment to the development of equality in marriage between husband and wife seems to be the persistence of polygamy’. It is still the case, in Indonesia and in Malaysia (Brenner 2012; Kasim 2002; Mohamad 2011; Nurmila 2009). And where there are unequal gender relations there are unequal power relations (Blackburn 2004; Connell 1987, 2005); I here lean on Weber’s (1948) classic definition that power is the likelihood that a person within a social relationship will be able to execute his will even if others resist it. The elite women that I worked with would probably be considered powerful by most people in Malaysia. Rashidah, for example, is very powerful in the public domain through her professional position, and she is powerful in her private domain, as she can take financial care of herself and her children, and make independent life decisions that often go against the wishes of her husband, such as going abroad to take a master’s degree. Rashidah can live her

Introduction7

life with minimal interference from her polygamous husband, yet she nonetheless considers her private domain the site of her disempowerment, because her husband married another woman. It was doubly humiliating for her through the secrecy involved and her present status as co-wife. It was during Rashidah’s overseas studies that her husband met the woman who later became his second wife, and Rashidah now feels that it was in fact her power vis-à-vis her husband, having left to pursue overseas studies without his approval, which ultimately disempowered her in her marriage. Malay marriage, as my interlocutors conceived it, is based on a contract, where husband and wife each have their specified duties towards each other, family and society. If one party reneges on an important duty, it can be grounds for divorce for both men and women; Syariah law (Islamic law) clearly sets out their respective duties (Karim 1992, 1998). Yet contemporary elite Malay women may no longer find much of what was traditionally perceived as Malay women’s duties appropriate. As Nazriah lamented: ‘Malay men expect their wife to be there for them; they expect to be served, to be number one in their lives. Malay women are brought up to be servants, which men expect; they are conditioned as children.’ Elite women are to a certain extent freed from many duties typically expected of Malay wives, because they have servants at their disposal or enjoy elevated social positions (Stivens 1998: 101). As Asmah noted: ‘Women in my family do not serve their husbands.’ According to Aisyah, spousal conflicts arising out of differing expectations regarding the performance of Malay gender roles are a function of the patriarchal nature of Malay society. To her, many relationships suffer because Malay boys are brought up by their mothers to be the ‘centre of the universe’; they are pampered and continue into adult life thinking they are the most important beings around. Studies have indeed shown that although modern Malay middle-class marriages are based to a certain degree on partnership and egalitarianism between the spouses, husbands tend to retain a greater say in familial decisions (Embong 2002: 85–86). As Fauziah explained: ‘The older generation of women was brought up to defer to men, to trust them completely. Mothers would tell their daughters that going against husbands was sinful. Therefore many women trust men without questioning their actions only to be left and deserted by them.’ My interlocutors’ views on their husbands’ or men’s relative position vis-à-vis themselves in marriage were influenced by their particular circumstances as urban elites, educated women with careers

8

Elite Malay Polygamy

and independent incomes, often with powerful natal families to back them up. While acknowledging that they should consult their husband before undertaking any major venture, most women remain adamant that they never ask their husband’s permission to leave the house or other such minor ventures ‘as should a Muslim wife from her husband’ (Altorki 1986: 55–57). Aisyah finds the notion ‘silly’, and her husband never demanded it, not even when she went abroad for several years to study, leaving him and their four children behind. For my interlocutors, asking a husband’s permission to leave the house – for example, to go shopping – is seen as unacceptable and out-dated. It can pose a very real dilemma for women, nonetheless, as Katijah explained: ‘It is the culture of Malay men, even if they are educated and Westernized, they still want to feel like the boss.’ For urban elite Malay women, who like Aisyah are mostly emancipated, educated and economically secure, marriage is not only a contract but also a partnership. Power-sharing between spouses is the premise of such a partnership (Embong 2002). Katijah considers marriage a partnership made up of equals: ‘In Islam a woman is an equal to her husband, a partner, she does not need to be subservient to him.’ My interlocutors generally felt that men and women are equal, but different; women are thought to be ruled by nafsu or passion, and men by akal or reason (Peletz 1995, 1996). According to Aisyah, Malay women are very powerful; they make the decisions in the household, but do it discretely, behind the scenes. A wife’s best strategy, I was told, was to pretend to be submissive and let the husband believe he was in charge when in fact the wife was. In Aisyah’s own marriage, she also keeps up appearances, for even though she has a tolerant husband, ‘he is still a Malay man’. ‘Horrible husband’ stories were a favourite narrative among the women I worked with, and like urban polygamy legends (see Chapter 1), they may be told to illustrate how men act unfairly towards their wives. In polygamy, the ‘horrible husband’ acting unfairly towards one (or more) of his wives, or indeed initiating polygamy, is a prime narrative engine. The observation that polygamy affects women’s perception of marriage is perhaps obvious, but cannot be emphasized enough. The prominence of polygamy among urban elite Malays has led to changes not only in spousal relations within marriage, but seemingly to changes in Malay gender relations more generally. Divisions between modernists and revivalists rejecting the ills of modernity have implicated polygamy in competing definitions of Malay family

Introduction9

life, which have polarized into a discursive opposition between Islam and adat (Malay cultural codes or customary law) (Stivens 1996, 1998, 2012) (see Chapter 3). These changes are crystalized in the disempowering effect of ‘the threat of polygamy’. I was often struck by the enormous effect this ‘threat’ of polygamy could have on women’s perception and indeed actualization of marriage. As Kartini, an unmarried 29-year-old, described it: ‘Women are so stressed out in marriage here, the motivating factor to be nice to their husband is not love any more but just to prevent that he takes another wife, it is very disempowering for women.’ Polygamy has hence become a key aspect of contemporary Malay gender relations. No matter how powerful or well-connected a wife is, the knowledge that her husband might take or has perhaps already taken another wife secretly is altering husband-wife relations to women’s detriment. When I first interviewed Katijah in her office, I saw a woman in charge. When I later had lunch with her and her husband, this forceful and articulate woman metamorphosed into a demure wife, serving him and hardly uttering a word in his presence. Her public display of submission was perhaps part of a calculated strategy of not appearing in charge when she was in fact relatively powerful in her marriage when away from the public eye, as I discovered when I visited her and her husband at home. It has been suggested that women in South East Asia typically have informal rather than formal power (Atkinson and Errington 1990; Karim 1992, 1995, 1998), yet my interlocutors daily contest this premise in their professional lives. My conversations with Katijah revealed how her increasing anxiety about her husband taking another wife was clearly affecting her autonomy and influence in her marriage by making her more submissive even in ‘private’ domains. Like other women I talked to, she never voiced this anxiety directly, because that would be tantamount to saying she had failed as a wife. She implied it through general comments about polygamy and cases involving ‘friends’. Katijah’s anxieties revealed how deeply disempowering the potential of polygamy was felt to be by a woman like her, highly educated, ambitious and successful in her career and seemingly in her marriage. The prospect of her husband being able to marry another woman without her being able to prevent it, or indeed know about it, was seen as a serious threat to their partnership, undermining the bonds of equality that she felt they had always shared. Her worried comments also underscore that polygamy’s impact on Malay gender relations is not uniform, nor is it constant, but rather is in

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Elite Malay Polygamy

constant motion, as it is influenced by the ebbs and tides of women’s polygamous anxieties. The ‘threat’ of polygamy may indeed be used by husbands as a strategy to keep powerful wives in check. Elite women may dread the prospect of becoming part of a polygamous marriage, and this dread may be enough to alter wives’ behaviour to husbands’ advantage, without them actually having to engage in polygamy. They may not even need to ‘threaten’ their wives with polygamy, but just mention it with respect to others or partake in rumour exchange and legend creation, thus establishing the possibility of polygamy in their wives’ minds. Such strategies reinforce changes in gender relations that Malay women may find detrimental and disempowering. Polygamy is of course not seen as detrimental to gender relations by all women; and some may feel empowered in entering such marriages. Yet contemporary elite Malay polygamy as I got to know it through my interlocutors’ stories appears to be mostly perceived as a distinctly male strategy.

Working with Elites The women I worked with were all Malay, Muslim and from the urban upper middle and upper classes, what I believe in Malaysian terms to be elite (Case 1996; Shamsul 1999; Sloane-White 2014). The term class, and particularly middle class, is highly contested in the social sciences (Embong 2002; Kessler 2002; Stivens 1998); likewise, the term elite is a rather fuzzy concept, and it remains difficult to clarify according to which criteria elites are ‘elite’ (Marcus 1983; Pina-Cabral and Pedroso de Lima 2000; Shore 2002). I will use the terms nonetheless, for want of a better terminology. Assigning women to a specific ‘class’ may be done through such parameters as occupation, residence, economic and social standing, social and familial background – either the women’s own or their husbands’. The seventeen women featured in this book were of varying wealth and social status. They all lived on a permanent basis in K.L. or Selangor, though many of them were not born and raised there, but had come from other Malaysian states in order to work or following their husbands. They were all working women, keen on their careers in the public or private sphere, and most of them held academic degrees acquired abroad, typically in England, Australia or USA, including Ph.D. and master’s degrees, MBAs, medical and law degrees.

Introduction11

When describing Malay women as ‘elite’, it should be noted that for some it is an inherited status, while for others it is acquired, either personally or through their husbands. Some of the women I worked with were from traditional Malay elites, such as daughters of royalty or government ministers. Others were elite based on individually achieved prominence, such as heads of large companies or government departments, or their husbands’ prominence, such as wives of high government officials or corporate CEOs. Many of them carried titles, some acquired through husbands or fathers, some through their own merit. Current social mobility in Malaysia tends to blur the line between women with inherited or acquired elite status by allowing a much wider access to elite status through monetary wealth. Today, elite status can be achieved through economic affluence, rather than through traditional forms of hereditary ranking or leadership. The ‘new rich’ have been associated with state-promoted Melayu Baru or new Malay, sometimes called ‘orang kaya baru’ or new rich person in contrast to ‘orang kaya lama’ or old rich person – that is, belonging to traditional elites (Shamsul 1999). There are obstacles and challenges in all fieldwork, yet there are particular ‘field constraints’ when working with elites. There may be social and financial barriers to full participation in elite lives, and elites can seldom be ‘observed’ in a classic sited way due to their exclusive lifestyles, literally and figuratively (Hertz and Imber 1995). Working with elites hence renders the hallmark ethnographic method of participation-observation somewhat daunting. My observation on the sidelines, as friend and fieldworker, in one of my interlocutor’s secret polygamous marriage in London, highlighted that when working with elites there are no defined field boundaries. My work with my closest interlocutors extended beyond my ‘official’ fieldwork site in K.L. to Malaysia’s exclusive East Coast resorts, to shopping in Singapore’s glittering malls and to my own private home in London. One might argue that it was multisited fieldwork or rather fluid, dynamic ‘fields’ (Appadurai 1996; Marcus 1995). The challenge with such dynamic fields is where does one look for polygamy, as it were, if there are no specific field sites in which to observe it (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2015a).One obstacle was physical access. Malay elites live spread out over a large area, in several wealthy ‘pockets’ of K.L. and the surrounding state of Selangor. There are no neighbourhoods where one can simply stroll around and observe ‘elites’, let alone participate in their lives, or engage in friendly banter or gossip. Elite Malays may live in large houses,

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Elite Malay Polygamy

surrounded by fences and electric gates, making actual physical access difficult. One usually has to pass at least one gatekeeper before gaining entry into the house, giving the host the opportunity to ‘not be in’. I therefore began to focus on people’s narratives and conversations and observations of their interactions with spouses, families and friends wherever we happened to be. Such fluid sites were indeed symptomatic of elite polygamy – polygamous families may not have a defined physical locus, as such, where they can be ‘observed’. Social access was another obstacle. Elite Malays, like all elites, are notoriously difficult to work with because of problems of social access. I was introduced to several elite members of Malay society through family connections, in order to establish my social credentials. Yet during my initial long-term fieldwork, I was unable to find a host family to live with, apart from shorter stays, which would have immersed me in elite cultural worlds and lifestyles, in time-honoured anthropological fashion. I had come to Malaysia alone, and as such a single woman around whom men in the household could not be themselves, that is, without potentially violating Islamic rules of modesty and ‘close proximity’, khalwat. Such explanations were often given to me in more or less disguised forms as reasons why I could not live in their houses. The spectre of polygamy was also alluded to in general terms by some women. Yet this apparent obstacle turned out to be a blessing in disguise. Living on my own allowed me to invite whomever I wanted, as I had no allegiance to any particular elite family. This became an important consideration when working with such a relatively small group of people who all know (of) each other, and have as many friends as enemies among them. My apartment became a sort of liminal space, a ‘safe haven’ where I, being ‘foreign’ to their worlds, could safely be confided in and where we could talk freely and undisturbed. In response to the ‘field constraints’ of working among elites, one of my primary field methods became collecting women’s life histories. Life histories contain both women’s retrospective accounts of their lives as they choose to present them, as well as cover particular areas prompted by me, such as polygamy. Mostly, it was not necessary to prompt women about polygamy – polygamy looms large in Malay imaginings of marriage, and the ‘idea of polygamy’ is a prime narrative generator in many of the stories I collected. It might indeed be argued that it is the idea of polygamy, rather than the actuality of it, which has most cultural salience in Malay society.

Introduction13

Life histories’ depth of description personally and culturally did not absolve me from looking for other ethnographic insights into polygamous life, to avoid collecting just a waffle of thoughts and memories, recollections and ‘hearsay evidence’. Yet using life histories was methodologically liberating, for it enabled me to move beyond the search for ‘typical’ elite Malays or attempt to create representations of ‘typical’ elite Malay culture. The premise that the women as individuals, as Malays or as urban, elite Malays were not necessarily ‘typical’ in any representative way allowed me to concentrate on, and strive to understand, individual women’s perceptions and experiences of polygamy, as well as their idiosyncratic approach to life as urban elite Malay women. Personally recounted lives are inherently individual and subjective, and I was mostly unable to check life history data. Yet rather than try to establish the truth or falseness of their accounts, I used life history materials to examine how they conceptualize themselves, their lives and their world (Watson and Watson-Franke 1985). I did not expect women to speak ‘cultural truths’, nor was I looking for ‘true stories’; I wanted to record women’s own stories about polygamy as they chose to tell them. The book is hence written in an indistinct ethnographic present. It is a potentially problematic approach, because life as it unfolds is of course dynamic and ever-changing (Fabian 2014). Yet it allows me to convey particular emotions, particular moments in my interlocutors’ lives as they navigate through polygamous worlds. The perspectives and practices of the women who narrate the stories of polygamy found in the pages to come were mostly collected in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Their stories are conveyed within a context of societal processes in Malaysia spanning up to the mid2010s, however. The women’s concerns and the societal processes impinging upon polygamy in contemporary Malaysia are not only broadly the same as when I collected the bulk of the stories, they have in fact become more acerbated. A main change is the vastly expanded use of social media in polygamy discourses, but to protect my interlocutors’ privacy, I will not explore this discourse domain. I have indeed chosen this ‘soft-lens’ approach because it can help protect my interlocutors’ privacy, a central ethical consideration in all ethnography. As time goes by, circumstances change, events become less recognizable, memories blur. Focus on a subject as personally and publically sensitive as polygamy does indeed generate various ethical concerns. Issues of informed consent, protection of sources and invasions of privacy are

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Elite Malay Polygamy

concerns in all ethnography, but particularly when working with elites. Elites will have access to whatever is written about them, and many of them will know, or know of, each other. To safeguard the identity and privacy of the women who shared their lives with me, I have changed their names, and the names of their family members, and I have removed all reference to their titles or specific familial affiliations. I have changed certain aspects and details of their life histories, because they might otherwise be instantly recognizable for other elites, but I have attempted to do so in a manner that does not compromise the essential character of their story. I have also made an effort to respect the women’s right to remain silent. Many of the women, or their families, are very prominent and even small biographical details might lead to their identification; elite circles are narrow and circumscribed. When details of their lives set them apart in some specific way, or stories they told me were extraordinary or compromising, I have chosen not to tell them and let them remain silent. In a further attempt to protect their identity, I have merged these groups of women who are now all ‘elite’, but may have very dissimilar backgrounds. Furthermore, their reactions to polygamy tend to be similar. Women from traditional elites, such as royal families, who have grown up with polygamy as an ever-present possibility or actuality in their mothers’ marriages, are often assumed to be better able to cope with polygamy in their own marriages or to be less disinclined to enter polygamous marriage. Yet they may react just as strongly to their husband marrying a second wife as women from non-elite backgrounds (where polygamy was rarely practised), who have risen through the social classes and now find themselves facing polygamy in their own marriages. They tend to agree that nothing can truly prepare a woman for the emotional and physical turmoil she may face in polygamy.

Notes   1. For IFL (FT) see International Law Book Series (ILBS), Petaling Jaya, Selangor, 2014.  2. For a discussion of the Malaysian legal system and Syariah law, see Endut (2015) and Peletz (2013); the legal history of polygamy in Malaysia is discussed in Abdullah, Abdullah and Ferdousi (2015).

Introduction15

 3. Malaysian population statistics can be found at: https://www.dosm. gov.my/ (accessed 25 May 2017); see also work done by reformist women’s group Sisters in Islam at http://www.sistersinislam.org.my.  4. For a discussion about equality and subjugation in polygamy, see Koktvedgaard Zeitzen (2008).

Chapter 1

Stories

Asmah’s Story bout Imagining Polygamy Like many monogamously married Malay women, 56-year-old Asmah worries about polygamy. Mostly, it is a general worry. For Asmah, relating what she would do and feel if her husband took a second wife remains a theoretical exercise. Yet Asmah has done more imagining than most, fuelled by her intense sharing in the emotions and experiences that her relatives and friends facing polygamy go through. For Asmah, there is a fundamental schism between men’s and women’s perspectives on polygamy. Trying to reconcile them often seems an impossible task: A second wife is not accorded the same dignity as the first wife. There is some stigma and she might feel inferior; she is looked at as someone who takes another woman’s husband. It is mostly other women who look at her this way; they have the most at stake, since their husbands can do that to them. Men mostly don’t care about polygamy, and men are never blamed for doing it. In men’s eyes they don’t see it as a problem.

To Asmah, polygamy is one of the worst fates that can befall a woman. A friend of hers became very distraught when the husband took a second wife, but deals with it by being very religious and accepting polygamy as a Muslim institution. The husband takes good care of her financially, so she has learned to cope. Asmah is adamant, however, that Malay women do not possess any special personal coping mechanisms with regards to polygamy: ‘It does

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Elite Malay Polygamy

not help to be Malay or Muslim, for you are a woman first and it is difficult for all.’ Yet Asmah’s own perceptions of living with polygamy have become less sharp and more pragmatic as the years have gone by: I always felt or said to my husband when I was younger, if you are lying in the drain drunk I will pick you up, if you are in jail or if you lose your job, I will stand by you, but if you take a second wife that is unacceptable, I will leave you. But now, when I advise my friend who faces the threat of seeing her husband getting married to a second wife, my perspectives have changed, why should she leave and loose the house and his pension, after all these years, why make it so easy for him, better stay and endure it.

Polygamy Storytelling ‘Just like there are seasons for rambutan or durian [local fruits], there are seasons for talks on such issues’, Aisyah noted when we discussed the prominence of polygamy in Malaysian media. High profile polygamy cases involving elite Malays feature regularly in various media. Polygamy’s present public prominence is probably partly a result of more publicity. Yet for the women who shared their polygamy stories with me it was very real indeed, and they increasingly rearrange their lives and loves on the assumption that for them too polygamy can become a reality. When elite Malay women recount their thoughts or experiences with polygamy in narrative form it creates meaning. Through their narratives, the women try to make sense of what is for many of them an unknown or unwanted world of polygamy. I went through a similar meaning-creating process by engaging in a common interpretive process with my interlocutors, in order to make women’s own interpretations of polygamy, as they offered them in their narratives, the basis and premise of my analysis of polygamy (AbuLughod 1993; Lindisfarne 2000). This interpretational pluralism was part of my attempt to contextualize polygamy, of evaluating earlier anthropological narratives and cultural assumptions about polygamy, as well as utilizing the narrative possibilities of engaging with the women in understanding and presenting their bodies of knowledge about polygamy (Bruner 1986; Harvey 1999). The result is very much an ethnography of the particular (Abu-Lughod 1991). My aim is to give some insight into elite Malay women’s

Stories19

emotional journeys in polygamy (Svasek 2005; Tonkin 2005; Wulff 2011), as well as their everyday practices in managing such a challenging matrimonial arrangement. Gossip, a favourite pastime of urban elite Malays (and most other people), is a prime production site for polygamy narratives, and hence for insights into women’s emotional journeys and everyday practices in managing polygamy. A number of ‘publicly owned’ stories about polygamy circulate in town and in various media, acquiring increasing infamy the more they get around. These stories help create a sense of a growing number of polygamous unions in the K.L. area. Such stories, especially if they are spectacular or involve public personalities, may be published in various media, though not necessarily in full detail. Invariably, someone will know or have heard of one or more of the persons involved, so people start filling in missing details and persons, developing the story, adding to the gossip. I would also swap stories and add dimensions in order to create my own space on the polygamy gristmill. My motto was ‘give in order to get’, while being exceedingly careful not to reveal any one’s identity – a very hard task indeed when many of my interlocutors were on the ‘known list’ or had bonds of family or friendship – or indeed enmity – with the gossiping crowd. It required consummate social manoeuvring. Much of my knowledge of women’s perceptions and experiences of polygamy in fact came not through formal interviews, but from casual conversation. Many stories I heard and exchanged – based on their typically sensationalist content, their stereotypical narrative structure and their impassioned performance – were clearly gossip. It was admittedly a gratifying way of learning. A classic polygamy gossip story in modern day K.L. might typically contain elements of power, fame, wealth, violence between wives, scorned first wife and betrayed second wife. Regular players in such scenarios might include beauty queens, actresses, media women, top civil servants and senior politicians or their offspring, leading businessmen, as well as members of aristocratic and royal families. In one particularly ‘gratifying’ gossip story, a woman moved from one man to another as a potential second wife, going, I was told, ‘for a bigger fish’. This act outraged high society while simultaneously thrilling them, especially as her second choice of husband ultimately died, adding a touch of scandal. Others claimed she was dumped by her different boyfriends because she was too expensive to maintain, in the process reclaiming polygamous

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Elite Malay Polygamy

initiative for men. As Shamsul (1999:92) notes, gossip and stories laced with envy or insult are often associated with the new rich Malays, and what may be considered by some to be their inappropriate displays of wealth. An important aspect of gossip is indeed how it is used instrumentally by the women who are in, or are faced with being in, polygamous unions themselves (Paine 1967; Scott 1987). Gossip can be used to secure allegiances from friends and family. Getting your children or your parents-in-law on your side might help you avert your husband engaging in polygamy for fear of family sanctions. A second wife spreading the word about her husband’s first wife can be an attempt to get allies on her side, get greater attention from her husband and achieve the ultimate; namely, to get her husband to divorce his first wife. Similarly, spreading the word about one’s husband’s second wife can discredit her (Geertz 1961: 132–33). One of my interlocutors related how her family was often the target of polygamy rumours, because many people assumed that her father had a second wife, ‘in his position, when he would go outstation, and stay away for some days’. There is a widespread belief that men who travel a lot, and regularly spend some days away from home, ostensibly on business, probably have a second wife installed somewhere (see Chapter 6). She relates how: There was also the problem of confused identities, since there was one or two other Tan Sri1 … around, who had a second wife. Once my father brought me in his car to run an errand, and because I was seen waiting outside in the car, people thought I was his second wife. Another time he brought my pregnant sister-in-law to a hospital for check-up and then after a few days rumours started to circulate that he had a second wife who was pregnant.

Women often use their female friends to gather intelligence on their husbands, either through the gossip mill or by direct observation. First wife Fatimah, for example, gets updated on her husband’s second wife by a friend who works in her husband’s office; she regularly receives reports on ‘how unpleasant and disliked the second wife is’. Halima recounted how she was asked to spy on her colleague, the husband of a close friend, who suspected him of ‘polygamous intent’. Halima refused, and so her friend had to rely on other sources of information, such as gossip, to gauge her husband’s polygamy plans. Polygamy ‘intelligence’ can indeed be very significant, for alerting a friend that her husband has an eye for another woman can help her deal with the situation before it

Stories21

gets out of her reach. Zainab had been married for twenty-five years when she heard through friends that her husband wanted to marry a young girl. Rather than confront him directly, she told him that if he wanted to marry again she would sign the consent form but then wanted to lead her own life without interference from him. So he knows that she knows, and so she averted him marrying the other woman because of his fears of family sanctions, particularly from his children. Using gossip to secure intelligence or allegiance from friends and family can also backfire, however, as Rokiah suggests: ‘We don’t see a friend who became a second wife any more, because she is not sincere; she makes up stories which are not true; she says bad things about the first wife to get more of her husband’s attention. But she has taken someone else’s husband, so she should not make up stories about the first wife.’ Much knowledge of polygamy thus comes from gossip and stories exchanged among women in the family, in the network of friends, in the office or in various media. The same goes for me as an outside observer as for local people, who might not themselves have direct experience with polygamy. Gossip can constitute significant ethnographic data (Stewart and Strathern 2003). Rather than just being a result of the way I conducted fieldwork, and the very real constraints I faced in obtaining data, these stories are of analytical importance. They gave me ample empirical insight into the potential psychological and physical turbulence of living in polygamy, or with the threat of it. Gossip is clearly very prominent in narrating elite polygamy in Malaysia, perhaps because gossip – as a form of narrative, a sort of story – in a very direct but also very dynamic way can encapsulate women’s perceptions and experiences of polygamy. Exploring gossip allowed me to see polygamy through a prism of words and worlds. When women gossip about polygamy, they are also describing and discussing the cultural and social worlds they live in. Gossip may give them room for reflecting on their lives and the lives of others inhabiting their worlds. It may help them to better navigate a cultural and social landscape where polygamy can suddenly seem to occupy a more prominent position than they may have expected or been prepared for. Keeping updated about peers through gossip – who has married whom, under what circumstances and with what consequences – may help women prepare for similar eventualities in their own lives or in the lives of those close to them.

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Elite Malay Polygamy

Everyday exchanges about polygamy provide a way for women to build common frameworks for handling polygamy, through constant negotiation and alignment of cultural ideas and ideals, and potentially associated social behaviours with respect to polygamy, among their peers. Stories about polygamy, whether told through gossip or other forms of storytelling, may provide women with an opportunity to explore cultural conventions regarding love, marriage and partnership. Yet cultural conventions are never clear-cut or static, and women may not reach consensus on how to deal with polygamy, personally, in practice. It may not be the aim of exchanging gossip, for gossip both fragments and reaffirms their daily lived world; rather, gossip and other stories allow them to vent worries and seek solutions to problems, even if only to get empathy from the listener. For some, gossip clearly acted as a stress-management strategy (Bergmann 1993; Haviland 1977; Stewart and Strathern 2003; Wardle 2001).

Urban Polygamy Legends In a typical scenario from my fieldwork, I was attending a ‘power-lunch’ with three prominent women at a Japanese restaurant in K.L. We had our own little room, surrounded by rice paper walls, entailing that our conversation could be heard far and wide. One woman in particular freely discussed corruption and commented on government policies and people, even though people in the restaurant knew who she was, her name and title having been loudly announced by the waiter when we entered the restaurant. I put it down to her power and position that she felt at ease talking publically about such potentially divisive topics. Our conversation invariably strayed onto the latest affairs and marriages among the elites, and before long polygamy came up. At this point, the loud lady hushed us up and made gestures to the paper walls to indicate that other people could hear us. Polygamy was considered a sensitive topic. She did know salacious details, yet intriguingly she felt that this issue was more off limits than corrupt politicians, a topic that is not entirely without risk to discuss publically. It involved people personally known to them, part of their extended families, networks of friends, colleagues and business partners, so it was prudent to be discrete. It was the gossip mill that most forcefully alerted me to polygamy’s ambiguous status among elite Malays. Polygamy might be

Stories23

on the fringe of acceptability, a culturally ambiguous domain that is both accepted and rejected, often by the same people, for different reasons. This cultural ambiguity towards polygamy makes it something that one still gossips about, something slightly shady and a bit scandalous to be passed on with fright and delight, at least among women. It is not just a matter of marriage; it is still to some degree considered an extraordinary event. An important element of polygamy’s ambiguous acceptability among elite Malays is the fact that many men keep their second wives secret to all but a few friends. This was abundantly illustrated in the stories told by the lunching ladies. Not even the first wife may know that her husband has taken another wife; in fact, that seems to be the case in many polygamous unions in urban Malaysia. The secrecy of the institution might imply that it is not fully accepted by society. The many layers of meaning involved in secret polygamous marriages will be explored in Chapter 4. Among women polygamy was thus a favourite topic of conversation – perhaps not surprisingly, considering what is potentially at stake for the individual woman. They would revel in stories about whose husband had married whom, why and under what circumstances. With a sense of thrill and outrage they would tell me particularly hair-raising stories about men’s cunning and women’s abandon in polygamous unions. The more stories I heard and collected, the more it became apparent that there were myth-like elements in many of the polygamy stories that circulated among women (Rudie 1994: 159; Segal 2004). In a typical story, I was told of a man who obtained consent from his first wife for taking a second wife by putting the consent form in a stack of papers she was to sign for the jointly owned company. She did not actually read the form but just signed it. It might have happened, but it might also fall within the category of mythical stories that women exchange on polygamy. I began to wonder if there was a production of what may be termed ‘urban legends’ about polygamy in K.L. Such legends tend to exaggerate and fabricate events, so that the core might be true, but time, place and persons involved will change and evolve to suit the needs of the person telling the story (Brunvand 1981; Stewart and Strathern 2003). Elite Malay women, like all people in living cultures, connect culturally by sets of connected stories. They create and develop cultural identity through the stories they exchange, including myths of polygamy. Myths are often understood to be fictional stories about imaginary happenings, but in contexts where

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Elite Malay Polygamy

people actively create, perform and use myths, this is not necessarily so. Myths may in some contexts be understood as ‘true’ stories relating to some reality, akin to what in other contexts passes as history, based on happenings considered to have objective reality. The distinction between myth and history may thus be considered to some extent fictional, in the sense that they both represent narratives that might be considered true or real in their cultural contexts (Tonkin 1992). Urban polygamy legends are stories women exchange to make sense of difficult and culturally challenging situations. The point of these stories may not be whether they in fact happened as described – that is, whether they are ‘true’ in relation to an ‘objective’ reality. Myths at their most basic, according to Segal (2004: 4–6), are stories whose main figures are personalities, who accomplish something significant for their adherents, who hold to them tenaciously. The myths of polygamy are indeed stories of significant upheavals and emotional turbulence in elite women’s lives. The main protagonists may be public personalities, and the stories provide culturally appropriate narratives about how (women believe) men trick and hurt their wives when engaging in polygamy. They are held tenaciously by women in the way myths may be believed, if we understand myths as ‘traditional’ narratives about semi-historical happenings that explain some of the ultimate questions about human existence (Bowie 2006). Urban polygamy legends are generalizing and moralizing stories that illustrate the predicament of elite women facing polygamy. They may not necessarily be factual stories relating to actual situations, yet they may still be believed to be true by the women exchanging them. One of the central aspects of urban polygamy legends is their ability to subvert women’s public claim that men are not to blame for polygamy (see Chapter 5). They offer women an outlet to blame men without doing so directly. The legends narrate a phenomenon, polygamy, which in many ways goes against the grain of Malay (and Muslim) emphasis on complementarity between spouses (Karim 1992, 1998). Polygamy cannot easily be told within conventional categories in Malay culture, because it has not been a significant part of Malay marriage; through urban legends, women can redefine polygamy as the exception from the marriage norm. By defining polygamy as something aberrant, the ‘normal’ way of marrying – that is, monogamy, is confirmed. Through a narrative context, where there are rules and structures for what

Stories25

is right and wrong, legends can both explain and explain away polygamy as something deviant from normal Malay monogamous marriage (Tonkin 1992). Narrating polygamy as aberrant is fuelled by the strong personal emotions involved. Fifty-six-year-old Rokiah, who grew up in polygamy, often described to me how very hard polygamy is on women; how they feel discarded, useless, betrayed by their husbands, and how difficult it is to deal with personally and socially. She described how a friend, who had married very young, nearly went mad when after twenty years of marriage her husband took another wife of the same age as her. Krulfeld (1986: 204) reports similar themes of insanity and betrayal among women in polygamous unions in Indonesia (Ahmed 1992: 108). Narratives of madness and betrayal eminently provide fuel for urban polygamy legends. The legends provide women with a framework for relating the personal pain they go through in polygamy, by reinforcing culturally appropriate categories of what is right and wrong with respect to marriage. The narrated theme of female madness in trying times is part of Malay cultural discourses, as exemplified in the phenomenon ‘latah’. Latah is usually explained as a form of temporary insanity or cognitive disassociation displayed by women frustrated and disempowered in the face of adversity. Though rare, it is a culturally recognizable way of dealing with intense stress in a cultural context where women are not supposed to express strong emotions in public (Baker 2008; Kenny 1990; Ong 1987). Latahlike acts can help narrate the extreme stress experienced by some women in polygamy. Urban polygamy legends may involve certain factual elements, which are then embellished with more colourful if less factual elements for dramatic effect. Certain apartment complexes in K.L., for example, have become infamous for housing secret second wives and mistresses. As Kartini wryly noted, ‘in the … apartments the gym is always full of models, they go there to be picked up.’ Such often luxurious complexes may be patronized by expatriates and polygamous wives alike, both groups enjoying above average incomes. Living among expatriates rather than locals furthermore lessens secret second wives’, and their husbands’, chances of being ‘exposed’ in the Malay community. The theme of ‘second wife complexes’ is common in narratives of polygamy, reflecting a factual element that may then be embellished by being portrayed as secret sites of sin. Katijah related the following story:

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Elite Malay Polygamy

Such women are usually kept in particular areas, in condos. … There was a block of flats which collapsed not far from my house; it was full of mistresses and second wives, because I always saw young women drive by very fast in flashy cars which they could not have afforded already on their own. I believe that the death toll was much higher than reported, because men would not admit that their second wives were living there. Some say that the collapse was God’s revenge for all the sin committed there.

Modern Malay myths of polygamy derive their power from their affective, performative aspects – good myths are simultaneously entertaining and thought-provoking. As strong narratives forcefully performed, myths can delight and shock audiences while involving them emotionally, inspiring laughter and tears, in order to give audiences greater insight into the ambiguities of their lived realities (Vernant 1996). The myth-like elements in urban polygamy legends help specify and define the distinctive social norms of elite Malays, and can strengthen elite Malay women in their understanding of their own cultural identity. Following Malinowski (1948), we might say that myths of polygamy become prominent and dominant because the social or moral order demands justification and sanctity – for elite Malay women, polygamy may threaten the perceived normal or ‘right’ Malay social and moral order with respect to marriage. As such, the mythic narratives in urban polygamy legends provide a charter for ‘right’ marriages – that is, monogamous marriages.

Narrating Polygamy The narrative identity the women created through their stories was fluid and dynamic; the stories suggested that the women lived through several fragmentary, discontinuous narratives, relating different lived worlds to me at different times. Narratives became primary in our interactions in a self-reinforcing cycle, as narratives once told provoked new thoughts about polygamy, and our understandings of polygamy evolved as the narratives evolved. Relying on narratives as my primary ethnographic data opened up new avenues of understanding into my interlocutors’ lives and thoughts. As Ochs and Capps (1996: 25) point out, ‘narratives are often launched in response to current worries, complaints and conflicts. In a reciprocal way, in the course of their telling, portions of narratives may provoke interlocutors’ concerns about the present and future’.

Stories27

I met 45-year-old Rashidah, as I met a number of prominent women, by contacting her directly in order to conduct a formal interview about her work. Within an hour, however, she started to pour her heart out over her agonizing polygamous marriage. Suddenly, she confessed that her husband had secretly married a second wife – doing a double narration of successful professional woman and vulnerable first wife. For Rashidah, self-narration may be less prominent than professional stories in her public life, yet when facing the particular personal crisis that polygamy can elicit, she may even in public perform a personal narrative. I was initially stunned that women as prominent as Rashidah would volunteer such personal information to me when hardly knowing me, and clearly aware that I was a researcher. I took it as a sign of the frustration and angst that polygamy creates, even in such powerful women. The much talking about polygamy among Malay women, gossip exchanged in the family, the network of friends or in the office, make women anxious that their husband will be the next to be, or perhaps already secretly is, married to a second wife. The threat of polygamy in elite Malay women’s lives, as they called it, made women turn to narrative to relate their experiences and anxieties. While anxieties and suffering are always intensely personal and subjective, narratives mediate between the cultural and the personal, providing insight into the many layers of meaning in elite Malay polygamy. The women’s many different narratives about polygamy – from gossip to formal interviews – embodied their understandings of their worlds, their experiences, themselves. Their stories are influenced by broader Malay conventions of context, communication and performance, and indeed by the multiple other polygamy stories circulating in K.L. Even the women’s most personal stories may be said to be fashioned from elements of others’ stories: their families, their friends, prominent public figures. The many available narratives set up conventions and constraints on individual women’s own stories, but also contribute material that women can use when narrating themselves and their (potentially) polygamous lives; their stories spring from individually lived lives, however (Garro and Mattingly 2000; Kerby 1991). People’s perceptions and experiences, their feelings, thoughts and actions about polygamy are strikingly filtered through a gendered lens. Men and women tend to perceive polygamy, and people engaging in it, quite differently. Yet several major narrative themes as to why people become part of polygamous unions in

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Elite Malay Polygamy

contemporary Malaysia kept cropping up in my conversations with both men and women. The stories on which this book is based, and the themes I have discerned in them, are primarily women’s stories. It is important to state, because polygamy elicits strong emotions in women, from feelings of confusion and ambivalence, to anger and sadness, and at times also happiness and exhilaration. Such emotions must be explored and contextualized, not least when informing descriptions of men’s views and reasons for practising polygamy. One of the main challenges of my fieldwork was indeed that I had little access to men and men’s perspectives on marriage, family and polygamy. Firstly, I worked almost exclusively with women, often away from their homes, which limited my chances of talking to men. Secondly, when opportunities arose for me to talk to men, their wives would usually be around, since etiquette prevented me from being alone with men. Particularly in public places, since it might mistakenly be assumed, I was repeatedly warned, that I was their European second wife or mistress. This is a general problem facing female ethnographers in societies where there are strict gender-based rules of conduct (Bell, Caplan and Karim 1993). Thirdly, some of the women I worked with were unmarried, divorced, widowed or polygamous wives whose husbands might not live with them any more or outright neglect them. Then, there were simply no men around to meet. Consequently, I had little opportunity to interview men directly about polygamy, having to rely on general conversation and carefully worded queries to men whose wives I knew. For bringing up as sensitive a topic as polygamy might create anxiety in their wives; women whose marriages were under real or imagined threat from polygamy might feel in jeopardy by hearing their husbands potentially voice support for polygamy, as Malay elite men tend to do (with varying degrees of conditions attached). Women would explain how they dreaded such support ‘coming out in the open’. Men tend to refer to what they regard as their right to marry four wives under Islamic law. Women tend to be more concerned with how men manage polygamy. Particularly whether husbands treat all their wives fairly according to Qur’anic conditions for polygamy, as the following extract from my journal illustrates: Hussein then said that a man could not simply marry another woman. There were three conditions: 1) the first wife must be sick; 2) the first wife cannot have children; to this he added that it was the duty of a Muslim to have many children as a means to propagate the

Stories29

faith, gesturing with his arms to show the expansion of the faith; 3) he must get permission from his first wife to remarry. At this point Rokiah [his wife] added loudly that Hussein had forgotten the most important condition, namely that the man must be fair to all the wives and children, and to underline this [our friend] Sabariah said ‘first has a bungalow, second gets a bungalow, first has a Porsche, second gets a Porsche’.

Maznah’s husband Zainuddin clarified that there are very definite rules in the Qur’an for a man to marry a second wife, and that these were next to impossible to satisfy for normal men. If a man marries a second wife because he has strong sexual desires and needs two wives, for example, one must challenge him to show where in the Qur’an polygamy is sanctioned for that particular reason. It is not enough that a man can legally marry four wives; he must have a good reason as well. Maznah added that the acceptance of polygamy is related to practitioners following the rules of Islam, yet some men abuse their right to polygamy and marry more women for the wrong reasons: Society still does not accept it fully, but more because of the reasons behind a man’s decision to marry more than one wife, when a man does not have a strong enough reason in people’s eyes. In the Qur’an are stated the proper reasons for marrying another wife, but men don’t follow them; polygamy is not bad, but the reasons behind it often are; men take advantage of the fact that they can marry four wives without proper grounds.

My restricted access to men means that most of my data on polygamy comes from women and is about women and their perspectives and experiences of polygamy. Relying mostly on women’s perspectives on polygamy, and on women’s descriptions of men’s perspectives, raises questions of representativeness and legitimacy in using gender-biased data for discussing elite Malay polygamy. I do not, of course, suggest that my descriptions of Malay polygamy are ‘objective’ or fully cover the range of polygamous perspectives and practices found among urban elite Malays. This would be nonsensical; ethnography can uncover partial insights into the field only. Working with elite women may nonetheless provide some small insight into elite men’s worlds, as elite women may share specific worlds and world views with elite men, to which rural and non-elite men and women have little access (Pina-Cabral and Pedroso de Lima 2000). The way I conducted fieldwork was indeed symptomatic of Malay elites’ transcendence of ‘Malayness’.

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Elite Malay Polygamy

Elite polygamy is literately crossing borders when Malay men marry their second wives secretly in Thailand to avoid applying for permission to marry polygamously in Malaysia. It is figuratively border-crossing when it circumvents Malay (traditionally monogamous) norms and expectations of marriage. Elite Malay women have a range of ideas about polygamy in Malay culture and society available to them, and they choose those ideas best-suited for their purposes in particular situations. Their narratives are informed by particular aims in telling that particular story or pointing out that particular perspective. Urban elite Malay women are, like all people, ‘strategic actors’, navigating within their cultural worlds (Bourdieu 1977). Aminah was thus typical in her acknowledgement of polygamy as a marriage form acceptable in Islam, and in her use of Islam to simultaneous reject it. Trying to reconcile her acceptance of the Islamic legitimacy of polygamy with her personal rejection of the marriage form was a delicate balancing act, which she elegantly solved by suggesting that one of the reasons there appears to be more polygamy is because many people do not have a proper religious education any more: They do not know what is in the Qur’an and Hadith regarding polygamy; they don’t know the strict rules about how to treat wife number two and three. For example, it is not enough to give a sapphire ring to the second wife if the first wife gets a diamond ring. Those that use the Qur’an to legitimize polygamy are only using those passages that suits their needs, they are not really following the Qur’an.

Women may say different things about polygamy, and people engaging in it, in different contexts. Arranging their stories into narrative themes may help to understand why this is so. The chapters of the book are all thematically built up around one such major theme. They are not mutually exclusive and themes are woven into each other in the stories people told me. Separating the women’s lived stories into themes may on some level do them a disservice, yet it offers a way of telling the stories in a form accessible to people who are not part of them. I remain acutely aware of the multiple ways the women’s narrated world of polygamy could relate to the actual worlds they live in, of the women’s many potentially conflicting emotional and experiential relations to their specific narratives. Furthermore, my being who I am personally and professionally might have elicited a certain set of stories. The polygamy narratives’

Stories31

situated and dynamic nature suggests that there are many ways the women’s words can relate to their worlds.

Note  1. Tan Sri is the second most senior federal title bestowed in Malaysia.

Chapter 2

Elites

Rokiah’s Story about Enduring Polygamy Rokiah, fifty-six and monogamously married, grew up in polygamy, as her mother’s three marriages were all polygamous. Rokiah’s father was married already when he secretly married Rokiah’s mother as his second wife. When Rokiah was born, his first wife found out about her and her mother’s existence, as is common. When Rokiah was only one year old, her father’s first wife forced him to divorce Rokiah’s mother. Rokiah’s mother quickly remarried in an arranged marriage. Her new husband had been married twice before, but had divorced both women by the time he married Rokiah’s mother. He proceeded to marry three other women after marrying Rokiah’s mother, without divorcing her. It was a matter of prestige for him, but caused her mother great pain and misery. Rokiah remembers all the scenes, the quarrels and the many times they packed and left for her grandparents’ house, only to be picked up by him again; it happened every time he married another woman. Rokiah’s mother was his first wife, thus his ‘main wife’, and he lived mainly in her house. He had no children with Rokiah’s mother, and died when Rokiah was eleven. Some years later Rokiah’s mother married a man who already had two other wives, so her mother became his third wife. She had two children by him. Her third husband died when their eldest child was nine; by then they were already estranged, partly because his other wives never accepted her. Rokiah’s mother has thus been a first, second and third wife.

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Rokiah feels there is nothing unusual about polygamy: ‘It was quite normal for me, in those days it was common for [her class of Malays]. My uncle also had four wives; they all lived in the same large house with different sections. Polygamy was prestigious, so if a man could afford it, he would marry several wives.’ Today, Rokiah related, ‘society’ might still encourage affluent men to have several wives, as polygamy is still prestigious. Early in their marriage, her husband was asked completely unsolicited whether he wanted a second wife, since ‘it could be arranged’. Rokiah was very upset and told him she would divorce him if he took another wife; she had made it clear to him that she would not accept co-wives in her marriage, having experienced as a child what heartache polygamy brought her mother.

Economy of Polygamy The vast majority of Malays are Muslims, and thus in principle all Malay men are potentially polygamous. Yet polygamy has never been a common practice among Malays. Historically in Malay society, polygamy was largely confined to the ruling class and the upper classes generally; its practice predates Islam in the region. It was more regularly practised by rulers and the well-to-do than by commoners, as practising polygamy and maintaining concubines was considered a luxury of the great, and therefore existed primarily among the higher ranks of society. Polygamy’s typical association with aristocracy and elites has continued into contemporary times in the region, whereas polygamy has not been very prevalent among ordinary people in the Malay-Muslim world. Members of rural elites, comprising schoolteachers, landed and titled farmers and local political leaders, also marry second wives. The dominant Malay marriage pattern was and is monogamy, and a traditionally relatively easy access to divorce for both sides. It allowed dysfunctional polygamous marriages to be ended quickly; in contemporary Malaysia, however, both divorce and polygamy are more contentious. Polygamy is not particularly widespread in Muslim South East Asia or in the Islamic world as a whole (Abdullah, Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015; Bowen 2003; Gullick 1987; Jones 1994; Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011; Karim 1992; Mohamad 2011). Among Malays, wealth generally forms the basis for engaging in polygamy, excluding much of the population in the process. This is one of the reasons it has not been widely practised in Malaysia

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nor in Islamic South East Asia in general. Economic strength has always played a part in Malay polygamy, as Djamour (1966: 84) points out among Singapore Malays; impoverished parents would accept a married man as a son-in-law if he offered them financial benefit in return for their daughter. Yet as a Muslim, a Malay man always has the potential to become polygamous, whether rich or poor. As Firth (1966 [1943]: 49) remarked years ago, ‘the absence of [wealth] does not necessarily inhibit a man from becoming polygamous’. The women I worked with would often complain that ‘now taxi drivers want to be polygamous’, confirming Strange’s (1981: 147) observation that although poor men may engage in polygamy, they are generally considered rash to do so. In Malaysia today, I was often told, polygamy has become more prominent even among men from lower income groups, often those of very meagre means. A poor man’s reasons for entering a second marriage when he can hardly afford to maintain his first family, and has to rely on his wives supporting themselves as well as perhaps their husband’s other wife and dependents, are difficult to gauge. My concern here is not with exact numbers; at any rate, I cannot definitely corroborate them. Sisters in Islam (SIS), a reformist women’s group working for women’s rights within Islam, are working on uncovering the actual extent and impact of polygamy in Malaysia.1 Yet it may be that the demographic picture of people entering into polygamous marriages is changing: it used to be associated with the upper classes or local leaders, but now everyone, ‘including taxi drivers’, seems to practise it, according to my interlocutors (Mohamad 2011). For the upper middle and upper class Malays, among whom I did fieldwork, wealth weighed heavy in the polygamy equation, however, and the increased prominence of polygamy in principle or practice among urban elite Malays was clearly linked to increased economic power. There is a positive association between socio-economic status and polygamy in Islamic South East Asia, a pattern found among numerous if not most polygamous populations. In many African polygamous systems, for example, more wives may mean more social and economic powers, for a man may increase his wealth through securing the productive and reproductive capacities of more women (Clignet 1970, 1987). This is not necessarily the case in Malaysia; a reason may be that the structure of Malay rice production did not encourage the appropriation of female labour by polygamous men (Bretschneider 1995, Stivens 1996: 194). More wives in Malaysia usually mean expending rather than gaining economic power for

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the husband. Resources may flow in different directions, or in different ways, in these various systems, but husbands in all polygamous systems share their ability to convert economic capital into social capital through polygamy (Bourdieu 1992). That is, the social status men may derive from polygamy is related to their economic status, however deployed. The Malay form of polygamy usually requires the husband to have enough wealth to attract and retain more than one wife. The ruling classes have always had obvious advantages in this respect, through proceeds from rights over fruits of land and labour. Similarly, many high-ranking men in the civil service, government or private business, often with titles, come from privileged backgrounds of powerful and wealthy families, since systems of patronage have traditionally ensured that the well-connected get good positions in modern Malaysia (Gomez and Jomo 1997). Contemporary polygamous men, however, seem to come from a variety of backgrounds, and not necessarily ones of (traditional) privilege. Today, education followed by a successful career based on a combination of merit and good connections can propel men from humble origins into positions of power and wealth, which makes polygamy desirable and attainable. There is a much greater social spread today among urban men who have more than one wife, from sons of sultans to sons of padi (rice paddy) farmers; a common denominator seems to be their relative wealth compared to other men. In Malaysia, polygamous marriages have typically been limited to two wives, since economic, social and personal obstacles tend to prevent men from marrying the four permitted under Islamic provisions. Members of Malay royalty or men of great wealth or social standing often marry more than two wives. Elite polygamy hence stands out because it can involve more than two wives, whereas polygamy among non-elites typically involves no more than two wives. Polygamy rates have generally been low among the vast majority of Malays, and until recent years ethnographies of non-elite rural and urban Malays have emphasized the limited extent of polygamous practices. Several reasons have been proposed to explain why polygamy has been rare among Malays. The most commonly mentioned reason is women’s reluctance to be part of a polygamous union. Polygamy is more frequent in the east coast states of Kelantan and Terengganu, with a predominantly Malay Muslim population; they also have the highest divorce rates in Malaysia. It fits the dominant narrative of Malay women choosing divorce when facing polygamy, leading to low levels of polygamy even if it is often engaged

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in. Men may also fear balo or ‘evil’, a general term for bad relationships, with the potential of magical attack, if they marry more than one wife (Carsten 1997; Firth 1966 [1943]; Karim 1992; Kuchiba, Tsubouchi and Maeda 1979; Peletz 1988; Rudie 1994; Stivens 1996; Strange 1981). There is a strong social and cultural ambiguity towards polygamy among Malays. It is another reason why observers believe that the practice has not previously been prevalent in the Malay world. Generally in Islamic South East Asia, polygamy has not been fully socially approved, even though it is sanctioned by Islamic law, leading to low polygamy numbers; they officially account for 2–5 per cent of marriages in Malaysia and Indonesia (Bowen 2003; Jones 1994; Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011; Peng 2011). Polygamous marriages among the urban elite are often secret, however, with many performed out of state or out of the country. They may not be officially registered as polygamous marriages, making the actual extent of polygamy difficult to pinpoint. Such secrecy and circumvention of proper procedures for Muslim marriages fuel the social disapproval of polygamy and its cultural ambiguity among Malays. Polygamy is often the subject of joking in Malay society, though this does not necessarily imply that it is socially or culturally unacceptable; Malays may struggle between finding it acceptable in Islam and finding it unacceptable on a personal level. Many modern Malays, men as well as women, find polygamy ‘feudal’ and unjust to women; this is also the case in Indonesia (Bowen 2003; Brenner 2012; Stivens 1998). People will joke about a man’s virility and interest in women if he is considered to have taken a second wife because he has strong ‘desires’. If a man who cannot really afford it engages in polygamy, it may be considered to reflect an unwise lack of control over sexual drives (Firth 1966 [1943]: 55, 203; Kuchiba, Tsubouchi and Maeda 1979: 36). Humour, often with sexual innuendos, plays a large role in narratives of polygamy, though I found joking about polygamy mostly in men’s narratives. Among women, the emotions elicited by polygamy were usually rather far from mirth and merriment.

Elite-ness Traditionally, Malays could be divided into two social classes. At the top was a relatively small hereditary elite of royalty and aristocracy, usually associated with urban centres (royal capitals) and closely

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related affairs of government and religion. Below was the majority of Malays belonging to the commoner class, primarily associated with rural areas. Today, there is a strong middle class among Malays. It is generally ‘white collar’: clerical, administrative, managerial and professional. The people are not all well-off, though many are, but tend to have higher status occupations and above average educational levels. To Malays, upward mobility may involve access to positions once reserved for the upper classes, such as government bureaucracy or religious hierarchy, rather than solely amassing wealth, since traditionally there was no inherent connection between wealth and high-class standing in Malaysia. Among contemporary Malays, however, status is increasingly defined in terms of monetary wealth rather than as traditionally gaining status through hereditary titles or political or religious leadership. Among the new middle classes a small fraction has become very affluent, to the point of constituting a ‘class’ unto themselves (Embong 2002); these very rich Malays make up the upper middle-class elites to which many of my interlocutors belonged. The genesis of the new Malay middle classes resulted primarily from the postcolonial Malaysian state’s Western-oriented development policies as expressed in the ‘New Economic Policy’ (NEP). They relied on heavy state intervention with respect to economic planning, distribution and capitalist processes. The NEP, launched in 1971, had two major objectives: ‘(i) to eradicate poverty irrespective of race, and (ii) to restructure the Malaysian society in order to do away with the interethnic economic imbalances. … [O]nly a successful implementation of the NEP would bring about the important, ultimate national goal, that is, “national unity”’ (Baharuddin 1994: 23). The NEP was born out of the need to unify the country after the ethnic riots of 13 May, 1969, which saw battles between Malay and Chinese workers in K.L. It aimed at bringing the Malay population up to the economic level of the Chinese population, who were (seen as) controlling the country’s economy. Allowing the Malay population to lag behind economically compared to other ethnic groups in Malaysia was seen as a threat to national security and political stability (Andaya and Andaya 2001; Ariffin 1992; Embong 2002; Gomez and Jomo 1997; Mohamad 2010). The NEP reinforced the definition of Malays as bumiputera or ‘sons of the soil’, who, because of their certified status as ‘original natives’, had special claims to national wealth. The stated goal was to have a 30 per cent bumiputera ownership of the corporate

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sector by 1990. The NEP further strengthened previously instituted affirmative action policies in favour of Malays, such as awarding scholarships and places in educational institutions and reserving jobs in various firms and industries. The result is most obvious in the civil service, where the vast majority of employees are Malay; state sponsorship has been pivotal in the upward intergenerational mobility experienced by Malays. The Malay ‘elite’ has hence been expanded to include Malays who have acquired economic, social or political status through such means as employment in the Malaysian administrative and diplomatic service or political leadership, as well as through the NEP, which has created a number of rich Malay business people. Private enterprise is seen by many Malays today as a more desirable vehicle of social mobility than the traditional way through governmental or religious bureaucracy (Embong 2002). Status and prestige continue to depend to some extent on ancestry and background, however, and important posts are still often held by the traditional upper classes. The lower classes are still made up of farmers, joined today by workers in the industrial and other sectors. According to Case (1996: 252), ‘Malaysia’s class structure is characterized by both social mobility and rigidity, featuring breath-taking rags-to-riches stories together with a relative passive, even manipulated work force and peasantry’. An important factor in Malay social mobility is, as everywhere, education. English speaking education used to be a privilege given only to a small local elite, as well as sons of royalty and nobility, by the British colonial administration, to prepare them for work within colonial bureaucracy or European-owned companies, or to ensure pro-European leaders. Now people from commoner backgrounds can get scholarships enabling them to join elite English-medium schools, paving the way for future success. Another important factor in the emergence of new Malay middle classes has been political patronage. NEP privileges, officially extended to all bumiputera, have been appropriated by the most well-connected in the Malay community. Politicians and businessmen with close links to the country’s leadership have been able to amass great personal wealth. In the process, a group of politically influential ‘new rich’ Malays have been created (Embong 2002; Gomez and Jomo 1997; Gomez and Saravanamuttu 2013; Hamayotsu 2004; Hooker 2003; Shamsul 1999; Sloane-White 2014). The NEP, then, created a whole new class of successful Malays, who, helped by generous conditions and incentives extended by

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the government’s pro-Malay affirmative action policy, have been able to achieve the economic, social and political level that allows them to join the country’s elites – and practise polygamy. The NEP has since been replaced by newer economic development policies, and its quota systems have been relaxed somewhat, but it was the NEP that brought about the most profound changes in Malaysian society, and sowed the seeds of economic and social power for the men who are now likely to engage in polygamy. Among K.L. elites, factors believed to precipitate a decline in polygamy, such as women’s education and greater emancipation, appear to have been eclipsed by factors that seem to encourage it; first and foremost socio-economic factors. It is indeed among the affluent new upper middle classes – which in some ways confound the two ‘old’ classes of Malays – that polygamy appears to have gained prominence. In contemporary Malaysia, to be polygamous is thus by no means antithetical to modern life or modernity. Polygamy can provide Malays with a powerful statement that they are elite. Postcolonial economic development policies meant that many more Malays were able to reach a level of income that makes polygamy feasible. Yet polygamy among emerging Malay upper middle classes is not all about wealth. Rather, it may signify that the men engaging in it have reached a social status level that makes polygamy desirable as a sign of being elite. Among affluent Malays in what is the most developed, affluent and urbanized part of Malaysia, the prevalence of polygamy might be increasing because more men can afford, socially as well as economically, to have more than one wife. It may be seen as a sign of affluence among the new urban upper middle classes, as in ‘many wives, many powers’, a phenomenon found particularly in societies touched by rapid social change (Clignet 1970: 361). A contemporary model for what constitutes a successful modern Malay man in urban Malaysia may thus involve expectations that he takes a second wife. The prominence of new forms of urban elite polygamy involves an adaptation of a traditional elite institution, a revamped polygamy reflecting the newly powerful classes in contemporary Malay society. Polygamy has always been part of the Malay ‘cultural repertoire’, yet today it may have also become a lifestyle choice, indeed a strategic choice, among urban elites. It appears to have become part of elite social reproduction, forming a building block in the genesis of new urban Malay elites. They are appropriating traditional signs of wealth and rank by engaging in a practice that used to be the domain of the rulers and the powerful. Polygamy has

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become a status symbol and a form of conspicuous consumption in a setting where people have found wealth and power and want to flaunt it (Daloz 2010: 142–43). Among modern Malays in the new upper middle classes, practising polygamy may be a deliberate choice, sending out a strong message in a society grappling with cultural and social ambiguity towards polygamy. Malay polygamy is not a ‘survival’ of a traditional Malay cultural custom inserted into a modernizing Malaysia, it is a (self-)consciously chosen and powerfully modern marriage form with a long local history. Polygamy may be a way for new Malay elites to signal aspirations to be part of or strengthen their positioning in the ruling classes.

Elite Marriage Strategies Exploring polygamy as an elite marriage form involves exploring what status and benefits can be derived from such a marriage; presumably, it has some allure over and above monogamy for people engaging in it. There might be several reasons why a woman would enter a polygamous union. One reason for becoming a second wife may be a woman’s desire to be married to a powerful and socially influential man. For some, the social status as married women may be primary, as they may themselves be powerful and socially influential, and not need to gain such status through their husbands. Marriage is universal among Malays, and remaining unmarried is considered a (moral) problem that should be remedied (Banks 1983). Socially and economically established but unmarried women may hence find it appropriate to marry men on par with themselves socially and economically – even if these men are already married; Muslim men who have less than four wives may be married but still available as spouses. Such unions were often the focus of stories and gossip circulating about town. In such stories, men were often portrayed as targeted by ambitious women – that is, ‘trophy husbands’ to financially independent women who want to be wives of prominent men but may require little from them beyond that. Such women will accept the status as second wives, but wives nonetheless, to prominent men. Divorcees are a distinct group of women who are considered to marry to secure a social status as married women. Securing social status through marriage can be achieved through monogamy as well as polygamy, and it may therefore be a woman’s particular circumstances when marrying that guides her marriage choices. A

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woman who has already been married may not be seen as a suitable spouse for a man who has not been married before. Malay belief in complementarity between spouses calls for ‘like marrying like’, and people generally prefer to take previously unwed spouses when they marry for the first time. Ideally, a first wedding is between a virgin or young girl (anak dara) and a previously unwed man (anak teruna) (Carsten 1997: 194; Karim 1992, 1998). Hence, a divorced or already married man may be considered a more appropriate spouse for a divorced woman. Indeed, married women would often talk to me about divorced women as ‘loose women’ stalking their husbands in order to marry them as second wives (see Chapter 13). Divorced women may for various reasons find it necessary to get married because of the ‘status factor’, even if they can take care of themselves financially. Some of them may then opt to become second wives. Nazriah, thirty-five, was a divorced mother of two when she became a second wife in a secret marriage in Thailand: I tried to avoid polygamy or to get involved with already married men, but there is a limited number of single guys out there and they want single girls right? It makes it difficult for single parents like me to find a man, so because of the circumstances I had to accept it. I ask myself though whether it is worth it to fall in love with such a man, he is lying to you and to his first wife.

Another group of women who are considered to marry as second wives are very ambitious women, who aim to marry an influential man as second wives for instrumental reasons. Such a marriage may help them in their business, for example, as Sloane (1999) also points out. Marrying an influential man opens up his network of business and political alliances, and his wife may secure personally advantageous business deals through him. Women with ambitions in business, politics or social life may thus seek out husbands who are perceived to provide good networks and will marry them as second wives if need be to further their own goals. Men, of course, might marry their second wives for precisely the same reasons. Marrying into prominent families creates networks or cements alliances. It could be a politician hoping to secure support from a leading local family, or a businessman keen to exploit the new contacts a marriage into a powerful family might bring. This is a traditional elite use of polygamy, creating support networks with as many important people as possible through marriage, to secure influence and opportunity; such strategic use of polygamy is found

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cross-culturally (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). It may be equally useful to members of the new urban upper middle classes keen to establish themselves as big players in the city. Some women marry as second wives to achieve material security, a traditional reason for polygamy. Divorced or widowed women with children, for example, may find it difficult to survive with their children or maintain their lifestyle without a husband to take care of them. Polygamy may offer them financial benefit or material security. First and second wives have equal inheritance rights and claims to their husband’s property; a second wife’s children from a previous marriage must be adopted by her new husband to share in his assets. For some divorced women, polygamy might appear to be their only or best option to secure themselves and their children financially. When economically pressed women become second wives they are mirroring the social situation that the allowance of polygamy originally intended to address in Islam; it was aimed at the welfare and protection of women and children following the death of many Muslim men in battles during the formative years of the Muslim community in Medina (Kasim 2002, 2008). Among elites, this scenario is not common, as women usually have families that are able to help them out financially if they are in dire straits. Even elite women may suffer a serious reduction in lifestyle level if they are divorced, however. Then there are women who feel that being married to a rich man as a second wife is better than marrying a poor bachelor, securing them instant material benefits. Young unmarried girls who become second wives might fall in this category, as may older unmarried women who might want to augment their lifestyle level, even if they can support themselves. This is nothing new, since it generally was older, richer men who married more than one wife; wealth has always been, and to a certain degree remains, a prerequisite for polygamy. There will always be women willing to accept polygamous marriages to get the status and wealth flowing from it. It may be that today, with the increasing consumerism and materialism in Malaysia, the number of women willing to enter into polygamous marriages is increasing. More young girls want to be able to buy brand names and other prestige items, and one way to achieve this is to marry an older, richer but already married man. At least that is the somewhat condescending view that some (older) women have of such (younger) women’s decision. One might call it the instant material gratification explanation.

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Materialistic marriage strategies figure prominently in stories about a special ‘subset’ of women in arts and media opting for polygamous marriage. Such wives are often the classic ‘trophy wives’ of rich men, young, pretty and well known. The gossip story in Chapter 1 involved a newscaster who moved from one rich man to the next to obtain the best secondary ‘marriage’. It appears to be a classic trophy wife situation, but in all such cases there is equally the possibility that women themselves are instrumental in becoming second wives to obtain a trophy husband. Katijah, who sees several of these ‘actress wives’ of polygamous men close to where she lives, gives her take on the women and their ‘sugar daddies’ (Dinan 1983): These entertainers seem to be the classic gold-diggers; they will agree to it because they get a house and a BMW. For men it is about status, showing off – like buying a new car – a young newscaster or actress, they have glamour and are known personalities. These young women are clever, ‘they are not all dumb blondes’; they know they are in this business because they have a pretty face and it will not last, so they must get something out of it when they can. They go to parties and events and flaunt themselves hoping to attract the attention of a politician or a businessman and get him to marry her. This is the quick way to get all those things they want, branded clothes from top to toe, flashy cars etc.; they don’t have to wait for it, so they don’t mind who he is, if he is married already.

Fauziah offered some insights about which men might marry such ‘actresses’ as second wives: ‘Men who are self-made have no scruples and marry several women, powerful people like government ministers or top businessmen.’ A friend of Fauziah is the first wife of a very powerful man; at first she did not want to admit that her husband had taken other wives; she felt it was an affront to her dignity; she felt humiliated and feared that people might say that she did not take good care of her husband, since he married another wife. Later on, all of K.L. knew that he had married three wives, but he did not divorce his first wife because her family’s money and influence had made his ascent to power possible. When he became wealthy and powerful in his own right, he felt entitled to marry more wives, but was reluctant to divorce his first wife who brought him his initial success. He also remained with her to maintain his lucrative connections (Djamour 1965: 85). Such instrumental polygamy scenarios often came up in narratives. A common theme is that husbands of wealthy and

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well-connected women are reluctant to marry a second wife because they fear losing their first wife and her network’s support; the financial risks might be too great. If the first wife decides to leave because of a second wife, as Fauziah did, the husband could lose not only her money, but also her connections, which could in turn jeopardize his future ventures. In a typical narrative, Katijah described how a former colleague had married the daughter of a top politician as a way of advancing in business; he was very manipulative, and had affairs with other women, but would never divorce his wife or marry a second wife because his power derived from her father’s connections.

Polygamy Protocol Elite Malay men who marry second wives do not all opt for secret weddings with pretty young girls who are lured by their wealth and power, as is often assumed. In fact, they may marry women from within their own social circles, and not necessarily younger than themselves or their first wives. Families, friends, business partners and other acquaintances will therefore often know both wives, and are forced to manoeuver within the potentially troubled waters of secrecy and rivalry. Keeping up appearances in public and avoiding confrontation with the first wife in situations of such social closeness, particularly if trying to keep a second marriage secret, is one of the challenges of modern urban elite polygamy. Families and friends may find it difficult to cope with one of their members, whether male or female, engaging in polygamy. Whereas first wives are often pitied, there is some stigma attached to second wives, though this varies according to the person’s relationship to the second wife. If a person knows the first wife, she may ‘express anger at the second wife for stealing the husband from another woman’, according to Aisyah, but be more forgiving if they are friends. Yet friendships, like familial ties, do not necessarily guarantee that a second wife will be accepted by those close to her. Friends and acquaintances of polygamous spouses, like family members, have to contend with the pragmatic difficulties and tricky etiquette of knowing the husband and often both wives. Polygamy protocol is unchartered territory for many new Malay elites (Altman and Ginat 1996; Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). For Rokiah, it posed a problem when her divorced friend secretly married the husband of one of her other friends. Typically, co-wives

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do not get along with each other and prefer not to know about each other, yet once the first wife found out about her co-wife and realized Rokiah knew her, she began asking about her. Rokiah felt extremely uncomfortable and trapped between her allegiances to both friends, particularly when she had to decide which wife to invite whenever they invited the husband: It is a general problem when you know both wives of a polygamous man; you might get alternate invitations to the wives – one night with one, and next night with the other, then you have to pretend that you are seeing the husband again for the first time in a long time, to not hurt the other wife’s feelings. You have to be part of play acting, pretending, even though you know the man is married to another wife.

One challenge for polygamous husbands is indeed how to handle the social commitments of being married to several wives, whether secret or not. With his own family and close friends, he may feel at liberty to bring whichever wife he wishes, and expect his decisions to be accepted by those close to him. But when it comes to more distant acquaintances and official social functions, stricter rules of etiquette apply with respect to which wife to bring. Different wives are typically brought to different functions. First wives will usually be brought to official functions because they are the senior wives and customarily get their husband’s title if he has any. They may themselves hold prominent public positions, and have titles in their own right. Furthermore, the second wife may be secret or unofficial. In Indonesia, a similar pattern of first wives rather than all wives in attendance at functions prevails (Nurmila 2009). In Malaysia, if a husband were to bring both his wives to an official function, it might cause talk, and so rarely occurs; with the greater public prominence of polygamy, this might change. Generally, to avoid any public confrontation between the different wives of the same man, a hostess may discretely let it be known that she will only accept first wives in attendance. Several of my interlocutors described how a powerful hostess was able to voice that she does not accept polygamy, and will not accept second wives at her function. Or she might decree that only first wives can be members of a particular organization in which she has influence, to avoid any confrontations between co-wives. This becomes an important consideration among elites keen to establish a public charity profile, for example. Second or younger wives might be brought to more unofficial events, as when their husband is among (male)

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friends and feels entitled and safe in bringing her. One of my interlocutors related how she had experienced several such awkward confrontations with her co-wife: ‘I met her from time to time, because we were members of the same … club, but I felt confident because she is not as pretty as me, I would wear my best clothes and walk in proud. People would say ‘you are so brave Puan Sri’.2 The customary rule that a husband brings his first wife to official functions might be bent if a husband feels that his second wife is more suitable. An acquaintance of Salbiah managed his social engagements with each wife according to which function they were going to. He would bring his English wife to official functions where there were Europeans or expatriates, even if such a function fell in the week allocated to his Malay wife in his rotational marriage schedule. In each instance he judged which wife was the most ‘appropriate’ to bring rather than her time-share. Some men may marry a second wife precisely because they feel they lack an ‘equal partner’ in their first wife, and so may bring their second wife to official functions. Asmah recounted how a prominent man had married an equally prominent woman as his second wife, officially because his first wife could not bear children. It was initially secret, but his new wife soon began appearing alongside him on society pages of newspapers and magazines. She gave birth to several children and her career prospered, not least through the boost it received from her marriage. The husband brings his second wife to functions because she works well in such gatherings, and enjoys a high profile in Malaysian society. His first wife, a friend of Asmah’s, was so distraught when he married the second wife that she resigned from her job and completely withdrew from society. The first wife has been pushed into obscurity by her co-wife, who has taken over as the main wife. That the second wife is the main wife is unusual, and generally considered inappropriate. The second wife will ‘excuse’ her social dominance with the first wife being sick, according to Asmah, but ‘of course the first wife is sick, because her husband married another woman’. The second wife’s dominance is so complete that when her husband was bestowed a title by the ruler of his home state, she was given the corresponding female title because of her prominence and because the first wife is ‘out of circulation’. Many people were surprised by the decision, for normally only the first wife receives her husband’s title. One of the reasons elite first wives stay in unhappy polygamous marriages is to keep their title and prominent

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social position and prevent the second wife from getting it upon their divorce. The ruler’s decision turned upside down established etiquette of polygamous wives’ public roles and expectations, and as such jeopardizes one of first wives’ central power bases in polygamous unions. Asmah’s stories illustrate that in spite of customary norms dictating first wives’ official privileges, particular circumstances may catapult the second wife into social prominence. It feeds into the cultural ambiguity created by the contemporary confluence of polygamy’s high visibility in K.L with its supposed secrecy. It is polygamy as a distinctly elite institution, with all the wives, wealth and woes it entails.

Notes   1. See work done by Sisters in Islam (SIS) at http://www.sistersinislam. org.my (accessed 27 May 2017).   2. Honorific title given to the wife of a Tan Sri.

Chapter 3

Islam

Halima’s Story about Avoiding Polygamy Halima, thirty-six and single, had a ‘brush with polygamy’, as she calls it. She met a man and they became engaged; her family was very happy because she was thirty-five and unmarried. During a Hari Raya1 gathering, Halima received a call on her mobile from a woman who said she was Halima’s fiancé’s sister and would like to talk to him. She found it strange that the sister she had never met called her phone, but she did not yet put two and two together. When she came home the phone rang again and it was the same woman, only this time she said ‘do you know who I am, I am the wife of that man you want to marry’. So they spent two hours on the phone, where Halima among other things found out that the two ‘nieces’ her fiancé always visited but never brought Halima to see were in fact his own two daughters. Halima was devastated but did not break down; on the contrary she got very angry. Her mother was very upset but said she had always suspected something was amiss, since the fiancé had not seemed sincere when doing the wedding arrangements. Halima broke off the engagement immediately; she found it completely unacceptable that he was already married and had deceived her in this way, and felt there was no longer any basis for their marriage. Telling everybody why the wedding was off was humiliating, yet, worse still, the wife kept calling and harassing her, calling her a ‘loose woman’ chasing after her husband; Halima was scared that she would come and beat her up, since she was very aggressive.

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Halima feels her suitor probably thought she was ‘easy prey’ because she was thirty-five and not married and therefore more ‘desperate’; she fell victim to the not uncommon practice of men deceiving women into thinking they are single in order to marry them as second wives. Yet even if Halima had known that her almost husband was already married, and could have chosen to marry him as a second wife, she would not have been willing to. She could never share a husband with another woman: ‘I don’t believe in this sharing bit, I am against polygamy. … Normal men cannot engage in polygamy because they are not prophets, Mohammed could do it because he was the messenger of God.’

Men Who Are Good Muslims How religiosity affects people’s perspectives and practices of polygamy is difficult to generalize about, as faith is intensely and intimately personal, even if publically practised. I met very religiously conservative people who felt that ‘only the Prophet can do it’, and very religiously liberal people who said ‘it is my right’. According to Strange (1981: 147, 230), religious leaders are believed to have a higher rate of polygamy than average villagers, as a result of their generally greater respect, prestige and wealth, yet mentions an imam (religious leader) who was credited with influencing men to remain monogamous. Karim (1992: 141) similarly reports how men with strong religious convictions may be reluctant to marry more than one wife or may restrict themselves to two because they feel they cannot meet the commitments and responsibilities laid down in Islamic law for four wives. While uncovering people’s inner religious beliefs may be challenging, if not impossible, their practices are more readily observable. Religion can clearly be used instrumentally in relation to polygamy, as Malays may use Islam to argue both for and against polygamy. It is furthermore a highly gendered use of religious arguments to reject or accept polygamy. Men typically claim it is their right as Muslims, while women typically stress that it is impossible for men to live up to the conditions set forth in the Qur’an for polygamy, and that it therefore should not be practised. A truly good Muslim, from the perspective of most of the women I worked with, is probably a monogamous Muslim. Reference to the Islamic legitimacy of polygamy may supply some elite Malay women with a valid reason for their husband’s

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polygamy, a reason that to some extent is considered beyond reproach. My interlocutors would regularly refer to men who practise polygamy in an attempt to emulate the Prophet’s example. Similarly, a common theme in polygamy narratives is that husbands and wives who can maintain a harmonious polygamous family are seen as particularly good Muslims, because they seem able to emulate the Prophet’s marriage. They have attained what only very few families can aspire to, by engaging in what may be seen as a quintessential Muslim marriage form and succeeding at it. This may in turn imply that most polygamous marriages are not harmonious precisely because ‘normal’ people cannot emulate the Prophet; only he is able to live up to his own requirements for polygamy. A common contemporary notion is indeed that polygamy is an original Muslim institution widely practised in Muslim countries, particularly in the Middle East. Such sentiments are fed by the increasing ‘Arabization’ of Malay Islam, in which Malays develop new ‘Islamic’ traditions in their everyday practices, borrowing mostly from Islamic Middle Eastern societies (Ong 1995, 2006) (see cover photo). Through polygamy, Malay elites may tap into what they believe is an Arab-oriented Muslim lifestyle as well as a Muslim discourse by appropriating what is seen as a distinctly Muslim (read Arab) marriage form. There are, of course, opposing narratives, counter-discourses. As scholars have pointed out, polygamy predates Islam in the Middle East (as elsewhere), and is as such not an ‘original’ Muslim institution (Ahmed 1992). Nor is polygamy numerically very common in the Middle East. A common complaint among my interlocutors was that while the rest of the Muslim world appears to restrict men’s right to polygamy – particularly North African Arab states have passed laws restricting men’s right to polygamy – the Malaysian state seems to broaden them (Minza 2009: 53). For those women, polygamy does not represent an original Muslim marriage form to strive for. In Malaysia, there have been several attempts to harness polygamy as a Muslim symbol by Islamic movements. The most prominent was the Islamic movement Al-Arqam, known for among other things its polygamy. Arqam community and family life was modelled on an ‘invented’ or imagined Arabic seventh-century Islamic society, which included polygamy and rigid gender relations and distinctions. Arqam women were very assertive about practising polygamy, extolling advantages of co-wives in assisting with domestic chores and childminding so they could maintain working careers. Arqam’s activities were seen as deviant (songsang), however, and not

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conforming to moderate state-promoted Islamization; its promotion of polygamy, for example, was seen as giving Malaysian Islam an image of backwardness and fundamentalism. Al-Arqam was consequently banned in 1994 (Karim 1995; Nagata 1995, 1997, 2010; Stivens 1998). In 2010, the Ikhwan Polygamy Club of Malaysia was launched, with a similar promotion of polygamy and Muslim community focus as Al-Arqam, and with some of the same members; it was hence suspected of being a revival of Al-Arqam. Similar movements exist in Indonesia, where polygamy is publically promoted as a marriage form eminently suitable to modern Muslim life. Most notoriously, the Indonesian restaurateur Puspo Wardoyo instituted a ‘Polygamy Award’ to celebrate successful polygamous marriages (Brenner 2012; Minza 2009; Nurmila 2005, 2009). A common narrative relating to the Islamic legitimacy of polygamy is the widespread notion that there are more women than men in Malaysia. This statistically false notion is seized upon to argue that men have a legitimate reason, even a duty, to marry more than one wife to make up for the supposedly skewed gender ratio. The explanation has echoes of the Qur’anic basis for a man’s right to polygamy; namely, that in the time of the Prophet, there were many widows and women without husbands because many men had died in battle in the early Muslim community in Medina. Polygamy was allowed for Muslims to alleviate the suffering of destitute women and children (Kasim 2002, 2008). This explanation was frequently related as being ‘common knowledge’, and seen as providing justification for polygamy. In Malaysia, the persistent claim that there are more women than men has no basis in reality; according to population statistics the sex ratio is 107 males to every 100 females. Men outnumber women in Malaysia in other words, and the sex ratio is in fact skewed in men’s favour. Furthermore, the many non-citizens working in Malaysia’s various industries (for example, from Indonesia) are mostly males, adding to the skewed sex ratio; among non-citizens, the sex ratio is 156 males to 100 females.2 A similar statistically false notion is found in Indonesia, where Krulfeld (1986: 202) relates how men justified the relatively high incidence of polygamy in their village by claiming that there were more women than men, and polygamy ensured that more women could have husbands. Actual population figures, however, revealed that there were 348 fewer women than men in the village. The suggestion that polygamy should help alleviate the supposed surplus of single Muslim women of marriageable age has a long history in Malaysia (and Indonesia, see Brenner 2012). It appears to

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be perpetuated by, among others, religious officials, who may urge women to allow their husbands to take second, third or fourth wives as a way of tackling what they consider the ‘problem’ of unmarried women. Modernity is equated with grave moral danger for unruly young women and their uncontrollable sexualities, and it is argued that polygamy can prevent extramarital affairs (Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011; Stivens 2012; Yamani 2008). Elite women tend to see such reasoning as an excuse by men who are either in or contemplating polygamous marriages, and may not agree that single women are better off in polygamous marriage than in non-marriage (Siraj 2001). Yet even more women (and men), whether elite or not, seem to actually believe it to be true, and so may condone some polygamous unions (Karim 1998). The notion that there are more women than men in Malaysia, providing men with a legitimizing reason for polygamy, is very much born and nourished in the media. Not all media reports on the supposedly skewed gender ratio interpret it to mean that men have a moral duty to marry many women to help those unfortunate spinsters, however. What adds spice to the debate is that statistically, the gender ratio does indeed change to women’s favour in the sixty plus age group (Kasim 2002). One of my interlocutors suggested that the only way polygamy can be legitimized based on gender ratio is if husbands are ready to take on wives who are sixty years or older and already in the menopausal age. It was a statement that provided some comic relief about an issue that to most elite women is no laughing matter.

Islam in Malaysia Islam is the predominant religion of Malays, shaping beliefs and rites, social interaction and daily life in all segments of Malay society. Malays belong to the Shafi’i branch of Sunni Islam and Islam is the official religion of Malaysia. Constitutionally, Malaysia is a secular state, yet in 2001 the then Prime Minister Dr Mahathir declared Malaysia to be an Islamic state. Article 11 of the Constitution provides that every person has the right to profess and practise his or her religion. The propagation of other religions to Muslims is forbidden by state laws, however. Because of the constitutionally based equation between being Malay and being Muslim, Malays must follow Muslim rules of behaviour and Islamic law, and religion in Malaysia does not belong to the domain of privacy but is a

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collective and public matter. Not adhering to Muslim prescriptions can result in public accusation and punishment, administered by the state religious departments (Nagata 1984, 1995, 2010; Peletz 1998, 2002, 2013). As Islam spread through Peninsular Malaya and the Indonesian archipelago from the 1300s and onwards, it acquired a characteristic cultural baggage that meant that it was not religion in a narrow sense that was spreading, but a complex Islamicized culture. The great variety of societies and cultures in South East Asia had a profound effect on the development of Muslim culture in the region, as Islam was accommodated to local customs and conditions. There were always different Muslim rulers, diverse religious associations and alternative ideas about how to be Muslim, so neither courts nor religious scholars (ulama) had exclusive control over the practice of Islam in South East Asia. South East Asian Islam has thus been seen as a religious orientation rather than a fixed category with predefined practices. Within this cultural pluralism, Islamic identity, however understood, is the one shared factor among Malay-Muslim populations in the region (Ellen 1983; Hefner 2000; Woodward 1989). Malay religiosity is traditionally expressed in a tolerant blend of adat and Islam. Adat is a body of knowledge and cultural codes in accordance with which Malays order their social relations. Adat is of Arabic origin, and was introduced to the region along with Islam as a means of codifying traditional or customary law.3 There are two major variants of adat in Peninsular Malaysia: adat perpatih, found mostly in Negri Sembilan and associated with matrilineal descent, and adat temenggong, found in the rest of Malaysia and associated with bilateral rules of descent and inheritance. Adat constitutes a crucial underpinning of Malay life, but has no universal accepted referents, nor is it a fixed or unambiguous body of ideas and practices. It is all-encompassing of the Malay way of life, yet it can have specific connotations in the ceremonial and religious spheres. Traditionally, in most social situations, differences between adat and Islam were not made explicit because of the syncretism of Malay Islam with pre-Islamic traditional beliefs (Kling 1997; Nagata 1974; Peletz 1996). In traditional Malay religiosity, women played an important role in religion. Adat provided women with a keen sense of independence, mobility and entrepreneurship, and with seniority and age, prestige. According to Karim (1992, 1995, 1998), the strength of Malay women lies in adat, and that of Malay men in Islam,

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because women are better able to develop a sense of autonomy and self-identity through adat, and men through Islam. Where women’s influence is limited in Islam, adat attempts to diffuse the rules of separation, hierarchy and prestige by giving women dominant roles in Sunni Islamic rites of passage, acting as a sort of equalizer for women. Malay religiosity traditionally leaned towards an ‘adatization of Islam’, emphasizing bilateral features of family and social organization. Islamic resurgence in Malaysia has meant that Malay religiosity now leans towards an ‘Islamization of adat’, however, emphasizing hierarchy in family and social organization, underlining men’s role in religion. A universalistic and increasingly orthodox Islamic position now permeates all of Malay(sian) society, moving away from South East Asian syncretic Islam and from adat. As Malays and the Malaysian state seek identification with and membership of a global Islamic ummah (Muslim community), Islamization affects all areas of Malay life. It is particularly apparent in the legal system, and rules applied in contemporary Syariah courts have lost much of their colonial English common law antecedents. State-supported Islamization has led to a bureaucratic expansion of government agencies overseeing Islamic affairs, reflecting increased institutional expression of Islamic legalism in legislation, with the creation of state religious departments, councils and courts. New religious elites have emerged as Islamic court officials and teachers, and Islamic affairs officers have entered the civil service in great numbers. Promotion of a universalistic Islam has also led to the increasing prominence of global political Islam in Malaysia and to increasing Islamic orthodoxy. It is partly inspired by Wahhabi Islam, a very conservative branch of Sunni Islam associated with Saudi Arabia, which has had some influence on Malay Islamic movements for over a century. A substantial minority of Malays are aiming for the alternative modernity of an Islamic state and Islamic criminal law (Ellen 1983; Endut 2015; Hamayotsu 2004; Hassan 1995; Kahn 1998; Mohamad 2010, 2011; Peletz 2013; Stivens 2012). Islamization is central to the Malaysian state’s push to build a global, modern, united Malaysia. State-sponsored economic development planning is based on a notion of a corporate Islamic culture that promotes self-discipline, capital accumulation and loyalty to the state. Gaining ground in the 1970s, this state vision of modernity led to changes within political economy, class and ethnic groupings, which in turn may have contributed to a growing crisis of Malay national and cultural identity as the boundaries between

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Muslim and non-Muslim worlds, and the proper roles of men and women, became less clear and more ambiguous. The result was an Islamic revivalism, or resurgent Islamic dakwah movement, among the emergent Malay middle classes, who searched for an Islamic identity as a way to address the cultural challenges of living in a secular, multi-ethnic world. Turning to Islam as both spiritual guide and organizational support through their rapidly changing world partly grew out of insecurities experienced by the first generations of Malays confronted with new roles, occupations and expectations of an urban Western-influenced and entrepreneurial capitalist society, for which they had few models or precedents. For many Malays, the religious option provided a culturally appropriate solution to the many new choices they faced (Nagata 1984, 1997, 2010; Ong 1995, 2006; Peletz 1996, 2002; Shamsul 1999). Islamic revivalism developed into a characteristic Islamic nationalism, where Malay ethnicity and Muslim authority were joined in a process of nation-building, based on a discourse of Islam as a ‘practical’ religion driving social transformation. By participating in international Islamic networks and activities, Malays became more aware of their global Muslim identity while generating local ethnic confidence, and creating a sense of distinctiveness from local non-Muslim communities. The Malaysian state’s nation and culture-building was epitomized in the 1990s by Wawasan 2020 or Vision 2020, launched by then prime minister Mahathir. It was an attempt to transform Malaysia into a fully developed country by 2020, as well as to formulate a new kind of Malay or Melayu Baru, modern yet religious, practical yet spiritual, patriotic yet borderless. Melayu Baru is represented by the growing Malay middle classes, and steered by a small corporate and ruling Malay elite attempting to formulate a new kind of Islamic state based on ‘moderate Islam’, conducive to capitalist markets, enterprise and foreign investments. The pragmatic move towards a moderate Islamic identity focusing on progress and improvement as well as fostering better ‘compatibility of interests’ between Muslims and non-Muslims, particularly in business communities, was expressed in a discourse of Islam Hadhari, civilizational Islam or ‘Islamic civil society’ (Kahn 1998, 2003; Karim 2009; Khoo 2009; Mohamad 2010; Nagata 2010; Ong 2006; Shamsul 1999). Islam’s impact on urban elite Malay women’s lives must be viewed within this process of ‘Islamization’ and Islamic nation- and culture-building, and its concomitant changes in understandings and expressions of womanhood. An ‘Islamic society’ inherently

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implies distinctive gender roles and modes of behaviour; for over a century, ‘the woman question’ has been debated within Islamic and Islamist discourses (Bloul 1998). Yet in Malaysia, cultural manifestations of Islam remain influenced by the pre-Islamic status of women in the region, which inhibited enforcement of restrictive Islamic rules on women’s behaviour. Traditionally, Malay women have enjoyed great freedoms, such as their ability to travel alone, to trade and entertain in their homes. The elite women I worked with all led such unrestricted lives. Western observers have often attributed this freedom to a weakness of Islam in Malays’ daily lives, though it may rather be a result of religious law not being seen or felt as a coercive instrument in their lives. Within contemporary Malaysia, however, Islam as a powerful social, cultural and political institution is increasingly redefining Malay gender roles and relations, including for elite women (Mohamad 2011; Nagata 1995; Ong 1995, 2006; Stivens 2012). Islamization and the resultant changing dialectic between Islam and adat impacts all aspects of gender relations in contemporary Malaysia. Nowhere is this clearer than with respect to polygamy, because from women’s perspective, adat may be said to discourage polygamy while Islam may be said to encourage it. Adat, according to Kling (1997), portrays society as ordered, in a state of equilibrium and at peace with itself. It provides an internal methodology for society members, a system for regulating individual behaviour, which emphasizes human sensitivities and is based on reciprocity and taboos to ensure individuals or groups do not infringe on the status, position and rights of others. Polygamy is often seen as directly infringing on the rights of first wives, bringing their marriage out of equilibrium, breaking a partnership that is no longer based on reciprocity. Polygamy can create a marriage not at peace with itself.

Malay Muslim Life Islam in Malaysia does not belong to the domain of privacy but is a collective and public matter. In principle, all Muslims must honour the Five Pillars of Islam: 1) the doctrine of the unity of God whose divine apostle is Muhammad; 2) the five daily prayers; 3) the annual fast during the month of Ramadan, where no food is to be consumed between sunup and sundown; 4) the hajj or pilgrimage to Mecca, which every adult Muslim of sound mind and body must

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perform once in his or her lifetime; and 5) the annual payment of zakat or religious alms. Elite Malays follow these requirements to varying degrees, and attach varying importance to them. Total compliance was rare among my interlocutors, reflecting a pattern throughout South East Asia; religious fervour among Malay upper-middle and upper classes in K.L. tend to be tempered by affluence and cosmopolitanism. While elite women are to a certain degree shielded from the effect of the increasing Islamization of Malaysia through their economic and social power, allowing them to live their lives more or less as they see fit, the public pressure and for some the private wish to lead a more ‘Muslim’ life is increasing even among elite groups (Ellen 1983; Olivier 2016; Ong 1995; Raudvere 2015; Sloane-White 2014). The elite Malay women I worked with were mostly liberal in their interpretation of Islam, and pointed out that ‘it is what is in the heart that matters’. This is used as an explanation for why they do not wear a tudung (headscarf) or assiduously follow all Muslim rites. In contemporary Malaysia, they might find themselves under increasing pressure to do so, however, to meet performative expectations regarding a ‘proper’ Muslim identity as well as public perceptions of Muslim piety (Olivier 2016: 277). Generally, Malays follow Muslim law when performing rites of passage such as circumcision, marriage and burial rites, though Islamic prescriptions may be subject to variations deriving from local cultural and personal interpretations. The women I worked with mostly did their daily prayers, though few did the required five a day, instead fitting them in when convenient. They all fast during the month of Ramadan, yet even here there was room for manoeuver, as one does not have to fast if menstruating, pregnant or breast-feeding, ill or otherwise incapacitated. Elites may also take holidays abroad during Ramadan to avoid fasting, as did several of my interlocutors. Many of the women I worked with had a very pragmatic relation to religion. In contemporary Malaysia, however, elite women must express their Muslim identity within a religious climate moving away from traditional syncretic Islam, which gives room for individual variation in Muslim lifeways. Today, Muslim practice is increasingly dominated by more rigid and scriptural interpretations of Islamic jurisprudence, influence by Islam as practised in conservative Middle Eastern and South Asian societies. Malays feel increasingly surveyed, as their Muslim lifeways are increasingly subject to evaluation by religious departments and Syariah courts acting almost

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like a ‘sovereign sub-nation’ (Mohamad 2010, 2011), as well as by their peers, increasingly through social media, and Malay society at large. Peletz (2002) has described this as a ‘Malay panopticon’ (Foucault 1991), working on the principle of self-discipline and voluntary submission to Islamic regulations to avoid criticism or even punishment. As Peletz (2002: 235) notes: ‘erring on the side of being “too Islamic” … generally carries little risk and does, moreover, bring many potential social and cultural rewards’. Such surveillance means that Malay elites tend to increasingly respect Muslim pre- and proscriptions in public (Hoffstaedter 2011). The taboo on eating pork, for example, is generally strictly upheld, yet other foodstuffs are more open for interpretation. As one of my interlocutors explained: ‘After I have read the Qur’an myself, I now feel that I can eat “non-halal” food, since the Bible is also a book of Islam from before Prophet Muhammed.’ The lifestyles of urban Malay middle and upper classes were previously similar to those in East Asia and the West, but from the 1980s and onwards, some of the new middle classes turned to Islam for ethical guidance, rejecting many of their previous habits (Hefner 1998; Kahn 2003; Mohamad 2010; Nagata 1997). Elites are also subjected to surveillance, but are more able to shield themselves if they want to indulge in some haram (forbidden) activity, for example by travelling abroad. Alcohol is consumed by some Malays, mostly at private events rather than in public. Of those Malays who used to drink in public, many have now stopped because they ‘understand Islam better’, as they explain, and feel that they should no longer drink alcohol. According to the Syariah Criminal Offences (Federal Territories) Act 1997 (Act 559), as from 1 January 2013,4 (henceforth SCO (FT)) Part III, Offences Relating to the Sanctity of the Religion of Islam and its Institution, section 19, ‘any person who in any shop or other public place, consumes any intoxicating drink shall be guilty of an offence and shall on conviction be liable to a fine not exceeding three thousand ringgit5 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or to both’. In 2009, in a widely publicized and hotly debated case, a Malay actress was sentenced to six lashes with a rattan cane for publically drinking beer in the state of Pahang. She was set to become the first woman to be caned in Malaysia, but her sentence was commuted in 2010 by the sultan (hereditary ruler, who traditionally has control of religious laws in his state) due to massive uproar in the media and among women’s groups. However, three other women were later caned in 2010 for engaging in sex

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outside of marriage; their punishments were carried out away from the public eye and did not generate similar publicity (Peletz 2013).6 The threat of caning in certain states and the growing threat of postings and tagging on social media, which could expose women drinking alcohol to the watchful eye of religious authorities, are curtailing women’s sense of freedom of choice when it comes to alcohol. As one of my interlocutors told me, exasperated: ‘I am so scaring of tagging now that I don’t even accept water or juice in a wine glass any more, because on Facebook it could look like I am drinking wine’ (Olivier 2016: 271). Some Malays nevertheless have a pragmatic approach to alcohol, as one of my interlocutors explained: I have done haram things like drinking alcohol; I tried that for the first time a couple of years ago. But I feel that it is okay since I am not a robot, I am human. In Islam, ‘ideally’ I should not do this or that, but as long as I don’t go overboard then it is okay. I feel that I must try out what is given in life, and that God understands that.

The public focus on proper Muslim practices has also encouraged more Malays to perform the hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca, one of the Five Pillars of Islam. Hajj allows a person to meet religious obligations as well as acquire great prestige in terms of highly valued religious experience and knowledge. With Malays’ greater affluence, easier travel and companies arranging all-inclusive ‘pilgrimage-tours’, doing the hajj is no longer as prohibitive as it used to be (Nagata 1997; Peletz 1998). Among today’s obstacles for elite Malay women remain the difficulty faced by unmarried women, who must be accompanied by a man on the hajj. Elites may do the hajj several times in order to acquire ever more prestige. Several of my interlocutors had also done one or more umrah, or minor pilgrimage to Mecca, which is non-compulsory and can be carried out any time during the year. The hajj, or major pilgrimage to Mecca, can only be carried out at a certain time of year. My interlocutors would perform an umrah to atone for some transgression, or ‘clear their minds’. Major and minor pilgrimages to Mecca figure prominently in the narratives of polygamy. Contemporary Islamic discourses in Malaysia have also forcefully extended into gendered domains. As Khoo (2009: 116) points out, they have entailed a focus on more superficial understandings of the Muslim body and Muslim identity as purely performative. A Malay woman is expected to exhibit and embody her Islamic identity publically, through Islamic dress or attending mosque prayers,

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for example. These repeated performative acts, which are not daily individual choices but rather ‘regulative discourses’, produce docile Muslim bodies, already disciplined and self-disciplined by the requirements of the Five Pillars of Islam (Butler 2011; Foucault 1991). Many Malay women have been swayed by Islamic resurgence in their understanding of femininity, emphasizing women’s roles as wives and mothers and associated ideas of chastity and modesty. This new understanding is reflected in their clothing styles and performance of their Muslim selves, when they choose or may feel obliged to cover up or veil (hijab), usually in the form of a tudung or telekung (scarf covering hair, neck and shoulders), as well as display other outward signs of their modest Islamic identity. For some Malay women, Islamic dress may be used to explore their gender identity in modern Islamic terms (Bloul 1998; Khoo 2009; Nagata 1995; Sandborg 1993; Stivens 1998; Wichelen 2007). Many elite women now wear what has become a national dress, the loose-fitting, two-piece full length baju kurung, which in accordance with Muslim standards of modesty veils the contours of women’s bodies. It has been a traditional Malay dress style since the 1700s (Sandborg 1993:195). Some continue to wear mostly Western clothing, but many switch between styles, adapting to the particular circumstances. This constantly changing dress style is symbolically significant of urban elite women’s often difficult oscillation, literally and figuratively, between Western and Malay lifestyles. Elite Malay women may experience strong feelings of ambivalence when attempting to navigate through a plethora of Western gender norms and secular lifestyles as well as Islamic gender norms and Muslim lifestyles. Polygamy is at the nexus of this ambivalence.

Manipulation of Islam Raihana, who grew up in polygamy and now herself is considering becoming a second wife (see Chapter 7), suggests that whatever one thinks of polygamy, the spouses are legally married under Islamic law, and are not having an adulterous affair. She refers to the hegemonic Malay notion that it is better to permit and accept polygamy than to encourage adultery. She therefore finds second wives acceptable in the sense that they are not committing a sin in being the man’s mistress. She was commenting on an old friend who brought his young second wife to a lunch we attended. They

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had been married for two years, yet Raihana was meeting the second wife for the first time, as the marriage had been secret. The husband had not told her, since she is also a close friend of his first wife and suspected that Raihana would be very upset and tell his first wife. Not least because the second wife turned out to be his children’s former playmate. The first wife now knows about the marriage and so it can be made public. Raihana stressed that her friend was acting appropriately according to Islam; if he had brought a mistress to the lunch, we might have felt uncomfortable because he was committing a sin. When he brings his second wife ‘at least he is doing it right’. When practising polygamy, elite Malays may use Islam for conflicting purposes: they marry under the Islamic banner of acceptance but may simultaneously break Malaysian Islamic family laws to achieve it. They may manipulate not only Islamic norms and ideals but also laws to suit their needs (Minza 2009). Rokiah explained: Polygamous marriage is not a right of men in Islamic law; it is a provision to help elevate women who are destitute. The Prophet had ten wives – this was before the revelations on polygamy which limits it to four – all of whom except Aisyah were widows, including his first wife Khadija. The provision was formulated under conditions which no longer apply in Malaysia, which means that men do not enter into polygamous marriage with the right spirit of Islam. Not telling your first wife that you are taking another is an example of entering into it with the wrong spirit.

Many elite women furthermore voice concerns that the provisions for polygamy in Islamic Family Laws are written and approved by male politicians and civil servants, often to safeguard their own perceived interests. They are seen as using Islam to suit men’s needs, reflecting traditional patriarchal views of males as rational and firm and females as emotional and weak, which inform various schools within Islamic jurisprudence (Al-Hibri 1995). Women’s perception that men manipulate Islam to legitimize polygamy highlights gender-based conflicts about the social, moral and religious legitimacy of polygamy. Women tend to use Islam to argue against, whereas men use Islam to argue for polygamy, as mentioned. The reformist women’s group Sisters in Islam (SIS) has been particularly active regarding polygamy and women’s rights in Islam (Abdullah, Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015; Foley 2004; Kasim 2002). While not all women see polygamy as a women’s rights issue, it is clearly a gender issue.

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Rokiah, fifty-six, who grew up in a polygamous family, personified women’s often conflicted sentiments with regards to polygamy, oscillating uneasily between personal rejection and reluctant religious acceptance. Rokiah would object if one of her close family members were to become polygamous: ‘Women today still do not wish to have polygamy.’ She added that mothers are in control of the husbands of the future, so they should teach their sons that they are irresponsible if as husbands they neglect their responsibility to their wife by engaging in polygamy. She found this a better approach than banning polygamy, since it does not attack its Muslim aspects. She noted that when a man wants to marry a second wife: There is no consent really needed, polygamy is allowed in the Qur’an, and if the wife consents she will go to heaven. Therefore most Islamic women lawyers do not fight against polygamy; it is difficult for women’s organizations to do something about it if you look at Islamic laws, since in the Qur’an it is clear that you do not have to have consent.

Muslim feminists might disagree with Rokiah that consent is not needed or that nothing can be done about men’s unrestricted access to polygamy (Kasim 2002; Sukidi 2001), as might most of my interlocutors. They might also disagree with her assertion that first wives who allow their husband to marry polygamously will go straight to heaven; it is a very common notion in Malaysia, seen by believers as stemming from the Qur’an (Karim 1998: 23; Ong 2006: 40). Katijah probably spoke for most when she declared that in a Muslim context polygamy is acceptable but frowned upon (Jones 1994; Siraj 2001). Islamic law allows a Muslim man to take another wife, granted that he fulfils certain conditions, but whether his wife or society at large finds it legitimate is another matter. Secret polygamous marriages contracted out of state or in another country for strategic reasons are considered clear violations of Muslim requirements for engaging in polygamy. This subverting effect of secret polygamous marriages particularly arouses elite women’s ire, and feeds urban polygamy legends with narratives of men’s deceit and denial of family. One of the reasons many Malay women, and men for that matter, speak against polygamy is precisely because of the very way it is often contracted, covertly, without proper permissions and procedures, negating such fundamental tenets of Malay society as communality and familial solidarity. It can create rifts in families, as some may be told and others left in the dark, pitting family members such as spouses, siblings, parents, children

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and in-laws against each other. Manipulation of Islam in relation to polygamy brings to the fore the conflict elite Malay women may feel and express in expecting and accepting polygamy as Muslims, but condemning and rejecting it as women and wives.

Notes   1. Hari Raya are days of celebration after ending the month-long fasting of Ramadan, where no food is to be consumed between sunup and sundown. It is the most important festive season for Malays.   2. Malaysian population statistics can be found at: https://www.dosm. gov.my/ (accessed 25 May 2017).   3. The Arabic word ‘adab’ refers to rules of conduct involved in the good deeds and manners in Muslim social practice (Raudvere 2015: 25).   4. Syariah Criminal Offences laws can be found at http://www.agc.gov. my/ (accessed 29 May 2017).   5. 1000 RM is USD 233 (24 May 2017) at https://www.bloomberg.com/ markets/currencies/cross-rates.   6. See: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/apr/01/malaysia-commutes-caning-sentence (accessed 29 May 2017).

Chapter 4

Secrets

Rashidah’s Story about Discovering Polygamy Rashidah, forty-five, has suffered tremendously as a first wife in a polygamous marriage because of secrecy. A secrecy found in many elite polygamous unions. Rashidah only discovered that she was part of a polygamous union when her husband brought one of their daughters over to his secret second wife’s house, where he without prior warning ‘introduced’ her to his second family. When the daughter returned to Rashidah’s house, she told her that she had met her ‘other mother’. This is how Rashidah traumatically found out her husband had been secretly married to a second wife for several years, and had several children with her. And polygamy, according to Rashidah, is ‘the last thing a woman would want’. Although unhappy about her marital situation, Rashidah has chosen not to divorce her husband. She is well established in her large house and her prominent job, while he pays the bills. She copes and does not challenge the status quo. She has yet to meet her Chinese co-wife; she has no relations with her and does not wish to have any; only their children meet her when their father brings them together. Rashidah worries about her children, especially her daughters, who were very upset when their father revealed his other family. Rashidah described how, at a Hari Raya celebration, she had bought some of her husband’s favourite foods. When he wanted to take some with him, their youngest daughter said ‘does your wife not cook for you’ and ‘papa, why can’t you eat it here’, which she saw as a sign of her daughter’s inner hurt.

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After Rashidah discovered her husband’s polygamy, he moved over to his second wife’s house, and did not sleep with Rashidah anymore. Lately, however, he has started to come back to Rashidah’s house more often, which she interprets to mean that he is disillusioned with his second wife, who does not cook nor pamper him anymore: ‘Chinese women don’t cook, they go out all the time.’ She calls it the ‘classic’ situation where the other wife loses some of her shine, and the husband starts going back to the first wife, ‘who was after all a better wife’. Rashidah now feels ‘vindicated’ as a good wife, but has no intention of resuming her marriage, for she feels betrayed by her husband: ‘The worst nightmare of a Muslim woman is for her husband to take a second wife.’

Secret Polygamy Secrecy is one of the hallmarks of Malay polygamy, in contemporary society as in the past. ‘In the old days second marriages were secret; they still are today, but now they are “open secrets”’, according to Katijah. As a man’s second marriage ‘used to be more of a secret’, his family would often not find out about his second wife until he died. Typically, I was told, at the wake before his funeral, with his wife and children and whole family present, a man’s second wife and her children would show up to everybody’s embarrassment and shock. Katijah related how a friend had experienced this traumatic event upon her husband’s death. Her husband’s secret second wife had barged in, heavily pregnant, and thrown herself wailing on the body. The many ‘wake’ stories bear the hallmarks of urban polygamy legends. Today, first wives may discover their husband’s polygamous marriage earlier, often through friends or even family members who may be aware of it and tell them. Husbands may also be less reluctant to disclose their second marriage, as a fait accompli, in line with the greater occurrence, visibility, and perhaps acceptability of polygamy among certain elite groups in Malaysia today. Once first wives know their husbands have taken a second wife, according to Rokiah, they will usually tell close friends and want to talk about it to better deal with the situation. Making it official and public is another matter, however, contributing to making polygamous marriages open secrets in contemporary Malaysia. Women’s explanations of why a husband might not want to make public that he is taking a second wife centred around three main themes: keeping

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up appearances in public, avoiding confrontation with the first wife and the family, and avoiding fulfilling legal requirements, including getting the first wife’s consent. A main reason second marriages may be secret among the urban elites of K.L. and Selangor is because the original married couple may be well known, with both wife and husband occupying prominent positions. The chief legal consideration that makes it expedient for the husband to contract subsequent marriages out of state or out of the country is indeed to avoid applying for permission to have a polygamous marriage. Not applying for permission to be polygamous minimizes the risk that other people will hear about the marriage. This is an important consideration among the elites of K.L. if a husband wants to maintain an officially monogamous marriage to a well-known wife. According to 36-year-old Halima, men want to protect themselves and their reputations, since most of them are on the ‘known list’, ‘they are hypocrites, they want to appear as good husbands, and so they keep their second or third wives to themselves.’ Typically they will bring only their first wife to functions, relegating the second wife to secrecy. Such considerations are related to the ambiguous social acceptability of polygamy. Being married to a powerful woman, perhaps financially and socially independent of her husband, may discourage men from making public that they have married a second wife. Marrying a second wife when the first wife is seen as performing her duties well is not generally condoned, and husbands may not wish to risk disfavour by publicly bringing out a second wife. A second main reason why a man might not want to publicly announce that he has married another woman is because it would involve informing his first wife of his decision, something many men appear unable or unwilling to do. Consent from an existing wife or wives to engage in polygamy is not a strict legal requirement in any state in Malaysia, yet most state laws state that the court should take the consent or views of an existing wife or wives into consideration when deciding on whether to grant a man permission to marry another wife. First wives are thus, in principle if not always in practice, able to frustrate their husband’s application to engage in polygamy by refusing to consent to the second marriage, as well as contest any court approval of the marriage. The first wife clearly plays a large role in bringing about the secrecy of polygamy, since many women appear reluctant or unwilling to accept a status as first wife. At least most people I talked to, including polygamous

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husbands, assume so. As Katijah emphatically put it, the secrecy is mostly to avoid fights with the first wife. Rokiah, herself the daughter of a secret second wife, suggested that men marry another wife secretly because they may feel insecure about facing their wife or discussing the reasons or problems that led them to take another wife. It is not shame that prevents men from disclosing their polygamous unions, since it is religiously acceptable, but rather insecurity towards the first wife. She added that men should be honest with their wives, and should discuss any problems with them. There are, of course, a myriad personal reasons why men choose not to inform their first wives of their subsequent marriages, which are known only to themselves, but most women seem to relate it to a fear of confrontation, both with their first wives, but also very much with their families. A man’s family often does not sanction the polygamous marriage, and may in fact side with his first wife (see Chapter 12). Moreover, men often fear their children’s disapproval. As a man’s application to practise polygamy can potentially be rejected by the Syariah court, a man’s marital status at the time of the application is of prime importance. This tempts many men into not disclosing that they are already married on the application form. The easiest way to avoid disclosing their current marital status is to leave the state where their first marriage was contracted, or leave the country, to marry a second wife. They may then avoid going through a legal procedure which may end in rejection, not to mention the potential for wrecking their existing marriage. These factors make it expedient for husbands to contract subsequent marriages out of state or out of the country. By leaving the country or state where the first marriage was contracted to marry a second wife, a man can have several wives, while in his home state be recorded and seen as being married to one wife only. The southern part of Thailand, home to a sizeable Muslim minority, is a favourite place for Malay couples to contract a secret or discreet polygamous marriage. It is convenient in being a foreign yet neighbouring country, and an added bonus for a couple seeking discretion is that the wife does not need her wali (guardian) present to give her away in marriage, as is required by IFL (FT) in Malaysia. Any adult male witness may do, and so allows for complete secrecy or discretion for both families if so desired. This option is so entrenched in Malaysia, that all-inclusive ‘polygamy packages’ to Thailand are openly advertised, particularly through social media.

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Polygamy packages may cost from 1,200 to 2,800 ringgits or more, and include transportation costs, payments to the official solemnising the marriage, the Islamic Religious Council and two witnesses, lunch, a copy of the documents, photos and perhaps a video of the event; the highest priced package may also include sightseeing tours.1 According to media reports, the number of marriages involving two Malaysian citizens or a Malaysian and a non-Malaysian citizen registered at the Malaysian consulate office in the Songkhla province of Thailand, across the border from the east coast Malaysian state of Kelantan, has risen steadily; in 2016, there were 4,178 couples compared with 3,831 in 2014.2 England is another venue for the affluent to marry polygamously in secret, as many will have homes or have friends or family with homes around London where they can stay. People will use their networks to do it discretely. One of the women I worked with requested my help in arranging her marriage as a second wife in London, where I lived at the time. For her, I was a safe choice, being an ‘outsider’ as well as bound by the discretion of being both a friend and a fieldworker. Yet marrying polygamously is illegal in Britain, so I could only help her so far as it was legally and ethically possible. On a personal level, the impact of experiencing a close friend enter into polygamy blurred the lines between polygamy as an analytical object and a personal subject for me, but also gave me some fundamental insights into elite cross-border polygamy.

Getting Consent A Muslim man’s right to take more than one wife is not automatically granted in Malaysia, but subject to approval from the Syariah court. According to my interlocutors, a third main reason a husband might not want to make public that he is taking a second wife is to avoid fulfilling legal requirements, including getting the first wife’s consent. In the Federal Territories (and in Selangor), a husband does not explicitly need consent from his first wife to marry another wife. Informing and getting consent from existing wives when applying for permission to engage in polygamy is not a requirement in all Malaysian states. In states where men are not required to obtain approval from their current wife or wives prior to applying for polygamy, a notification letter will typically be issued to the current spouse(s) when the court is handling the new marriage application from their husband. Existing wives may then have

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the right to object to the marriage in court before the husband can proceed with the marriage, if they are against the marriage. Not all first wives are notified, according to my interlocutors; notification is not automatic but at the discretion of the court. The IFL (FT), Part II: Marriage, Preliminaries to Marriage, Section 23, on Polygamy, states requirements for contracting a subsequent marriage: (1) No man during the subsistence of a marriage shall, except with the prior permission in writing of the Court, contract another marriage with another woman. (1a) A marriage contracted without the permission of the Court under subsection (1) shall not be registered under this Act unless the Court is satisfied that the marriage is valid according to Hukum Syarak [Islamic law] and the Court has ordered the marriage to be registered subject to section 123. (2) Subsection (1) applies to the marriage in the Federal Territory of a man who is resident within or outside the Federal Territory and to the marriage outside the Federal Territory of a man resident in the Federal Territory. (3) An application for permission shall be submitted to the Court in the prescribed manner and shall be accompanied by an iqrar [statutory declaration] stating the grounds on which the proposed marriage is alleged to be just or necessary, the present income of the applicant, particulars of his commitments and his ascertainable financial obligations and liabilities, the number of his dependents, including persons who would be his dependents as a result of the proposed marriage, and whether the consent or views of the existing wife or wives on the proposed marriage have been obtained. (4) On receipt of the application, the Court shall summon the applicant and his existing wife or wives, the woman to be wedded, the wali [guardian] of the woman to be wedded and any other person, in the opinion of the Court, may provide information relating to the proposed marriage to be present at the hearing of the application, which shall be in camera, and the Court may grant the permission applied for if satisfied – a) that the proposed marriage is just or necessary, having regard to such circumstances as, among others, the following, that is to say, sterility, physical infirmity, physical unfitness for conjugal relations, wilful avoidance of an order for restitution of

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conjugal rights, or insanity on the part of the existing wife or wives; b) that the applicant has such means as to enable him to support as required by Hukum Syarak all his wives and dependents, including persons who would be his dependents as a result of the proposed marriage; c) that the applicant would be able to accord equal treatment to all his wives as required by Hukum Syarak; and d) that the proposed marriage would not cause darar syarie [hardship] to the existing wife or wives e) deleted (5) A copy of the application under subsection (3) and of the iqrar required by that subsection shall be served together with the summons on each existing wife.

In K.L., a prospective polygamist makes a formal application to the Syariah court as partly outlined above, where a judge will determine if he satisfies the requirements as set forth in Section 23. As my interlocutors related it, this usually translates mainly into determining the husband’s ability to financially maintain two wives, based on his income tax returns. For elite men, justifying polygamy from an economic point of view will not be a problem, and even less so now that a provision that the second marriage must not reduce existing wives’ and children’s standard of living has been deleted. The kadi may ask the applicant if he can be fair to both wives and give them equal love and material comfort, though a man applying for polygamy is arguably unlikely to say that he cannot be fair (Karim 1991: 68–69). It should be noted that Malaysian Syariah courts today have trained Syariah judges presiding (Endut 2015: 270). My interlocutors consistently referred to them as kadis (Islamic judge) in their narratives, however, and I hence use their terminology. It may be more problematic to prove that a second marriage is ‘just or necessary’ when married to a well-functioning and well-connected first wife, who may not have done anything that in the court’s opinion would necessitate a subsequent marriage. This is now also less of problem in K.L., as the ‘just and necessary’ requirement for permission to marry another wife was changed in 2004 to ‘just or necessary’. A man can now argue that a second marriage is necessary to avoid engaging in adulterous relations with

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a woman to whom he is not married, for example, while not having to argue that it is just in relation to his existing marriage. This in effect reduces still further the conditions that a man must fulfil in order to marry another wife, and according to women’s rights activists makes the IFL less progressive in terms of Muslim women’s rights (Abdullah, Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015: 145).

Strategic Polygamy Secret polygamous unions are not just requested by husbands. In some cases, second wives themselves may be interested in keeping the marriage secret. It is probably mostly out of loyalty to their husbands, but sometimes the arrangement may suit them as well. Forty-year-old secret second wife Noor, for example, has agreed to keep her marriage as a second wife secret to protect her husband, since he has convinced her that if his first wife finds out she will take his children away from him. But Noor also enjoys the freedom of being married but not being known to be. She is seen as divorced, but if anyone should find out about her relationship with her new husband, they are legally married. ‘I have my private life which is nobody’s business and I like it that way.’ She often reiterates that she likes the arrangement, spending time with and then away from her husband, because it gives her personal space, something she lacked and missed with her first husband, who ‘crowded’ her. The secrecy of polygamy may hence also be related to the fact that polygamy can be seen as a legitimate way to have a mistress or lover, by both Malay men and women. Stivens (1996: 194) noted how the few polygamy cases she heard of in Negri Sembilan appeared to be ways of having sexual relationships without being involved in illicit affairs. According to Aisyah: ‘There are two forms of polygamy which one must distinguish: polygamy and polygamy on the quiet. … Polygamy is less secret than it was before; there is more talk about it now. It has to do with Muslim revivalism in Malaysia – people cannot live together without marrying.’ In K.L. today, Aminah argued, both men and women may feel more free to be sexually active outside of marriage, and this leads to more polygamy. While men are usually initiating polygamy, women are not innocent in their desires, she emphasizes, as ‘it takes two to tango’. Some women like to manipulate men, and might savour the ‘chase’ to get him; they are not necessarily after a man because

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of his money, but because polygamous marriage can be a legitimate way for them to have an affair – or a legitimate love life. Some women are ‘just like men’ in this respect, with regards to polygamy, according to Aminah (see Chapter 8). Aminah, whose father was officially polygamous, explained that in her father’s time, polygamy was more ‘in the closet’; now it is more open, but has changed character over the last twenty years: Some Malay men see a second wife as a legitimate way to have a mistress, and others prefer to maintain mistresses because they don’t want to perform duties as husbands. … There is definitely more polygamy now; it has to do with the increased wealth that bumi(putera)s have, the freedom they have to be promiscuous.

In Malaysia, it is illegal under Muslim law for Muslims to cohabit or have sexual relations with a potential marriage partner without being married. If caught, people may be fined, jailed or even caned. If you are from an elite family, the story is sure to hit the media and the humiliation will be compounded. A Muslim man and woman who are not married should not be alone because of the danger of engaging in immoral acts due to close proximity or khalwat. According to the SCO (FT) part IV, Offences Relating to Decency, Section 27, khalwat involves any: (a) man who is found together with one or more women, not being his wife or mahram, (b) woman who is found together with one or more men, not being her husband or mahram, in any secluded place or in a house or room under circumstances that may give rise to suspicion that they were engaged in immoral acts shall be guilty of an offence and shall on conviction be liable to a fine not exceeding three thousand ringgit or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or to both.

Mahram is unmarriageable kin by reason of consanguinity or affinity or fosterage; sexual intercourse with a mahram is considered incest. The state religious departments implement rulings imposed on Muslims through various acts meant to protect them from vice, such as raiding night spots and detaining underage girls and transgendered people. Some of their more controversial practices involve enforcement officers going to hotels, car parks or other areas where suspected khalwat takes place. Engaging in sex outside of marriage carries an even harsher punishment if caught and convicted. The SCO (FT) Section 23, part 2 and 3, on ‘Sexual intercourse out of wedlock’, states that

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Any woman who performs sexual intercourse with a man who is not her lawful husband shall be guilty of an offence and shall on conviction be liable to a fine not exceeding five thousand ringgit or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years or to whipping not exceeding six strokes or to any combination thereof … The fact that a woman is pregnant out of wedlock as a result of sexual intercourse performed with her consent shall be prima facie evidence of the commission of an offence under subsection (2) by that woman.

Section 24 deals with ‘An act preparatory to sexual intercourse out of wedlock’: ‘Any person who does an act preparatory to sexual intercourse out of wedlock shall be guilty of an offence and shall on conviction be liable to a fine not exceeding three thousand ringgit or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or to both.’ Syariah law has always penalized sex outside of marriage, but only in recent years has it been enforced in such draconian ways as to involve caning, according to my interlocutors. For some urban elite Malay women, such increasingly conservative and restrictive interpretations and understandings of Islam may seem increasingly incompatible with their lifestyles. They may attempt to distance themselves from such understandings, in personal practice if not in public, by continued orientation towards adat or by living according to their own moral compass. Yet as Muslims they are also under pressure to marry in order to have a love life. Strict Syariah rules on sex outside marriage is one reason why women may marry as second wives in order to avoid exposure and punishment (see Chapter 8). Choosing polygamy as a marriage option is hence a choice some elite Malay women make to manage their love life legitimately; it is not necessarily because they consider polygamy a superior or even desirable form of marriage.

Proper Procedures Secret polygamous marriages, left to the bride and groom to arrange completely on their own premises, can for some women be seen as a liberating experience. Contracting a polygamous marriage may be the ultimate act of self-management for a woman, involving choosing a spouse independently and arranging the marriage herself without her family’s participation or even knowledge. Here, a woman may feel in total control of the situation, without having to take familial or social responsibilities into consideration.

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Second marriages that start out as secret tend to be arranged very differently than (first) monogamous marriages, especially if they are out of state. Firstly, the spouses’ respective families may not be involved at all, since they may be unaware of the wedding taking place. Commonly, the second wife’s family knows about the marriage, since she may find it difficult or counterproductive to hide her marriage from her family, counting on them for advice and support. The second wife’s family may be involved in the actual marriage only through her father or close male relative acting as her wali. Elaborate ceremonies for engagement negotiations and the marriage itself may be dispensed with altogether, usually to keep the husband’s own family and, more to the point, his first wife and her family from finding out. The contrast with a couple’s first monogamous marriage is tremendous (Rudie 1993). Polygamous marriages may be hurried, hushed affairs, compared to monogamous marriage and engagement ceremonies, which are typically accompanied by extensive and expensive celebrations. Secret polygamous marriages may be completely on the husband’s premises, as it is typically he who wants to keep it secret. Few or even none of the spouses’ families or friends may be present, denying the bride public acknowledgement of her marital status. The importance of public acknowledgement of a wife’s marital status means that in some cases, even if a husband wants to keep the marriage secret, a ‘proper’ wedding will be performed for his second wife, particularly if she is young and has not been married before. Her family or she may insist on it. The husband may still manage to keep the marriage secret from his first wife and her family, and perhaps from most of his own family as well. This obviously works best if the second wife is from out of town or out of state, so the wedding can be celebrated away from K.L. If the wedding is held in K.L., chances are that the first wife will hear about it. Of course, if the second marriage is not secret, marriage celebrations can be held as normal, though they might be on a lesser scale than a first monogamous marriage. This state of affairs can only go on because the coordination of marriage records between different states and between Malaysia and abroad is rudimentary. It has prompted much debate among Muslim women’s rights groups, since the government is seen as allowing, even tacitly, polygamous marriages to take place with very little control. Various women’s NGOs, particularly Sisters in Islam, have suggested that a national computerised register of Muslim marriages (and divorces) should be established in Malaysia, as well as a stricter implementation of the law regarding polygamy (Abdullah,

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Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015: 144). When a man applies to register a marriage in a particular state, a link to the national register would allow the Syariah court or state religious department to determine whether the applicant is already married. Currently, neither court nor department has any central mechanism to check the marital status of a Muslim male. A woman would in effect have to check every state religious department to find out if a man is already registered as married (Kasim 2008). This is very unlikely to happen, so when applying to marry, a man can give false information not only to the court but also to his future wife, who might be unaware that he is already married. Katijah described how lawyers in her husband’s firm from time to time get contacted by men who want to know in which state it is easiest to get married polygamously; some of the lawyers refuse to assist in such requests, however. From the requests it is clear that some men go out of state to marry a second wife not just to avoid telling their first wife of their intent, for in some cases she might in fact know that her husband is marrying a second wife; rather, it is because the procedures for obtaining permission to practise polygamy might be easier in another state. Men marrying out of state often appear to be doing it covertly, however. For a wealthy Selangor man bent on polygamy, ‘it is easy to lie’ about his marital status when marrying a second wife in another state or abroad, according to Katijah. If he later chooses to register the second marriage in Selangor, he will only have to pay a fine; there will be no sanctions for false declaration, and his second marriage will be valid. Some out-of-state or cross-border polygamous marriages contracted without the appropriate Syariah court’s consent are indeed eventually registered in the husband’s home state. If a man marries a second wife outside his home state, the local Syariah court may consult with the Syariah court in his home state and require him to go through all the proper procedures for polygamy. If a man later registers his out-of-state marriage, his first wife must in principle be informed by the court. Going through the proper polygamy procedures in another state can be avoided if the husband does not disclose that he is already married when marrying his second wife. IFL (FT), Part IX: Penalties, Section 123, on Polygamy without the Court’s permission, states: ‘Any man who, during the subsistence of a marriage, contracts another marriage in any place without the prior permission in writing of the Court commits an offence and shall be punished with a fine not exceeding one thousand ringgit or with an imprisonment not exceeding six months or both.’

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An errant husband will hence only have to pay a maximum fine of 1,000 ringgits upon registering such an out-of-state marriage, no matter what his economic status is; in practice the fines are much lower. As Sisters in Islam and other Muslim women’s NGOs have pointed out, such amounts are negligible for rich men who wish to take more than one wife, and in no way deters them from their endeavour. To be effective, they argue, the fine should be related to a man’s income. Similarly in Indonesia, elites who marry polygamously without court approval and only later register the marriage are only faced with very low fines for circumventing the 1974 Marriage Law (Butt 2008). Men who marry second wives out of state to avoid seeking permission from and/or telling their first wife, may not be able to register the marriage in their home state, however, as not all states allow them to register such marriages when they come back. Registering out-of-state polygamous marriages ex post facto subverts the standard application and registration procedures for marriages under the IFL (FT). Yet the courts will often allow the marriages to be registered nonetheless to protect the interests of the subsequent wives. A number of states have made amendments to their Islamic Family Law to make it possible to register a marriage initially contracted through improper procedures. A marriage that is not approved and registered by the Syariah court is not legal. A woman who has married as a second wife in a religious ceremony, which is subsequently not properly registered with the Syariah court, is in a legal limbo. Her marriage is religiously valid and her children will be legitimate, but she will not have ‘relief of the law’ and cannot seek the help of courts in disputes with her husband. Similarly, if a second wife’s marriage is contracted in a civil ceremony outside Malaysia and subsequently not registered in a Syariah court in Malaysia, it has no legal validity and she will face a host of problems. Her children will be illegitimate and cannot be registered as Malaysian citizens. If her husband dies, she will not be recognized as his heir or dependent, and will have no claim on his property or access to his pension (Abdullah Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015). Furthermore, proper procedures for divorce cannot proceed. Women may be caught in a legal and moral limbo: she may not have an officially registered Muslim marriage in Malaysia, yet she may be married according to civil law in another country, and may not feel legally or morally free to form new relationships and have children with other men.

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The legal incongruity between the perceived intention of the law to protect the interest of women in polygamy, and its apparent application in men’s favour, is interpreted by many elite women as an erosion of women’s rights. It is seen as stemming from an interpretation and implementation of Islam that is increasingly male-biased. Muslim women’s groups have been trying to address the perceived injustices and loopholes in the Islamic Family Laws that allow for the relatively easy access to polygamy for Muslim men. Syariah courts are seen as not being particularly keen, or in some cases outright neglecting, to enforce the laws restricting men’s access to polygamy. Relatively lax interpretations of laws concerning polygamy by Syariah court judges are hence seen as allowing men easy access to polygamy (Abdullah, Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015; Kasim 2002; Mohamad 1998, 2011; Ong 2006; Stivens 2003). While it may not be the intent of the Islamic Family Laws, it has become the de facto situation. Even religious department officials concede that such practices effectively constitute loopholes in the law, according to one of my interlocutors who is a lawyer. Aisyah explained how kadis will excuse their seemingly automatic granting of permission to be polygamous with the argument that men will have other women anyway, and it is their duty to protect the dignity and interests of women by making sure that the men do not lead them to commit zina or adultery, a serious offence in Islam. Such arguments are put into perspective when confronted with women who are married in another state or country and now find themselves abandoned, with no legal rights because they are not officially married. Justification of polygamy on the grounds that men just follow a natural instinct, which should then be made legal to avoid sin and protect women, is very common also among women, despite its often clear circumventions of proper procedures and its resultant – as women see it – false management of polygamy.

Notes  1. http://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2016/11/24/malay-couples-opt-to-thai-the-knot-weddings-across-the-border-a-popularchoice/ (accessed 29 May 2017).  2. https://www.nst.com.my/news/2017/03/224359/spotlight-more-couples-tying-knot-thailand (accessed 25 May 2017).

Chapter 5

Blame

Katijah’s Story about Blaming in Polygamy To Katijah, forty-two and monogamously married, ‘polygamy is acceptable in society in the sense that it is legal in Islam and people do it and it is known, but you must differentiate between this formal acceptance of the reality of polygamy and women’s views of it. They do not like it or even accept it, but what to do if their husbands marry another’. Katijah would personally not accept polygamy in her marriage, but talks about the ‘whys’ with her husband when someone they know or hear of practises polygamy; she sees talking about potential problems as part of their commitment in marriage. Their talks about polygamy are becoming more frequent, as the number of polygamous unions in Katijah’s social circle grows. Some of her female business contacts have entered polygamous unions: ‘When a career woman marries as a second wife, she may feel she has everything, a career and financial independence, and she asks herself what is missing and it is marriage, but by the time she wants to marry, all men are already married. … If she chooses to become a second wife she will have more men to choose from.’ A ‘Malay career lady’ may find it difficult to meet the right man; men might be afraid of her if she is very successful or his senior. She knows several successful women who have accepted being second wives because they would rather have a part-time husband than no husband at all. When one of her husband’s business contacts got married, they were invited to the wedding reception, but her husband had tried to

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dissuade her from going because he knew she would be upset when she found out that it was his second marriage. She commented that the groom looked much older than the bride, and when her husband told her why, she was indeed very upset. Katijah suspected that he married the young woman because of ‘lust’, which she does not consider a legitimate reason for taking another wife: It is quite common: there is a man I know because he lives in our area – sometimes I see him there sometimes I don’t, so he says, ‘hang on, those days I’m in the other house.’ … People would never look down upon a man who takes two wives, but rather on the second wife; she is seen as the marriage wrecker. Women always get the blame; men never get blamed.

Malay Gender Relations There was a common lament among the women that I worked with that, contrary to the trend in other Muslim countries, where polygamy appeared to be decreasing or stabilizing, more Malay men from outside the upper classes were engaging in it to the detriment of women like themselves. As Malay women become more emancipated, better educated and increasingly socially and economically independent of their families, polygamy is seen by many women as a form of ‘development reversal’ (Brenner 1998), a wrong direction for Malays to take with respect to gender relations. Traditionally, in most Malay contexts, gender as a marker of social activities, spatial domains or cultural knowledge emphasized reciprocity and complementarity between men and women, and gender roles were not seen as asymmetrical or hierarchical (Karim 1992). Polygamy, as urban elite women tend to perceive it, creates unequal and unbalanced spousal relations, and as such, polygamy has become a key aspect of contemporary elite Malay gender relations. Malay gender relations are increasingly informed by state policies and national discourses bearing on the Malay social and political body. In particular, Malaysia’s various Islamic movements have highlighted and attempted to restrict women’s sexuality and emphasized women’s roles in biological reproduction. Religious and political developments in Malaysia have succeeded in defining women in relation to men as mothers, wives and sexual beings. It is considered acceptable and desirable for women to work as long as it does not interfere with their family duties. As national

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politicians, along with Islamic resurgents, place greater emphasis and restrictions on women’s bodies in their redefinition of Malay society, women are coming under increasing pressure to conform to gender roles formulated by others. State promotion of the ‘Asian Family’, a regionally specific version of the ‘nuclear family’, and prescriptions about a woman’s place have been supported by revivalist Islamic groups. The resulting debates about women’s rightful place have deeply implicated family and kinship in the cultural struggles about the future shape of the Malaysian nation (Ariffin 1992; Karim 1995, 1998; Ong 1995, 2006; Sloane-White 2010; Stivens 1996, 1998, 2003, 2012). In this climate of competing images of what constitutes ‘ideal Malay women’, urban elite women have to negotiate their lives in general, and polygamy in particular. The elite women I worked with, most of them highly educated with successful careers, have moved far beyond notions of either working for ‘development of the nation’ or staying at home and letting their husbands support and represent the family. Some of them make more money and are in higher positions than their husbands, and work for their own sense of achievement. On one level, then, state and national discourses on ‘women’ are only marginally applicable to them. Yet on another level, polygamy as an institution is now able to forcefully (re-)enter elite life precisely because contemporary Islamic discourses are (re-)establishing women’s primary roles as wives and mothers. The creation of a good female citizen is based upon the norm of marriage and motherhood, and pressures to marry in order to become ‘well-adjusted members of society’ are exerted by women’s families, peers and communities. Husbands may feel that they have religiously and socially sanctioned access to polygamy because their wives are seen in relation to them rather than to themselves, seemingly giving husbands the freedom to decide on polygamy whether or not their existing wives approve. According to Carsten (1997: 96), it was impossible to find a woman who would agree to a polygamous union in the village on Langkawi, where she worked. In K.L., I found a similar overwhelming reluctance to be part of a polygamous union among elite women, though some women readily agree to become second wives. Aristocratic and upper-class Malay women may traditionally, albeit perhaps reluctantly in some cases, have accepted polygamy as a potential or even inevitable part of their marriage. Today’s elite women, however, comprised as much of women from traditional upper classes as from new urban upper middle classes, who have

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risen to prominence based on economically and politically achieved power rather than hereditary position, may not consider polygamy an accepted or expected part of marriage. Women who have chosen to marry with their own choice of partner are likely to have different expectations and perspectives on marriage and their husbands’ entitlement than women who have a traditional arranged marriage. The women I worked with typically considered marriage to be a partnership of two people, each with their specified duties. Polygamy was considered to break that partnership, especially if, as is often the case, the husband contracts a second marriage without his first wife’s consent or even knowledge. Educated, ambitious and successful career women, many with several years in the West behind them, were my main interlocutors, and this clearly colours my analysis of polygamy among elite Malays. Many of the women had mothers, grandmothers or female family members who were pioneers with respect to their gender, as politicians, civil servants, teachers or entrepreneurs. Or they grew up with educated or independent mothers in a time when female education or independence was not common, and were inspired to achieve the same for themselves. Some of the women were exceptional in their own right, as trailblazers in their chosen profession. The importance of work was indeed a leitmotif in most women’s descriptions of themselves and their lives. They would stress the intellectual stimulation they got through work, which also helped them in their marriage. They particularly stressed the importance of being financially independent, ‘in case something happens’, for example, ‘if your husband takes a second wife and you want to leave him’. Elite women’s focus on financial independence is in line with the classic observation that, in South East Asia: ‘the real influence of the woman comes from her control over the purse strings’ (Firth 1966 [1943]: 26). Urban elite Malay women are able to pursue individual goals and strive for political, social and economic prominence. Yet Malays’ sense of self nonetheless remains to a large extent relational, and for many, social identity may be considered more important than idiosyncratic individuality (Peletz 1996: 202–4). Marriage and motherhood is still the expected norm for elite women, no matter how successful they are career-wise. Many elite women juggle with high profile, demanding careers, which may threaten their marriage or motherhood, the two main markers of Malay social adulthood. Ambitious women considered to work for themselves in a cultural context generally de-emphasizing individuality may

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perhaps be seen as competing directly with their husbands or potential husbands, which could jeopardize their marriages or chances of marriage, and lead to an increased threat of polygamy. Then there are women who choose to become (secret) second wives precisely because they chose careers rather than marriage earlier on, and now consider polygamy their best chance for marriage. As Katijah notes: ‘Often they will marry their old boyfriends who wooed them earlier and now perhaps feel they married the wrong woman.’ For them, polygamy may be a lifestyle choice, a strategy rather than a threat – though it remains an ambiguous choice for most. For all the women I met, however, including those marrying secretly as second wives, the threat of polygamy, as they called it, was a reality they had to deal with. The mere possibility that their present or future husband might take another wife was a heavy burden on women, influencing their view and management of marriage and family life. As Mernissi (1987: 116) points out in Morocco: ‘[p] olygamy is dying statistically, but its assumptions are still at work even within monogamous households.’ Among elite women, I found polygamy’s perceived creation of unequal and unbalanced spousal relations to be a key aspect of contemporary Malay gender relations. I am not, as emphasized earlier, suggesting that polygamy is inherently oppressive to women, rather that the elite women I worked with mostly felt oppressed by polygamy in their lives. This was primarily due to what they considered men’s false management of polygamy. It comes back to elite Malay women who may be forced to expect and accept polygamy as Muslims, but who mostly condemn and reject it as women and wives.

Polygamy as Destiny The potentially antagonistic gender relations engendered by polygamy are crystallized in the notion of ‘blame’. The word blame implies that a wrong has been done, which is what many elite women clearly feel with regards to polygamy. Yet although it is the man who has to apply for, and contract, a polygamous marriage, the man is usually never blamed for polygamy. It is typically considered the woman’s fault. A polygamous man is mostly seen as the victim of either his desires or the actions of women when he takes a second wife. So while elite women may personally condemn the institution, many of them appear to simultaneously blame womankind for its

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persistence. I rarely encountered a woman who lashed out at the licentiousness of men or complained about their lack of constraint and consideration for their wives. Rokiah’s comments were typical of this seeming inconsistency in elite women’s views on polygamy: ‘It is a very terrible thing; all women are afraid of it. Personally I would not accept it. … Usually a man only takes a second wife because there is something wrong with the first wife, otherwise he wouldn’t … so the woman should not say bad things about him.’ Men’s apparent disregard for the consequences of following their desires are, in polygamy narratives, often contrasted to women’s emotional state in polygamous marriages. Divorced first wife Fauziah, sixty, is typical in lamenting how men, when engaging in polygamy: ‘force women to lead unhappy lives, suffering the heartache you feel as a person in polygamous marriage. Men think they are great because they have two wives; they don’t know how we suffer’. Despite their often traumatic experiences of becoming polygamous wives, few elite first wives seem to divorce their husbands, as will be discussed in Chapter 15. It may have to do with the perception that men are not to blame for polygamy. Women may not actively try to change an unhappy polygamous marriage if they have internalized the notion that they are themselves to blame for it. Fauziah, who eventually divorced her husband because he took another wife, was atypical in pointing out that ‘the man should also be blamed; he thinks he has power and can take four wives. The man should also be firm, and not marry another wife’. While elite women do acknowledge that men are somewhat to blame in engaging in polygamy, ‘it takes two to engage in polygamy’, as Aisyah noted. Only a few would go as far as Fauziah in saying that men should be blamed equally to women. Fauziah is more in tune with the Kelantanese, among whom Rudie (1994: 159) found that husbands are usually considered the culprit in polygamy. Typically, however, polygamous blame is shifted away from the husband, who is technically creating the polygamous union through his plural marriages. This is most clearly expressed in the description of men’s propensity for being polygamous in terms of its hereditary nature. Men whose fathers are or were polygamous are often seen as predestined to engage in polygamy themselves. In effect, it renders husbands blameless; they are simply following innate drives that cannot be resisted (Brenner 2012; Wichelen 2007). Though this rationalization may be achieved in hindsight, by women bewildered by their once loyal and monogamous husbands

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taking another wife, it is a widespread belief. One effect of believing polygamy runs in families is that some young women are reluctant to marry men whose fathers are polygamous. Rashidah’s niece was going out with a man whose father had four wives, but she eventually stopped seeing him because she feared he might be a ‘chip off the old block’ and someday become polygamous like his father. Rashidah’s niece could look to Rashidah’s marriage for confirmation of such sentiments. Rashidah’s husband’s father had two wives; he married his first wife’s best friend. This was quite common in his generation, according to Rashidah, since men and women did not mix much and did not have much chance to meet partners, so if a female friend came over often to visit the wife, she might be a suitable choice. Aminah’s father similarly married Aminah’s mother’s best friend, for similar reasons. When Rashidah got married, her husband said he would never marry a second wife, but he obviously did, reinforcing Rashidah’s and many other women’s view that polygamy runs in families. Similar notions that men are ‘born polygamous’ are found in other polygamous societies, for example in Nigeria (Osakue and Martin-Hilber 1998: 201). The increasing wealth among urban Malays means that more men can now fulfil this supposedly innate destiny. While this notion of predestination seems to suggest once again that men are not directly to blame for engaging in polygamy, women are keen to point out that not all men are ‘equipped’ to be polygamous. It clearly requires a certain character on the part of the man, whether or not his father was polygamous. Elite men’s assumed innate drive to satisfy their basic needs – their resources and their biology almost seem to require them to satisfy such needs – form part of the ideological underpinnings of discourses seemingly absolving men from blame in polygamy. Women do acknowledge that men can have some blame in engaging in polygamy; Rashidah hence criticizes her husband for marrying a ‘simple’ Chinese girl (Nurmila 2009: 110). Blame is readily assigned to men when they trick women into polygamy, as Halima experienced. Yet women’s perceptions of men’s reasons for becoming polygamous often seem to shift the blame to women themselves – deficient wife, sexual deficiency, reproductive deficiency, too many women, over-ambitious women, man-eating women, etc. I was often told that one should not just blame the man but also the woman who marries him as a second wife, since she is just as much part of it. As Kartini noted: ‘Polygamy can only go on because women take part in it, a young woman who accepts being a second wife knows

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she is marrying a man who is already married, and in that sense women themselves take part in it and perpetuate it.’ Narratives of polygamy tend to cast women as active agents in bringing about polygamy, wittingly or unwittingly. The assignment of blame to the women involved in polygamy differs depending on whether the talk is of the first or second wife. Whether a woman is a first or second wife makes a great difference not only in how she is viewed, but also in how she herself views polygamy. When a married woman becomes a first wife, her family tends to look upon her with sympathy and pity, and would rarely blame her directly for the polygamy. Outside their immediate families, however, first wives may be blamed for failing to keep their husbands content enough to stay married only to them. Many of my interlocutors would in this manner blame the first wife for not taking good care of her husband ‘since he goes out and marries another’. As Rokiah noted: ‘When a man takes a second wife it might be because there is a bad first wife, one who is proud and who belittles him, scolds him, makes him feel upset.’ When a woman chooses to marry as a second wife, however, there is often very little understanding of her choice even in her own family. There are probably cases where the second wife feels she has no choice but to accept polygamous marriage because of certain real or imagined circumstances. She might be past what is considered the normal marriage age, think her husband is unmarried or is going to leave his first wife. While a woman might be willing to become a second wife because it suits her purposes, she may not be particularly thrilled about it. There are also women who are very willing to become second wives for a variety of reasons. There appears to be a distinction between women who start out married life being wife number two and divorced or widowed women who marry as second wives. Their motives may be superficially similar, such as material security, but they may look at the practice and their roles in it differently. A young bachelor girl may find it a convenient choice among several, whereas a divorced woman may find it necessary and her only option. The assignment of blame is very much related to women’s particular circumstances when marrying as second wives, allowing for a more fluid narration of blame. Second wives are the obvious, visible symbols of polygamy, someone interfering in the marriage, and as such become the object of hate and assignment of blame. First wives often harbour strong antipathy towards the woman who ‘stole’ their husband, and this theme of hatred and betrayal in polygamous unions is directly

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linked to the notion of blame. In line with the general tendency not to assign blame or guilt to men, shifting the blame to women for polygamy, first wives faced with a co-wife tend to focus their anger on the intruder in the marriage rather than on their husband, who brought the co-wife into the union. Blaming co-wives, and women in general, for polygamy can take material, magical forms. Magic may be directed at the husband, but more commonly at co-wives, in line with their being considered the main culprits in polygamy. First and second wives usually turn to magic for similar ends, to oust their co-wife or obtain their husband’s exclusive attention. Second wives are prime targets, since they are the visible sign of polygamy, intruders in the marriage, and a first wife’s use of magic may be sprinkled with a lust for revenge over the second wife for wrecking her marriage. Polygamy magic will be discussed in-depth in Chapter 14.

Accepting Polygamy Relating what they would do in case their husband took a second wife remains a theoretical exercise for most women. Yet speculation about polygamy and how they would react to it is rife among elite women, fuelled by much gossip and stories circulating in town. They in turn fuel the ambiguous acceptability of polygamy. If one imagines a ‘polygamy acceptance’ continuum, at one end, one would find women like 26-year-old Zarena, who unconditionally rejects polygamy. She said she would not stand for polygamy, now or later, and she would leave her husband if he took another wife. Zarena belongs to a new generation of urban elite Malay women, groomed to be independent through their family backgrounds (middle- or upper-class liberal Muslims) and their elite schooling and university education in Western countries. The maxim Zarena grew up with was, in her mother’s words, ‘you can wreck the marriage and then marry the man but do not marry a man who is already married’. Her mother was speaking from bitter experience, having herself lived through a short but traumatic polygamous marriage, when her husband married a secret second wife. For Zarena, it has meant total rejection of polygamy. Unmarried Kartini, twenty-nine, takes a more pragmatic view: I am too weak to handle polygamy, but infidelity is out, so I might be more forgiving in the real situation. … I would be so hurt if my

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husband took another wife; I would definitely talk to him about my feelings on polygamy before our marriage. … Women have a choice, too; she does not need to accept it – she can put it in the marriage contract, a type of prenuptial agreement that she will want a divorce if her husband takes a second wife.

Katijah, who has been monogamously married for sixteen years, represent a typical middle space on the continuum, where polygamy’s acceptability is at its most ambiguous. When asked what she would feel and do if, hypothetically, her husband took another wife, her answer was typical: ‘Religiously, I would have to accept it, but personally I could not. Religiously it is his right, if he can take care of all of them in the same way, which is very difficult. But if he did that, and it is theoretical, he would be breaking the partnership, the contract that we have.’ Despite this common contractual view of marriage, most of my interlocutors had not talked to their husbands about their feelings regarding polygamy upon marrying them. This is in line with a common lack of communication about intimate and potentially divisive issues among Malay spouses. Some women did talk to their husbands about it upon marriage, or intend to if they get married. Typically, they would point out to the husband that polygamy was unacceptable and that they would want a divorce if he took another wife. Katijah herself has taken a more indirect approach, talking about the ‘whys’ with her husband when someone else they know or hear of engages in polygamy. She sees ‘talking about their problems’ as part of their commitment in marriage, as mentioned, indicating that polygamy also to her is a threat. I did not really meet any women whom I could place at the other end of the continuum, the total and unconditional acceptance of polygamy. Women typically agreed with former first wife Maznah that ‘in the Qur’an, polygamy is very different, since it was a time when there were many women widowed because of the wars, so it was allowed to prevent the sin of adultery. It is not meant to be practised freely’. Yet I found older women theoretically willing to accept polygamy ‘for the right reasons’. They pointed out that when they were younger, they would not have accepted it, but now with age many felt they could perhaps accept it. Fifty-six-yearold Rokiah, who grew up in polygamy, had never really thought about what she would do if her husband took another wife, only in passing perhaps, but at this stage in her life she might accept it for the right reasons. Previously, she might have left him, since she

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could take care of herself, but now, if his reasons are right and she has no grounds for saying no, she might stay and accept it, regardless of the fact that she could still leave and take care of herself. In Rokiah’s case, as in many other women’s, the turnaround had in her own words to do with her ‘greater understanding of Islam’. Many elite women now take Arabic and Qur’anic classes to become better versed in Islam (Frisk 2009; Olivier 2016). The women may be influenced by what their mostly male teachers tell them about accepting polygamy as a Muslim institution. Certain teachers have become very popular, and command high fees; popular teachers may also be flown in from abroad. Maznah described how she used to go to religious classes and Qur’an readings in the mosque, but she stopped, since it was a male teacher who tended to side with the husbands when they had queries. She felt she could not really ask a man difficult questions about marriage etc., so she and a group of women hired a female teacher to come to a private house where she teaches them: ‘This is much better because we can ask her all kinds of things, it is like preferring to go to a female gynaecologist with “that part only your husband is supposed to see”, that you don’t want other men to see.’ Religion is commodified in Malaysia, as elsewhere, with expensive religious speakers, exclusive courses on religious subjects, luxury hajj pilgrimage packages, fashionable prayer garbs and religious accessories becoming big business (Nagata 1997; Wichelen 2007). Although it was never explicitly stated to me, women might also be more ready to accept polygamy when they are older because it appears to become more of a threat or reality for them once they are in middle age, and their husbands start looking for younger or other women. Telling yourself that you can accept polygamy might allow you to deal with the situation should it happen. Another reason why older women might accept polygamy is that, contrary to what is often described in the literature, many of the women I talked to feel that remarriage is not an option once they are in middle age. Women might fear loneliness if they divorce their husbands and do not remarry, or fear the financial and social fall from grace it might entail for an elite Malay woman to be without a husband (see Chapter 15). Urban elite Malay women’s views of polygamy, then, may change over the course of their married life from one of often absolute rejection to one of reluctant acceptance, something women themselves pointed out to me. This age-based shift in women’s view of polygamy is one way to deal with what an increasing number of

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especially middle-aged women in urban Malaysia are considered to face in their marriages. By not seeking divorce from their polygamous husbands, women tacitly accept polygamy; many urban elite women appear to remain in polygamous marriages no matter how unhappy they are about them. The general consensus was that no Malay woman likes polygamy, but often accepts it as ‘it is in the Qur’an’. This is turn means that second wives are acceptable, whereas mistresses, who are considered common among elite men despite their right to marry four women, are not acceptable. On a personal level, however, some first wives might not tell even close friends that their husbands have married another woman out of embarrassment; acceptance of polygamy is usually formulated within an Islamic context, not within their individual marriages. In their often conflicting stories of whether or not they accept polygamy, women express the cultural ambiguity that is such a central feature of contemporary Malay polygamy.

Narrating Blame Why do women who tend to clearly condemn (the thought of) polygamy in their own lives persist in not assigning blame to the men who technically create the polygamous unions, shifting it to women, to themselves? How, in other words, does this ideological shift happen – why do they ‘blame the victim’, as women would see it? The question is perplexing considering that generally in Islamic South East Asia, polygamy has not been fully socially approved even though sanctioned by Islamic law. People tend to be critical of polygamous men, particularly those who keep their second wives secret. This confluence of polygamy’s high visibility in K.L. and its supposed secrecy fuels social disapproval. The complex blaming process is influenced by the increasing Islamization of Malay society, which has helped increase and solidify distinctions between men and women. Men may set the ideological agenda, in line with the masculine and patriarchal ethos of Malay society, and an increasingly ‘muscular Islam’ (Frisk 2009; Khoo 2006; Ong 1995, 2006; Peletz 1995, 2002; Stivens 1998). Women may find it difficult to distance themselves from patriarchal views about men’s Islamic right to polygamy, in line with Islamic discourses equating rejection of polygamy with rejection of Islam (Alamgir 2014; Foley 2004). Such ideological embodiment makes women argue that second wives are not stigmatized because

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polygamy is permitted in Islam, in the sense that it legalizes relationships rather than forcing women to commit sins. It hence provides the ideological underpinning for the argument that it is better to permit and accept polygamy than to encourage adultery. It relates to what Wichelen (2007: 106) calls the ‘masculinist discourse of the male polygamous body’. For elite Malay men, being married to more than one wife signals prestige and wealth, which in turn is related to a male virility complex. Such a complex has powerful political, social, economic and reproductive aspects, as well as a direct sexual aspect (Wittrup 1990). As Mohamad (2011: 180) notes: ‘the right to polygamy is symbolically a potent symbol of male Muslim masculinity as it relates to his virility to redouble the procreation of the Muslim ummah’. For elite Malay women, in contrast, polygamy appears to lead to greater antagonism between the sexes. This is nowhere clearer than in relation to sexuality, where blame and ideology come to the fore in Malay polygamy. Polygamy can become an arena of potential conflicts between the sexes, as gender relations may be organized around notions of virility, associated with maleness, and lack of discipline, associated with femaleness, providing the cultural basis for polygamy. Such gender dichotomies, institutionalizing differences between men and women, lend themselves imminently to legitimizing polygamy. In Malay society, gender relations are organized around notions of reason and passion (Karim 1992, 1995; Peletz 1996). By assigning reason to men and passion to women, polygamy can be seen as a way of helping untamed women settle into gendered normality through the tutelage of reasonable men – that is, taming women’s passions and desires (see Laderman 1991; Ong 2006). Women may, in the current climate of public and patriarchal Islamic discourse, find it unwise to blame men for polygamy, as polygamy is increasingly narrated as a Muslim institution beyond reproach and critique. Women may fear that criticizing polygamy might be construed as criticizing Islam (Kasim 2002). Hence, women may find it beneficial to take the blame in some or most circumstances. In Indonesia, similar Islamic discourses have led some pro-polygamists to elevate polygamy to a type of jihad or Islamic struggle; a tabloid urged women to become ‘polygamy volunteers’ as a form of national duty to alleviate various social problems and help create a moral and righteous nation (Brenner 2012: 222–23). The reluctance to openly criticize polygamy as an institution is nowhere reflected more clearly than in the fact that women might

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talk about polygamy with family and friends, but less so with the most crucial person in this regard, namely their husbands. Childless women, for example, often live with the fear that their husbands marry other women in order to (be)get children. They may not want to discuss polygamy with their husbands because once it is voiced that they really want their own children, the polygamy wheels may be turning, metaphorically speaking (see Chapter 11). This is one of the reasons I had problems interviewing men whose wives I knew about polygamy, as mentioned. Assigning blame to themselves may form part of a strategy used by some women to protect themselves against (the effects of) polygamy. One must thus understand women’s narratives about blame in polygamy within their particular contexts as elite Malay women facing the threat of polygamy. Women may blame different people in different contexts. In their own marriage they may blame men for engaging in polygamy, whereas they may blame women in other polygamous unions. The discourses and narratives about polygamy I collected in effect reflect women’s struggles with men, and indeed with other women, as the increased prominence of polygamy impacts gender relations in contemporary urban Malaysia. The impact of polygamy is clearly felt in the threat it can pose for women. The possibility of polygamy is making young women apprehensive about marrying for fear of being part of a future polygamous union. For already married women, the threat of polygamy is even more real. It creates constant anxiety, and force women to re-evaluate some of their basic values. As Aminah asked, rhetorically, ‘what if my husband asks me to stay home to take care of the family and give up my career, and I refuse, does he then have the right to marry another wife?’ A Malay man applying for permission to marry polygamously could argue that the marriage is necessary because his first wife leaves the house to work, and thus in principle is not (sexually and otherwise) available to him, as Syariah law prescribes (Doumato 1995). Most of my interlocutors would probably have found it difficult to meet a request from their husband to stay home and tend home and children (Foley 2004; Sloane-White 2010). To Aminah, a wife’s refusal to stay home is not a legitimate reason for polygamy. Yet the fact that she wonders whether working could make her to blame for her husband’s polygamy, that is, whether she would be nusyuz, illustrates how deeply polygamy has penetrated elite Malay women’s perceptions of marriage. According to IFL (FT), Part VI: Maintenance of Wife, Children and Others,

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Section 59, a wife is nusyuz when she unreasonably refuses to obey the lawful wishes or commands of her husband – that is to say, (a) when she withholds her association with her husband; (b) when she leaves her husband’s home against his will; (c) when she refuses to move with him to another home or place, without any valid reason according to Hukum Syarak. She ceases to be nusyuz as soon as she repents and obeys her husband’s lawful wishes and commands. Polygamy elicits strong emotions in most elite women, and when sharing their thoughts with me women might offer inconsistent explanations or narratives. That women say different things about polygamy in different contexts also reflects women’s confusion and ambivalence regarding polygamy, however. Women may feel that they must accept polygamy as Muslims, but mostly cannot accept it on a personal level. This partly explains how they can condemn men for being polygamous, but take the blame for polygamous unions themselves. Women do have some respite from this self-imposed blame, however. Polygamy is, as discussed, a favourite topic of conversation among women in K.L., leading to much gossip and creation of urban polygamy legends. The point of these stories seems not to be whether they in fact happened as described, but rather how men trick and hurt their wives when engaging in polygamy. As such, urban polygamy legends subvert the women’s public claim that men are not to blame for polygamy and offer them an outlet to blame men without doing so directly.

Chapter 6

Husbands

Salbiah’s Story about Suffering in Polygamy Salbiah, fifty-one, is a third wife. She was married before, as a second wife, but her husband’s first wife was very jealous and convinced him to divorce her. It was a traumatic divorce, and, even more distressingly, her husband insisted on keeping their two children; she finally agreed to it because she knew they would experience great hardship if she was on her own with them. She has lost all contact with her children from her first marriage. After her divorce, she decided to put her marriage and her children behind her and start a new life. Salbiah took a master’s degree abroad after her divorce; she was well educated and could take care of herself, so everybody was shocked when she came back to Malaysia and married her present husband as his third wife. She describes how her friends suspected her of marrying him because she was desperate; she was in her late thirties and afraid that she would remain a divorcee. Her parents had not approved of her first marriage because it was polygamous, and were incensed at her losing access to her children; they were even more upset when she announced her new polygamous marriage. Her father was so upset when Salbiah wanted to marry as a third wife that he refused to act as her wali, so Salbiah got married in Thailand, where friends can act as witnesses. Salbiah’s family has since forgiven her but still refuse to see her husband; whenever they come to see her he leaves.

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Salbiah says she married her husband for love, ‘love makes you blind’, but she is now no longer in love with him. Her friends have told her that her husband probably put a spell on her to make her marry him; she was in a daze, and now that she is out of it she cannot understand why she married him. They have a daughter and she is the reason Salbiah is reluctant to divorce him. She is afraid of leaving him because he might take her child, as did her first husband. Salbiah often thinks of leaving him, and has tried to get a job abroad to escape him, but as she explains: ‘My husband is clever and has refused to register our marriage here in Selangor, so I cannot get help from courts to divorce him, I am actually illegally married.’

Men with Wealth and Power According to Rashidah, there are three things required for a man to engage in polygamy: money, opportunity, and that he feels no shame doing it. A man’s opportunity to become polygamous is directly related to the willingness of a woman to become a second wife. Part of the reason polygamy is becoming more prominent is probably the availability of willing wives (Jennaway 2000). As Aisyah wryly answered, when asked why men marry second wives: ‘It is supply and demand, there are enough women around to marry rich men.’ Speculating on what type of man might marry what type of second wife is often a central ingredient in elite Malay women’s polygamy narratives. Polygamy, like all forms of marriage, is practised partly based on individual circumstances, however, which cannot easily be generalized or predicted. Men may feel they have a dysfunctional or unsatisfactory marriage, and polygamy presents an option for developing a more satisfactory relationship with another spouse, without the necessity of divorce; divorce among elites can be extremely costly and may diminish a man’s prestige if the potentially acrimonious proceedings become public knowledge. Due to the difficulty in generalizing about men who marry for purely personal reasons, the focus will be on men’s more instrumental reasons for polygamy as suggested by my interlocutors. To follow an anthropological tradition of focusing on pragmatics rather than subjectivities of marriage (Stivens 1998: 102) becomes relevant in this context, because my primary data comes primarily from women’s perspectives on men’s reasons, rather than from men themselves. Among Malay men who have the wealth and power to engage in polygamy, there are as many reasons for marrying a second wife as

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there are reasons not to. A main group of polygamous husbands is therefore comprised of men who traditionally marry several wives, such as members of royal households, lesser royalty, nobility and aristocracy. Men with titles are another group who marry polygamously, and have always done so. Titled men may hold various positions in Malay society, typically high-ranking politicians, government officials, civil servants as well as successful businessmen. Titles are bestowed by sultans of the different states and by the king. Yet it may be that, today, men who have more than one wife may not necessarily hail from these traditional upper-class groups but come from the new urban-based middle classes, as discussed in Chapter 2. Though there is a greater social spread among the men who have several wives in Malaysia today, what elite polygamous men in K.L. and Selangor generally have in common is wealth. To many elite women, the present prominence of polygamy is related, as Aminah phrased it, ‘to economic development and the sudden surge of wealth among Malays’. While the general impression is that polygamy is related to wealth, Fauziah went further in suggesting that: ‘Polygamy occurs at the top level, where people are very rich, and at the very low level, where people don’t think too much about their actions, whereas in the middle range there seems to be very little.’ Women would describe how the practice was becoming more common in richer circles, among their peers, and ‘even among executives’. Second wife Zuriah, for example, claims her estranged husband only married her as his second wife for his ego, to get a new wife, an acquisition. In fact, according to Rokiah, ‘society’ might encourage men to have several wives if they are rich. As mentioned, her husband had been asked, completely unsolicited, whether he wanted a second wife. As Katijah commented: It has now become fashionable, there is more of it, men are now boasting about it, they feel they get more affluent and can afford it. If they are successful men, they are expected to have something on the side, have a second wife. … For example many people have asked [my husband] if he has a second wife.

Several women indeed pointed out that Malay men engage in polygamy because it has become an urban status symbol. Their new wealth made them, as Fauziah expressed it, ‘change status from one family to two families’. According to Asmah: Polygamy has become a status symbol; once men have achieved wealth, they might feel ‘once I reach a certain corporate position, a

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certain wealth, I deserve to be married’. It is related to income and status; you have achieved something in the corporate world, so the next step is to have two or three wives.

Polygamy was traditionally a status symbol among Malays, a marker of the ruling elite who had the wealth and power to have several wives. Raihana’s father had three wives, and her father’s brother had four wives, who all lived in the same large house: ‘It was a matter of prestige, so if a man could afford it, he would marry several wives.’ There are likewise men today who become polygamous as a matter of power and prestige, and for them, polygamy can be a status symbol. As Katijah explained: ‘For men it has to do with status, “if I can have two wives it means that I am powerful”.’ While women might concede that there were some ‘boasters and show-offs who parade their wives around’ among contemporary polygamous men, not all were convinced that men married second wives because it was a status symbol. The denial of this historically established explanation may be related to the ambiguous social acceptability and secrecy surrounding much contemporary Malay polygamy. Some of Frisk’s (2009: 165) interlocutors related how some men considered marrying a young pretty second wife as a sign of status, adding with disdain that men might even actively seek out second wives who were not wearing a telekung; that is, men were seen as marrying second wives for social status rather than religious reasons, and thus not in the ‘right’ spirit of Islam. Polygamy has, as mentioned, generally been relatively rare in Malaysia, and mostly practised by affluent members of society and by rulers. Elite women’s belief in an increase in men contracting polygamous marriages in urban Malaysia may signal that more men are able or willing to take more than one wife. Polygamy might be seen as one of the signs of success for the new breed of urban elite Malays, made rich in the wake of the 1970s and 1980s NEP. As Aisyah noted, there is more polygamy now because in places like K.L. there are more men who have the capacity to be polygamous and they attract single girls who would otherwise have married bachelors. Polygamy becomes an act of conspicuous consumption in a setting where an increasing number of Malay men have found wealth and want to flaunt it (Daloz 2010: 142–43; Shamsul 1999: 91). Polygamy is often considered an anomaly in urban areas, where plural wives may drain rather than augment household resources. Men’s pursuits of power and prestige through polygamy can take

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many forms, yet economic considerations are often paramount in their decision to take a second wife. Polygamy may be valued precisely because taking multiple wives represents a substantial financial drain on a man’s resources, and thus polygamy may serve to symbolize high status. In contemporary Africa, for example, urban residence, waged employment and high educational level all tend to correlate with higher rates of polygamy: men with ‘many powers’ are liable to take many wives as symbols of their high status. It may hence, contrary to many people’s expectations, be the modern, urban, educated elite who have the most second wives, in part because they can afford it (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). Just like an affluent K.L. or Selangor resident needs to have a Mercedes with a driver outside a remodelled house to show family, neighbours and the world at large that he has ‘made it’, so can a second wife tell of enhanced social and economic status. It is the consumption of wives to display wealth, just as consumption of cars, jewellery or holidays abroad might be. Fauziah explained the link between increased polygamy and the growing ‘affluent Malay class’: When a man become successful he usually does two things: he buys a Mercedes Benz, and he marries a second wife. When he can afford it, he can pacify the first wife with material goods, which allows him to take a second wife. … Many men think ‘I am rich, I can have anything I want in this world’.

Men with Strong Desires Malay men were thought by many of my interlocutors to often have ‘mata keranjang’, or a roving eye, as Zainab expressed it; they were seen as womanizers who like young women, some of whom they might marry as second wives. This was the case with her own husband, who maintained a very young mistress and had plans to marry her, before Zainab got wind of his intentions and intervened. Some women also described polygamous men as gatal, literately ‘itchy’ (Peletz 1995: 107; Stivens 1996: 194). Women who marry polygamously could, incidentally, also be described as gatal (see Chapter 8). The perception that men have strong desires that they cannot control and that their wives cannot satisfy feeds into a variety of the hereditary polygamy explanation. Like men who are ‘born polygamous’, men with ‘strong desires’ are similarly bound to

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follow their innate drives. It is polygamy as a man’s sexual destiny (see Gutmann 2009). All Muslim couples intending to marry are required to attend a premarital course (Hassan and Cederroth 1997; Peletz 2002). As part of my research, I also attended a kursus perkahwinan (premarital course), and met several single women who took the course to be extra ‘prepared’ for marriage. Here, we were told that because a man has greater sexual needs than a woman, a wife should accept that he takes another wife. This caused great consternation among some of the women present. Although a common perspective, it does not form part of Islamic jurisprudence, but is rather a cultural interpretation of the man’s right to polygamy based on his perceived (hyper)sexual needs (see Donnan and Magowan 2010; Gutmann 2009). That many women seem to believe it may have to do with the fact that Malay women are not particularly well versed in Islamic jurisprudence or their rights in it (see Chapter 15), and may accept the advice of male religious leaders, who in this way ‘defend’ polygamy. Syariah court judges granting men permission to be polygamous, as well as society at large, may feel that the best option for a needy husband is to marry another wife, in order to avoid zina (adultery), a serious crime in Islam, as mentioned. The same ‘strong desire’ argument in defence of polygamy is found in Indonesia (Minza 2009; Nurmila 2009). Women might likewise subscribe to the claim that it is better to institutionalize men’s polygamous desires than to force them to have secret mistresses. It may offer them a plausible and not too personally painful reason why an otherwise ‘good husband’ suddenly takes another wife: he is a victim of his desires and does ‘the right thing’ by marrying her rather than engaging in adultery. A man may thus feel vindicated in marrying another (often younger) woman to fulfil his natural urges. Both men and women would typically ‘defend’ polygamy by saying that at least it made ‘honest women’ out of men’s mistresses, in Western terminology. In the West, I was often admonished, men just use women and then discard them, giving them no rights. Muslim men, in contrast, were seen as safeguarding a women’s reputation and protecting her and her children’s interests by marrying her. Kartini, twenty-nine, had a different take on the situation: Many men have mistresses; politicians and wealthy men, they install them in condos … My uncle who has mistresses told me that once they become your wives they start nagging, they demand things, as

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mistresses they have no rights and they tend to please men more to get things, so if you marry your mistress you create a vacuum.

The argument that polygamy has a positive aspect in making ‘honest women’ out of mistresses seems, then, to be contradicted by the fact that wealthy Malay men who have not used up their ‘quota’ of four wives do not necessarily marry their mistresses. Keeping mistresses or concubines was generally seen as a Chinese (or Western) tendency, yet the morally and religiously based claim that polygamy offers an acceptable outlet for a man’s pursuit of sexual gratification clearly has limited applicability in actual practice among Malay elites. Twentieth- century Indonesian women activists were likewise not convinced of the ‘strong desire’ argument in defence of polygamy, focusing instead on what they considered the moral outrage of polygamy. As Blackburn (2004: 120) notes: ‘many women viewed the fight against polygamy as a battle against the demon of male lust.’ According to Aminah, thirty-eight, some men see taking a second wife as a legitimate way to have a mistress, yet other Malay men maintain mistresses because they do not want to perform duties as husbands. And as she wryly noted, men’s strong desires could also be harnessed for business success: ‘One business method is to set up your client with a girl, she might at first be a mistress then perhaps she may become a second wife.’ Maintaining a mistress requires sufficient funds, as it is assumed that no one will accept that status unless it is fairly lucrative; maintaining concubines is hence found primarily among the affluent elite, according to Raihana. She believes that lower class people ‘are more honest’ and tend to marry their mistress. She further explained that Malay men’s mistresses are often Chinese, because Chinese women will accept being a mistress to a married Malay man if he is rich and can maintain them in a suitable lifestyle. Chinese mistresses will not demand marriage whereas a Malay lady would, a difference that according to Raihana is related to religion. For a Malay Muslim woman it is a moral and legal offence to have sexual relations with a man to whom she is not married, as discussed; this is not (necessarily) the case for Chinese women. Malay women generally frown upon polygamous marriages seen as related to a man’s abnormally high sexual drive, according to Karim (1998: 20). They tend to consider it an excuse on his part to have a better sex life or to prove his continuing virility (Mohamad 2011). Malay women’s narratives here feed into global discourses

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typecasting men as hypersexual and unable to free themselves from their sexual destiny (Gutmann 1997; 2009), which among Malay elite men may involve polygamy. In their narratives one can therefore find a cross-culturally occurring variety of the sexual gratification explanation, namely the rejuvenation explanation. According to this reasoning, an ‘older’ man in his forties or fifties might want a new young wife to ‘rejuvenate’ himself. Women would, using Western terminology, describe it as resulting from a man’s ‘midlife crisis’; the difference is that a Malay can marry the object of his desire without divorcing his first wife. According to Rokiah: ‘Many Malay men take a second wife after fifty-five when they retire; they want to feel young again.’ That this explanation does not always apply is evident from the fact that many second wives are not particularly young, and may be of the same age as the first wife. Nonetheless, in many people’s minds, and hence in their narratives, the need to prove their virility and masculinity explains why particularly men in their forties and fifties seem to become polygamous. Aisyah, commenting on why older men marry polygamously, noted: ‘Those men in their forties and up marry for self-gratification; it is for their ego, to show that they are still virile. Perhaps it makes them feel more manly. They have a car, a house, a position and then they want to prove their manhood.’ According to first wife Rashidah, her husband married his second uneducated Chinese wife because he wanted a wife who exists only for him, looks up to him and does not compete with him professionally. Rashidah narrates her story based on a common notion that successful and ambitious Malay women such as herself are seen as very powerful and hence potentially threatening individuals (Banks 1983: 98; Sloane 1999: 18). Similarly, a friend of Katijah’s husband, a successful man himself, felt his wife was too successful. She was a prominent corporate figure, but he longed to get back to ‘the simple life’ when his wife was there for him, so he married ‘a simple girl’ as a second wife. Katijah was not convinced by the man’s reasons for remarrying, for it is acceptable, she explained, for a Malay woman to be successful, and this should not threaten the husband. Likewise, Rashidah’s husband’s second marriage might or might not be related to the professional competition that according to Rashidah exists between them; Rashidah assumes that she threatens her husband’s masculinity through her professional success and financial independence. Polygamy is potentially about establishing and re-enforcing Malay men’s masculinities; in Malay Muslim society, men are privileged in

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many domains such as religion and family life (Inhorn 2012; Stivens 1998). Wichelen (2007), discussing uses of polygamy and the veil in Indonesia, suggests that there is a masculine discourse of the polygamous male body, centring on men’s assumed naturally strong sex drive. She parallels polygamy’s role in constructing Muslim masculinity to the veil’s role in constructing Muslim femininity. Polygamy represents the ultimate male privilege, as they can marry several women, whereas women can marry only one man. As Jones (1994: 311) points out: ‘polygamy has become a rallying point of sorts for those in Malaysia who oppose the erosion of the men’s rights they perceive as guaranteed in Islam.’ Contemporary elite men may feel challenged by elite women who can achieve power and position independently, thus ‘threatening’ their masculinity and male privilege in business, politics and other status-generating domains (Connell 1987; 2005). Polygamy may provide men with a way to keep powerful wives in check as well as assert their masculinity and sexuality through polygamy as a male privilege.1

Men with Deficient Wives Women’s perceptions of men’s reasons for becoming polygamous typically shift the blame to women themselves, as discussed. A dominant narrative among my interlocutors was hence that a man will only take another wife if his first wife has somehow failed to maintain his interest or loyalty. Most of the reasons given to me for men’s polygamy relate to some perceived deficiency in the wife. Even women who deplore the practice, typically those who are not themselves part of polygamous unions, seem to feel that wives whose husbands take another wife are not ‘performing their duties’ as wives properly, and by implication, that they themselves are performing well as wives, since their husband is not (yet) polygamous. Part of this rationalization is indeed that men are not usually blamed for polygamy; it is the woman’s fault. As Aisyah relates: ‘Women always get the blame, women will blame the first wife for not taking good care of her husband, since he goes out and marries another.’ Polygamy is thus in a typical narrative the result of wife deficiency. The most common wife-deficiency explanation relates to the notion that Malay men marry second wives for lust, as discussed. It implies that the man’s current wife cannot satisfy him sexually. As Mernissi (1987: 48) suggests, polygamy may be a way for a man to humiliate his wife sexually, wittingly or unwittingly, expressing her

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inability to satisfy him. Malay men are seen as possessing greater sexual urges and needs than women, urges and needs that one woman cannot normally satisfy. Women thus see men as taking another wife for lust because they have ‘strong desires’, and need another outlet for their urges if their wives are ‘sexually deficient’. This was probably the most common reason given to me why men marry more than one wife. In Malaysia and Indonesia, marrying a second wife to achieve another sexual outlet (or legitimize an already existing sexual liaison, especially if it has resulted in a pregnancy) is the most common explanation of polygamy given by both women and men (e.g. Banks 1983; Firth 1966 [1943]; Nurmila 2009). It is a reasoning found in many polygamous contexts; in Nigeria, the notion that a man cannot be satisfied by only one woman similarly underpins polygamy (Osakue and Martin-Hilber 1998: 192). The desire for numerous sexual partners is, according to theories focusing on the sexual motives for polygamy, built into basic human biology and forms the basis for the universal occurrence of polygamy. Sociobiologists have argued that, while the capacity for sexual pleasure and the propensity to seek sexual variety is probably a universal attribute of human males (and females?), powerful men may simply be more able to obtain sex, for example through polygyny (Betzig 1986: 78–79; Hughes 1982: 125). The claim that men practise polygyny because it gives them sexual gratification and diversity in mates is interpreted by some as a reflection of the fact that polygyny involves the sexual exploitation of women; polygyny is a system geared to satisfy male sexual needs rather than those of women. A male advantage of polygyny is indeed that it greatly increases the likelihood that there will always be at least one wife to sexually and otherwise service him. Such arguments have in turn led to claims that researchers often overemphasize sexuality when discussing any form of polygamy. In this view, polygyny is believed to fulfil specific functions that are unrelated, or not primarily related, to male sexuality (Kilbride 1994: 97; Mair 1971: 152). Early Western researchers (and missionaries) were typically both fascinated and repelled by the sexual implications of plural marriages in non-Western societies. Researchers have often focused on the potentially troublesome sharing of a common husband’s sexuality, or a common wife’s sexuality in polyandrous societies. The people involved may not necessarily find it problematic, though some might resent it, of course (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008, 2015b,

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2016; Prince Peter 1963; Tiwari 2008). Sexual jealousy was, however, very prominent among the elite Malay women I talked to. It may not have been voiced in direct ways, more as sad and resigned laments about how their once loving husbands now neglected them physically and emotionally. Here, blame was often assigned to men, though usually by referring to their neglect of the Qur’anic condition that all wives must be treated equally, also with respect to sexual attention, nafkah batin. The men were rarely accused of acting out of selfishness, or ignoring their wives’ individual (sexual) needs. Only sometimes did such very personal pain with respect to sex come through in their narratives. Related to the sexual deficiency explanation is the notion that a childless man may marry a second wife to have children. Among Malays, children are highly valued and extremely important for a person’s status; Malays achieve social adulthood through marriage and children. In a childless marriage, what will often be seen as a wife’s inability to have children is considered a valid cause for the husband to either divorce his wife or take a second wife. This view is typically shared by men and women alike. If they could find any valid reason for a man to take another wife, elite women would normally mention a wife’s inability to bear children as providing legitimacy for polygamy. Among the urban educated Malays, there is equally the feeling that men can be to blame for childlessness, and marrying a second wife to have children may not necessarily be condoned. The notion that a barren wife legitimates a second marriage for the husband has nonetheless been reported by most ethnographers working in Muslim South East Asia, and it was, along with the sexual gratification explanation, the most common reported reason for a man to engage in polygamy (e.g. Firth 1966 [1943]: 55). The role of fertility in polygamy will be discussed in Chapter 11. At the premarital course I attended, we were admonished that if a Malay wife neglects her assumed duty to keep intellectually fit in order to be a good partner to her husband, it may provide him with a reason for polygamy. The instructor told the women that they must keep educating themselves so they can empathize with their husband when he comes home from work and ask him questions about his day. If they fail to do this, or worse, just talk about their own problems when he comes home, he will undoubtedly and justifiably look for another wife, the instructor stressed. This duty was mentioned by men and women alike, often with the explanation that it has a Qur’anic base: a man is encouraged to let his (presumably domestic) wife broaden her horizons so that she may better

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understand his (presumably public) world. The husband was not expected to keep abreast with his wife’s interests. Successful men, once they have money, want to project a certain image and they want a wife who fits this image, according to Raihana. If their wife has a low educational level, for example, a husband may feel that he needs a second better educated and more presentable wife, who projects a more successful image. She described how a friend of hers felt that his wife, who is a housewife, had not developed intellectually alongside him and that they were no longer on the same wavelength; she has lagged behind while he had become very successful, so he married a career woman who was more his equal as his second wife. In this vein, some of my interlocutors told me that one reason they wanted an education was to be good partners to their husbands, to remain able to follow them as they progressed in their careers and moved in ever more elevated circles. Thus, to some people, a man might be justified in taking a new wife when his first wife has not been able or willing to keep abreast with him, not talking or dressing like a top executive’s wife. Again, it is failure or deficiency on the part of the woman that leads the man to engage in polygamy. A wife is also expected to keep physically fit in order to deserve her husband’s attention. At the premarital course I attended the instructor illustrated with his hands how a fat woman sagged, and admonished us that: ‘when a woman is over thirty and has had children everything is hanging on her and her husband does not want to come home to her.’ An integral part of such reasoning, where age and unfitness is the wife’s deficiency, is a widely held cultural conception, shared by men and women: older women are (sexually) unattractive (see Donnan and Magowan 2010). The imagined difference between the often thin and petite young Malay women and rounder, heavier middle-aged and older women is seized upon as an explanation for why men marry younger women as second wives. This view of women’s bodies as getting fat and ugly with age is contested by elite women, who have the means at their disposal to maintain an attractive and fit body into old age.

Men Who Travel and Men Who Trick Women Men with occupations requiring them to travel a lot, such as traders and bomohs (traditional healers), are often believed to have a wife in more than one place. It is hence commonly assumed that

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a businessman might have a second wife in another town, state or country where he regularly does business, such as Indonesia or Singapore (Firth 1966 [1943]: 55). A similar belief is reported in Kelantan by Rudie (1994: 159). These wives will often not know, or not officially know, that their husband has a wife somewhere else. The mobility of businessmen plays a part in the prevalence of polygamy, according to Aisyah, since it may encourage them to take a second wife where they regularly do business. She ironically referred to this phenomenon as ‘buka cawangan’, to ‘open a new branch’. While usually referring to new business, it can also be used to refer to a new family. Zainab related how a businessman had rented one of her K.L. houses for his second wife, while keeping his first family back in his home state of Kedah. I did hear of Malay men who had wives in other countries, but only because the wives had returned to their home country after some years in Malaysia, without divorcing their husbands; these women were not secret ‘branches’, but official wives. Some of the women I knew were very afraid of, or suspected, that their travelling husbands had ‘opened a second branch’ somewhere, and talked about it often. Another common theme in polygamy narratives, which may or may not be related to travelling men, is the notion that men trick women into polygamy under false premises. One version of polygamy by trickery concerns women who enter polygamous marriage believing that the husband will divorce his first wife as soon as possible, thus accepting second wife status only as a necessary but temporary evil. Yet the husband (or in non-polygamous settings the lover) will typically not divorce his official (first) wife whom society recognizes as his wife, a pattern found cross-culturally. It leaves women stranded in polygamy under false premises. Secret second wife Zuriah married under the assumption that her husband would divorce his first wife shortly after their marriage, but he later admitted that he had been overly confident in promising a divorce. Zuriah has thus remained a second wife against her wishes (see Chapter 14). Then there are women who married men whom they thought were single but who were in fact already married. I met and heard of several embittered women who had been tricked by their husbands into a second marriage on false premises. They were always at pains to explain that they would never have married their husbands had they known that they would become second wives. This pattern of men ‘tricking’ women into becoming second wives has been reported by other researchers in Malaysia and Indonesia (e.g.

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Carsten 1997; Krulfeld 1986). In a typical scenario, two weeks before her wedding, 36-year-old Halima received a phone call from the woman her fiancé had referred to as his ‘sister’, as mentioned. The caller was in fact his wife and his ‘nieces’ were his own daughters. Upon discovering his deception, Halima immediately called off the marriage. The first wife had checked her husband’s phone bill, suspecting him of philandering, and found Halima’s number; it was a strategy practised by many worried (first) wives. In such travel and trickery stories, the blame is clearly assigned to the men who deceive unsuspecting women, luring them into polygamy. Trickery and secrecy in polygamy is fuelled by a Malay propensity to avoid dealing head-on with delicate matters, even among close friends and family. If my interlocutors discussed polygamy with their husband at all, it was typically in connection with someone they knew who had married another wife. It was rarely in relation to their own polygamous prospects. Generally, women might talk about polygamy with their family and friends, but less so with the person who is most important in this matter, namely their husbands. It might have to do with the different perspectives on polygamy, which according to my interlocutors seem to exist between men and women. Men tend to not be publically blamed for it and tend to condone it. In such a situation, women might prefer not to probe too deeply into the subject with their husbands. It is, as mentioned, one of the reasons I found it difficult to interview men whose wives I knew about polygamy. Bringing up a topic as sensitive as polygamy might create anxiety or even jeopardize their marital relationship. The discourses of blame underpinning narratives of polygamy often focus on the assumed characteristics and common traits of polygamous husbands in urban Malaysia. Through my many conversations with their wives, daughters, sisters, female family members, friends and acquaintances, as well as from general gossip and lengthy observations, and occasionally, from asking them directly, suggestions of some typical (if assumed or imagined) patterns regarding which men marry polygamously, and why, emerged. In a few cases, like the man who travels or tricks women, the blame for polygamy is directly assigned to men. In most cases, he is simply seen as following innate drives; women, in contrast, are often considered active agents of polygamy. Finding ‘legitimate’ reasons for why men marry polygamously is thus at the heart of many polygamy narratives. Women hurt or bewildered by their husband’s polygamous intent or practice will

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search for reasons to explain his behaviour, but must do so within a dominant narrative of Malay polygamy that suggests that men marry second wives because their first wife is somehow deficient. Elite women tend to subscribe to this narrative, and take the blame of polygamy unto themselves – even as they decry their husband’s betrayal. Elite women, like other Malay women facing polygamy, may try to find reasons for their husband’s polygamy that are not focused on themselves or their marriage, deflecting the focus away from the more personally painful reasons there might be for polygamy. Trying to reconcile men’s and women’s views on polygamy indeed often seemed an impossible task. As Asmah told me, exasperated: ‘My husband once made a remark about someone who married another wife: “they are all very happy.” The remark has stayed with me, I cannot forget it, I feel he did not understand it at all.’

Note   1. For a discussion of the interplay between masculinity, sexuality and reproduction, see Inhorn, Tjørnhøj-Thomsen, Goldberg and Mosegaard 2009.

Chapter 7

Wives

Raihana’s Story about Anticipating Polygamy Raihana, forty-three and unmarried, grew up in a polygamous household as the daughter of a second wife. Her mother was a successful entrepreneur, so she paid many of her and her four children’s expenses herself, even though Raihana’s father was wealthy; Raihana speculates that it might be the reason why her mother advised her ‘don’t be a second wife’. Raihana, like many other ambitious and successful career women, has not married because she did not find a suitable partner. She suggests that men may find her intimidating, perhaps because she may earn more than they do. Her parents did not try to force her into an arranged marriage, as they respected her own wishes, though her father remarked: ‘The problem with you is that you follow nafsu [passion], not otak [brain].’ Raihana ponders that this freedom of choice and lack of pressure from her parents may have backfired, for it made her not pursue marriage very vigilantly, ending up unmarried. Raihana is now considering becoming a second wife like her mother, ‘since romance can also be found there’. Raihana is attracted to the idea of being a second wife because she feels that she could not be a full-time wife as she still wants to work. In a polygamous marriage, her and her husband would not need to be together all the time, so she could keep some personal independence. Raihana was previously ‘involved’ with a married man; when she met him, he said he was divorced, but it later turned out he had a

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wife. For a while she contemplated marrying him as a second wife because she really wanted a child, and as a Muslim woman she cannot have a child outside marriage. She did not go through with it; she felt the basis was wrong, since he had lied to her. She is again thinking about having a child, this time with an old boyfriend and business partner, who is already married. She told him that she wanted a child, and had selected him to be the father. Raihana feels there may be an opportunity to have a child with her particular candidate, since he is having problems with his wife. Yet she feels bad about potentially breaking up his marriage, for she is aware that she must marry him in order to have a child by him, despite her wish to remain independent.

Women Who Must Marry Women, like men, have many different reasons for engaging in polygamy, just as there are many different groups of polygamous women; they encompass great variation in age and marital status, as well as in reproductive, socio-economic and ethnic backgrounds. The focus here will be on second wives, as their marriage marks the spouses’ transition from a monogamous family to a polygamous family. One distinct group of second wives may be women who grew up in polygamous households and are now themselves polygamous wives. This typically involves women from royal, aristocratic or traditional upper class backgrounds; some of the women I worked with fitted that bill. Polygamy practised among the Malay nobility and traditional upper classes is a perpetuation of an old elite marriage form, yet contemporary elite women may still contest its premises and practices. First wives appear to rarely take the initiative in entering a polygamous union; I never heard this mentioned as a possibility among the Malay women I worked with. This is, however, common in other polygamous societies, where a senior wife may encourage her husband to marry more women for various reasons (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). Elite first wives often denounce polygamy, especially if they have been brought into it by stealth, through their husband’s secret second marriage. It might therefore be more fruitful to concentrate on second wives, and their motivations and reasons for polygamy. Polygamy is a plural marriage, but a marriage first and foremost. There is relentless pressure on Malay women to marry, whether

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elite or not. Of course, at any given time, there are a sizeable number of women who are not married, women who are too young, women who are divorced or widowed, women who are looking for a husband and those who do not want a husband. The expectation is that all women (and men) eventually marry and have children, however, as marriage remains a defining feature of social adulthood for Malay women (and men), and therefore continues to have a high premium in Malay society (Banks 1983; Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011; Karim 1992, 1998). For those women who fail to live up to either of those expectations of marriage and motherhood early in adult life when it is expected of them, polygamy can become an option for some. A way to ease the pressure. Most of the women I worked with had internalized the need for marriage and considered it a prime life goal. Marriage was considered a ‘natural’, ‘automatic’ and even necessary part of being an adult. There was a sense in which you are not a woman if you are not married. In Asmah’s words: ‘I always thought I would get married. I could never imagine not getting married; it’s important to marry to complete the cycle. There must be something wrong with me if I don’t get married.’ If a woman was unmarried, it was seen as not by choice. The pressure on Malay women to marry thus remains, yet the marriage pattern is changing in contemporary Malaysia, from a tight control over adolescent females and universal, early, parent-arranged marriage, towards a freer female adolescence and later, self-arranged marriage, and greater options for non-marriage or late marriage (Jones 1994; Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011). Contemporary urban women are largely able to decide independently on the whom, when, why and increasingly the why not to marry. Parental and peer pressure on single women to marry intensify in direct proportion with their age. There is no ideal age for marriage as such, rather ‘upper limits’ of marriageable age. Today, this is thirty years for both men and women. As Rokiah pointed out: ‘Parents-in-law might be against their son marrying a woman that age or over.’ A generation ago, the limit was twenty-five, and by thirty there was no hope of getting married. As Aisyah related, when she got married at twenty-five over thirty years ago: Twenty-five was considered old to marry back then, if you were not married by twenty-five you would probably never get married. Now that critical stage has moved to thirty years old, because of the later age for educated women to marry. But if you are not pursuing an

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education, twenty-five might still be the appropriate age, since you have nothing stopping you from marrying.

In contemporary urban society, with more women postponing marriage to pursue education and career, women get a longer period of grace from their families, though it does not absolve them from their ‘duty’ to marry. In 2010 in Malaysia, the mean age of marriage for Malay women was 25.4 years, a slight rise from 24.6 years in 2000.1 Zarena, twenty-six and single, relates how she is regularly warned that she will be thirty in a few years, and should find a boyfriend soon: ‘There is definitely a cut-off date at thirty, then you become “anak daratu” [old maid] if you are not married.’ Being considered an old maid is a humiliation in a society where marriage is expected and universal. If women are deemed unable or unwilling to find their own partner as they approach the critical age of thirty, families often try to ‘help’ or in some cases coerce women to marry if they remain single too long. Nazriah’s unmarried elder sister, a successful working woman, was pressured into an engagement at thirty; she went through all ceremonies, but her fiancé later broke it off because he felt she was not keen on marrying him. Nazriah’s sister was under great pressure to marry because the eldest girl in the family is expected to marry and have children before her sisters. Asmah provides a remedy for such unfortunate women: People look down on women who are still single by thirty, so they may go to a bomoh [traditional healer] to wash off the bad luck. The bomoh says prayers and then bathes her in water with seven flowers; this will wash of the badness and she will get sweetness – people will look at her differently. It is called ‘mandi air bunga’ [bath of flowers].

Some of my interlocutors noted that after forty it is acceptable for a woman not to be married, if she seems happy and can take care of herself. Yet the general consensus is that neither time nor particular circumstances such as demanding careers lessen families’ expectations that a woman marries. An unmarried woman remains somewhat of an anomaly no matter how successful she is in life, for she has failed to satisfy the two basic prerequisites for reaching social adulthood in Malay society, marriage and motherhood. Having gone past the critical age, some unmarried women may feel that their only hope of getting married is as second wives. There are of course Malay women who do not want to marry, remaining single by deliberate choice. It is a significant category

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when seen against the universality of marriage in Malaysia, and the fact that premarital sex is illegal under Muslim law. Women who are allowed greater choice in marriage are indeed increasingly finding reasons not to marry, representing a major generational shift in urban women’s attitude to marriage. Rokiah, married for over thirty years and with six children, never thought about not marrying or late marriage; she never worried about not finding a suitable partner, and married a fellow student three months after finishing her studies. For unmarried Kartini, in contrast, marriage is not a life goal, she ‘would not go all out’ to get married. She will only marry ‘the right partner’ but he is difficult to find, because she is ‘looking for intangibles’ such as love and compatibility, a ‘soulmate’. Such attitudes to marriage, voiced by increasing numbers of young educated urban women like Kartini, are viewed with concern by some quarters in Malaysia, who see them as signs of the imminent breakdown of the Muslim family. As discussed in Chapter 3, the trend of women remaining unmarried is seen as a moral challenge to the community, and may be seized upon to promote and legitimize polygamy. Men are called upon to marry more than one wife in order to ‘help all those unmarried women wanting a husband’; it is their Muslim duty. Many unmarried women live and work in urban areas like K.L. due to greater educational and employment opportunities than in rural areas (Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011; Peng 2011). Aisyah explained: Often men are scared of them because they are not afraid of challenging customs in their private lives. Such women are happy to be single, since they find fulfilment in their jobs, they have a house and car, and when they want to have a good time they round up some girlfriends. They don’t need a man any more.

There are women who may find the imagined Malay form of marriage, with its expectations and demands, undesirable or unacceptable. A common lament among women I worked with who had met their future husband abroad, typically during their overseas studies, was how wonderful he was abroad and how horrible he became upon his return to Malaysia. Here, he would revert to being a spoiled mother’s pet, expecting his wife to serve and obey him, the Malay Muslim head of household, as discussed. This was an unappealing scenario for some single women. Combined with the threat of polygamy, it may make some young Malay women reconsider marriage, as well as influence already established

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spousal relations, as discussed. Zarena, twenty-six and unmarried, summed it up: There is some stigma associated with not being married, but some like me don’t accept it. I don’t want to look for a man just to get married for the sake of being married, in fact many young women like me are afraid of getting married, because they have seen things, the older they get, without marrying; they see their friends marrying and see and hear about all the troubles, how the men change after marriage, so they get scared. … I want to marry only if I find the right one, but I am afraid of marriage because husbands change after marriage, I am afraid of what my husband might turn out to be. I also despise the fact that Muslim men can have several wives, I despise this fact about Malay men.

Women Who Choose Careers The upper middle class polygamy that has emerged in urban areas is an intriguing and fertile field for exploring women’s reasons and motivations for marrying polygamously. Rather than representing a distinct group, there were clusters of women from different backgrounds who would enter polygamous unions for various reasons; prominent clusters include divorcees (and widows) and career women. What characterized them was less their belonging to a certain socio-economic class and more their particular circumstances when marrying. There are also women with individual needs and reasons for becoming second wives who do not fit in any category. A special group of women enter polygamy unknowingly, by marrying men they thought were single; they usually denounce the practice. The reasons and explanations described below apply mostly to women who knowingly accept the status as second wife. That does not mean that many of them do not hope that their husbands will eventually divorce their first wives. My purpose is not to provide an exhaustive and accurate list of polygamous women, but rather to give some sense of potential reasons why some women might choose to become second wives in Malaysia. The most prominent, though not necessarily most numerous, group of unmarried women I came across while working in K.L. were women who had chosen to pursue a career rather than to marry. These career women are also, in the popular imagination in K.L., considered the typical unmarried woman. As Asmah explained: ‘Some women concentrate on their careers so much when

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they are young – they are ambitious, they have no time to get married – suddenly they are thirty and not married.’ She related this trend to a belief that it is easier for women to be successful if they are not married and can concentrate fully on their career. Women who pursue careers may therefore be seen as not entirely to blame for their lack of a husband; through their committed pursuit of careers they have already moved beyond the bounds of what is considered ‘normal’ womanhood. While the many married and professionally successful Malay women that I met demonstrate that marriage and career can be combined, there was nonetheless a widespread belief among my interlocutors that for women, pursuing a successful career may be connected with remaining single. Katijah married at twenty-six, but started on her successful career while still unmarried, despite her mother’s worry that she would end up an old maid. Katijah insisted that she would rather be rich and unmarried but able to take care of herself, and her mother accepted it because Katijah was the main income earner. To Katijah, an unmarried woman can concentrate on her work, so had she not found a partner who was her equal and respected her work, she would not have married. To her, it is ‘culture’ that imposes the need to marry on women. The lingering fear that marriage will interfere with their careers is probably why many working women stress the importance of a husband who respects his wife’s ambitions and her need to pursue a career. It testifies to what extent some contemporary urban elite women may feel removed from, and unbound by, what they see as traditional culture and customs regarding their lives in general and marriage in particular. Yet this emancipatory standard must be seen against men, who are considered able to marry early and carry on with their lives and careers, whereas women may not feel able to do so. Women were generally seen as more choosy regarding marriage partners than men. If a woman is educated she will not settle for just any man, and may remain single rather than marry a less educated man. Increased education and employment opportunities in urban areas mean that women may no longer have to rely on family or spouse for financial support and increasingly for social support. Western influences in Malaysia have also meant increased emphasis on the individual and individual achievement, and parents may be less likely to force their daughters to marry before they are ready. Parents might encourage their daughters to delay marriage and finish their studies, since it is considered difficult for a woman to balance her duties as wife and mother with her studies.

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The shift in parental control has to do with the different set of circumstances that young women find themselves in today (Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011; Peng 2011). Education is deemed essential in today’s increasingly competitive urban environment in order to find a good job – and a good husband (Sloane-White 2010: 388). There is a widespread fear among educated women that they will not get married if they leave university without a partner, as it is not considered good for a woman to have a husband without an academic degree if she herself has one. According to Aisyah, Malay women tend to prioritize marriage as soon as they find a partner, and many marry shortly after finishing their studies. Aminah’s sister accepted an arranged marriage because she had been warned that it was her last year in university and that it would be more difficult to find a husband outside university, ‘since men don’t like women who are more intelligent than they are’. With the rise in women’s education, more women will experience the mixed blessing of acquiring an education with respect to marriage: it allows you to meet the ‘right sort of man’ during your studies, but if you do not, finding a spouse outside university may be more difficult (Peng 2011). For a woman who is educated but unmarried, arranged marriage can then become an option, if a suitable match can be found. So can marrying a successful, educated man, who will not be threatened by an educated woman’s abilities and personality, but who may already be married. Career women in particular, I was told, have problems finding a man who can match their ‘intellectual capacity’. They are seen as preferring a man who is at least as educated and successful as they are, and he may already be married, so she becomes his second wife. In polygamy narratives, career women are often seen as marrying as second wives because of their age. Single women in their thirties and forties may find it difficult to meet bachelors in their age group, so they may have to marry an already married man, as it may be considered inappropriate for a woman to marry a younger man, who is more likely to be unmarried (Karim 1998). Career women are seen as compartmentalizing their lives; when young they set goals and work on their careers, and when they reach their goals, they want to share their achievements with someone. By the time they think of marriage all available men are ‘gone’, however; they are married already, and the women’s only option might be to marry as second wives. Older women who marry as second wives, even though they may be socially and economically independent,

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are considered to accept the situation in order to achieve the much desired married status, and hence social acceptability as married women. An age-based explanation for polygamy is here directly related to a social status explanation. The link between marriage and social adulthood does have a particular twist for single career women, and may precipitate polygamy for some. If a woman wants to move up in her career, being unmarried appears to elicit some stigma, and may delay or even hinder her promotion. Unmarried, ambitious career women might be seen as a threat by both men and women, making it potentially difficult for some of them to attend late business meetings or travel abroad on business trips with male colleagues, for example, or attend work-related social functions without a partner. Male business partners may be more comfortable with women if they are married, so it may help women career-wise to be married, as she is considered less of a threat and her reputation will not suffer with male colleagues. The pressure to be escorted by or have a partner may hence encourage some women to become second wives rather than remain unmarried and potentially jeopardize their career opportunities. Incidentally, men feel pressured to marry to protect their careers as well, since an unmarried man in his thirties or forties, no matter how professionally successful, might similarly be seen as ‘not mature’ and hence not ripe for promotion. Career women, often older, single and professionally successful, who in their younger years placed education and work before marriage and motherhood, were indeed considered the quintessential second wives by my interlocutors. Career women who have remained single into their forties are seen as accepting being second wives because they feel it is their last or best chance to get married. Pragmatic considerations clearly enter into it. Zuriah married as a second wife because she wanted the recognition that she was married, not because she needed her husband’s financial support. Most woman I talked to have a theory about why successful single women might marry as second wives, maybe because they themselves were successful women and had given the idea some thought, or had friends or colleagues in that situation. There might hence be several reasons why career women would choose to become second wives. Financial benefit appears to be the least important. Reasons seem mostly to have to do with status – status as married women or social status as wives of important and powerful men. Many career women clearly marry as second wives to gain married status; they would usually not explain their

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marriage in terms of an ideal or even desired choice, but rather as a result of necessity. Polygamy was an option in a very limited field of marriage options, as they perceived it. Polygamy can, then, address some of the limitations following from the life choices that urban career women are, or feel, forced to make early on. As such, polygamy can become a strategy for coping with contemporary urban life for some elite Malay women.

Secret Lives Malay women are expected to marry: it is the cultural and religious norm. It can have great personal, social and legal consequences if women are discovered to be having a love life outside of sanctioned marriage. Yet living in K.L. can lessen the pressure on women to marry, and marry polygamously, in order to have a love life. Urban elite Malays have typically lived for a period abroad for study or work, have non-Muslim and foreign friends or business contacts in Malaysia, and are more exposed to alternative ways of conducting their lives than rural-based Malays. Some have privileged backgrounds and families who were liberal in their views, not least on religion; others come from rural backgrounds. Yet the fact of living an elite life in the city, rather than their familial and religious origins, seems to most influence women’s management of their love lives. Not only may city-dwelling elite Malays have more liberal views, but as several women noted, if you live in K.L. ‘you can have a secret life’. Before forty-year-old Noor married her present husband as a secret second wife, she was living with him in an apartment in K.L., unbeknownst to her ex-spouse and her family, as this was a moral and legal offence for a Muslim woman. As all communication with her family was via mobile phone, they assumed that she lived in her own (other) apartment (see Chapter 8). Such an arrangement would have been impossible had she lived within easy reach of her family, as family members visit each other frequently and usually unannounced. Living in K.L. allows people to have double or secret lives, and to redefine the form of their (potential) marriage. Living in K.L., then, can mean greater freedom for a woman to pursue the lifestyle and love life of her choice, regardless of the wishes or needs of her family. Raihana, commenting on the reported rise in unmarried Malay women, particularly in urban Malaysia, blames it on their falling commitment to marriage:

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‘People can have premarital sex and might not see the need for marriage.’ Most Malays live deeply enmeshed in networks of various kinds (e.g. Sloane 1999), the most prominent of which is the familial network. Settling in K.L. without your natal family can give people room for manoeuver. For people coming from rural backgrounds, it partly has to do with the rural-urban divide and the more choices available in cities. Mostly, though, it is the sheer fact of physical separation from families and home communities, which gives people more options. Rokiah explained it thus: In villages it may cause problems if you are not married, because they have no deep understanding of religion. There is stigma on unmarried women there; they think there is something wrong with you if you are not married. It is less so in the city; they don’t know you in the community, so they don’t expect things of you – you can live more your own life there. There is no pressure on women to marry in cities.

Rokiah further explained: ‘If you believe in religion, marriage is determined by jodoh, it is in the hands of God; you must accept what comes to you – there is nothing wrong with you if you are not married.’ A number of older women similarly mentioned the religiously based notion of ‘jodoh’, which relates to finding a suitable marriage partner and ultimately to the success or failure of a marriage. The concept of jodoh was not seen as directly related to women’s identity as Muslims, but had more to do with fate (Li 1989: 33). Overall, religion seems to play a relatively minor role in elite Malay women’s management of marriage, and younger women never mentioned jodoh to me. With regards to religion, young women rather brought up the problem of having non-Muslim boyfriends (Mohamad, Aziz and Chin 2009). Zarena, twenty-six and unmarried, described how her parents are not exactly pressuring her to get married but that there is some tension in their household because her and her older sister are still not married. Her parents are particularly worried that she will not marry a Malay Muslim, saying things like ‘you are only going to marry a Malay’. Once some friends of her parents had seen Zarena out with a Chinese male friend, and had called her parents to enquire about the Chinese son-in-law. Her parents were very upset, so she has to watch who she is going out with. As she explains: ‘My parents have more or less given up on my sister, who is going out with a Christian mat salleh,2 so they are pinning their hope on me.’ Some Chinese Malaysians are Muslim, but most are not, and it was assumed that Zarena went out with a non-Muslim;

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interethnic marriage is typically inter-religious marriage and remains contentious in contemporary Malaysia (Lindenberg 2009). Several of the women I met and worked with had relationships with non-Muslim men during their residence abroad, often to the chagrin of their parents. Families often object to such unions, and may actively try to end them. Particularly those who had been abroad to study had experiences with non-Muslim boyfriends. Kartini, twenty-nine and unmarried, has only had non-Muslim partners, both in England, where she studied, and back in K.L., where she now lives and works. One of her European boyfriends came out to Malaysia with her; she related how he was very nervous about meeting her family, because he had to convert to Islam if he wanted to marry her. Indeed, all her relationships with non-Muslims have faltered on the conversion question. According to Syariah law, IFL (FT), Part II, Section 10, a Muslim woman can only marry a Muslim man, and a Muslim man can only marry a Muslim woman or a Kitabiyah, a woman from ‘the people of the book’, which is usually interpreted as being a woman from Jewish or Christian communities; marriage to polytheists is prohibited. So a non-Muslim man who wants to marry a Malay woman must convert to Islam. Kartini now feels that conditioning by her parents and society might eventually make her choose to marry a Muslim, not least because Islam has become more important in her life. Kartini finds it important that her husband understands Islam, and what living a modern Muslim life entails. Tension between Muslims and non-Muslims remains high in Malaysia, especially between Malays and Chinese, who are primarily Buddhist, with Christian and Muslim minorities (see Chapter 13). One of my interlocutors lived in England for several years with her Chinese boyfriend. They could not marry, as he refused to convert to Islam. Both families were aware of and reluctantly accepted the situation, as long as appearances were kept up during their visits to Malaysia. There she was considered another unmarried career woman. Malay women who remain unmarried because they have relationships with non-Muslim partners who refuse to convert to Islam are thus, by religious laws, forced to choose not to marry. Intimacies between Malay women and (non-Muslim) Chinese men can create intercultural ambiguity (Khoo 2009; Nagata 1997); cultural ambiguity is not as publically prevalent when Malay men marry Chinese women, for example as second wives. My interlocutors’ discourses about ethnic Chinese and Islam in relation to marriage were indeed very gendered, as Chinese woman are generally

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seen as willing to convert to Islam in contrast to Chinese men, who are seen as unwilling. One way for Malay women to have a discreet and secret love and sex life is thus to have affairs abroad, whether with Malays or non-Malays. Raihana, forty-three and unmarried, has an off and on relationship with a Malay man living in another country. In Malaysia, they would have difficulty having a relationship, not just because they are not married, but because of their age difference; he is eleven years her junior, and it may not be considered appropriate for a Malay woman to be married to a much younger man, as mentioned. Unmarried or divorced women may of course also have affairs while in Malaysia, though long-term commitment without marriage is more problematic due to the greater chance of being ‘found out’. One of my interlocutors had several non-Malay boyfriends before she eventually got a Malay boyfriend, and explains that: ‘Marriage was necessary to try him out.’ To not alert her parents, she would claim to visit ‘invented’ girlfriends when in fact she was out with her foreign boyfriends. She also contrived to protect herself from religious authorities, which for elite women is more feasible than for non-elite women (Olivier 2016: 278): The trick is to stay in expensive hotels and of course say that you are married upon checking in, then there are no khalwat raids, since they tend to be in cheaper lodgings. One has to take some chances, but they tend not to go after mixed couples, since they assume they are married, and rather target Malay couples.

Some Malay women marry their non-Muslim partners abroad in order for the man to avoid conversion, which would be impossible in Malaysia. If discovered, the women might face social ostracism and more severe sanctions back home. Firstly, they have entered a union with a non-believer who might lead them from the true path of God, a serious offence in Malaysian Islam. More disturbingly, they are not considered legally married and seen as living in sin with their partner. Their children will be considered born out of wedlock, one of the greatest shames to befall a Muslim woman. As such, even if a woman is technically married abroad, she will be considered unmarried in Malaysia. Most such relationships are hence kept secret, even from their families. Because of the secrecy they cannot live together and have children together, so a woman who chooses a relationship with a man who does not want to convert may be forced to give up not only marriage but also motherhood.

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Women who spent years in semi-secret relationships with non-Muslim men who do not want to convert may end up finding themselves unmarried and ‘single’, as their partners may eventually cave in to familial pressure or an own desire to marry and have children, and marry a non-Muslim woman. Such scenarios were often described to me; it happened to one of my interlocutors, who was devastated not only because she still loved him, but because she had spent her youth with a man who then abandoned her. For those women, perhaps in their forties and beyond the ‘normal’ marriageable and perhaps childbearing age, becoming a second wife can become an option. Sexuality thus remains a contentious domain for Malay women, one which must be carved out in the maelstrom of potentially conflicting ways one can live life as modern urban elite women. Becoming second wives in order to have ‘legitimate’ sex may be considered a good option for some women, such as older career women or divorcees, because their typically higher age and/or previous marriage means they are considered more on par with their husbands, who are typically older and already experienced in marriage. Choosing polygamy to have sex and companionship is a function of still more elite women putting their own needs first. Some women felt that they could not commit the time or effort needed to be full time wives, since they still wanted to work and engage in their own interests and friends. It is a view based on a common perception that such activities become restricted in marriage, as mentioned. Polygamy as a time-management strategy for modern working women is indeed promoted by contemporary pro-polygamists cross-culturally (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008; Minza 2009: 39). A woman might thus consider becoming a second wife because it is seen as less demanding than being a monogamous wife, yet still (potentially) providing sex, love and companionship.

Notes   1. Malaysian population statistics can be found at: https://www.dosm. gov.my/ (accessed 25 May 2017).  2. A colloquial Malay expression for Caucasians/Westerners.

Chapter 8

Desires

Noor’s Story about Choosing Polygamy Noor, forty, is a secret second wife. She shares an apartment with her husband three nights a week, but maintains another apartment in another part of town, where she spends time with her children from her first marriage. They normally live with their father, and like him they do not know that she has remarried. Having two apartments allows her to keep her polygamous marriage secret: The advantage of having a mobile is that people will not know where you are when talking to you. My brother called me recently and asked ‘where do you live’. Since he knows that I am no longer with (my first husband), he had gone to see my children and found that I did not live there any more. So I said ‘just in the city, you can always call me on the hand phone’.

Her first apartment functions as her ‘love nest’, as she calls it, and only a handful of people now know that she lives there with her new husband. It has been her ‘love nest’ for quite a while; she used it with her now husband for almost a year before they married. It required great discretion, as they could both be arrested and charged with khalwat. Despite her precautions, rumours are circulating that Noor and her husband are married. Noor suspects her ‘unofficial’ co-wife of being the source; she knows Noor and is suspicious of her husband due to his many absences from home. For Noor, it is of prime importance that her husband does not sleep with his first wife any more. As long as he only remains married to

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her because he feels responsible towards her as the mother of his children, but does not have relations with her, Noor can accept being a second wife. She has told him in no uncertain terms that she only puts up with their arrangement for the moment, when his children are older she expects him to divorce his first wife, and if he does not she will leave him. She has also told him to let her go if she was no longer happy with the situation. Finally, Noor has made it clear to her husband that if he ever took another wife she would leave him for ‘he married me for love and how could he then love another woman. I told him that I cannot share him with another woman’.

Women Who Marry for Love Desires, feelings of love and lust, are some of the sticky stuff that make polygamous unions happen, hold them together, and break them up again. Emotional and physical abandon feature prominently in women’s narratives of polygamy, though often couched in softer versions of domesticated desires – with appropriate outlets. So who desires polygamy? Noor married as a second wife ‘for love’. She was not happy about becoming a second wife, but she consented because she loved her husband and had left her former husband and her children to be with him. She is independently wealthy and would have preferred to have a relationship with him without marriage, but as she explained, that is not possible for Muslims in Malaysia. Cohabiting or having sexual relations with a potential marriage partner without being married is illegal, and both partners could be arrested for khalwat. Noor felt it was safer for them to get married, particularly as she worried that her husband’s first wife might tip off the authorities if she found out about her. Should they get caught in a khalwat raid, they can now show a marriage certificate. She has had to accept polygamy because of the circumstances and feels there is nothing she can do about it. As she said, emphatically: ‘I did not think I would ever be a second wife earlier on, but then you are suddenly in the situation and the man you love is already married and what do you do then, you accept it because you have to.’ Love and romance were cited as key reasons by my interlocutors for marrying their husbands or considering marrying a man. While romantic attachment and passion between man and woman has always been a recognized part of the Malay cultural repertoire, to marry a man of one’s own choosing based on love was not

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necessarily the expectation a young Malay woman might have or be able to have in times of arranged marriages (Altorki 1986; Karim 1990). Traditionally, all Malay marriages were arranged. Parents of a young girl might choose a husband among the men who asked for their daughter in marriage, or arrange a marriage with the son of family friends. Arranged marriages were supposed to be based on compatibility and mutual consideration, and girls had various ways of avoiding marriage or precipitating a quick divorce if they were unhappy about the chosen husband. Parents therefore rarely tried to force a girl into a marriage she was against (Banks 1983). Girls cannot marry without the approval of their wali, usually their father or other close male relative. But they nonetheless had ways of marrying against the wishes of their parents, mainly by going to another state to marry. Such clandestine marriages are similar in nature to contemporary secret cross-border polygamous marriages (Jones 1994; Mohamad 2011), which now flourish for similar reasons, primarily to hide the fact from the respective families until the deed is done, as discussed. Contemporary elite Malay women may still marry based on pragmatic choice, of course, adhering to a traditional premise of arranged marriages that love can grow between spouses during their marriage. Love is not seen as a prerequisite for a union to be successful. Katijah recounted how she was friends with her husband for six years before marrying him. Their marriage was not initially based on love: I wanted the same things as [him] and love can grow between people after marriage. I did not want to go into marriage like some of my friends, blindly, so in love, only to find out three months later that they are incompatible … If you expect marriage to be based on love you are going to be in trouble, because love can be expressed in different ways and your husband and you might not do it in similar ways.

First wife Rashidah, forty-five, who now lingers in a loveless marriage because her husband’s attention is focused on his second wife, recounted a similar story: I married my husband at twenty-three, after having gone out with him for three years. It was expected of me according to ‘traditional culture’. It was a transition period in Malay society, where the old ways still held sway, so I married him even though I did not love him. I was very naive then and did not think love was important. I took my parents’ marriage as [a] model, they had an arranged marriage, it was not based on love but they worked things out and got along lovingly.

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I thought my marriage would be like that of my parents. I never imagined that my husband would marry a second wife.

Love similarly figured prominently among reasons why women might marry as second wives. As Katijah pointed out, it is the women’s choice to marry as a second wife and ‘love’ is part of the justification for marriage: ‘Maybe she was lonely and wanted companionship; she might have been seeing him for a while and wanted to marry this particular man who happened to be married already.’ Women who expect to find their own partner based on love might not have met ‘the right man’ early in life and not married. When they finally meet him, he might already be married, and they may have to become second wives in order to be with the man they love. Circumstances such as khalwat laws might also force some women into accepting polygamy. There is, of course, also the possibility that ‘love’ as a reason for why women marry as second wives may be used as a polite and socially acceptable euphemism for lust (Jankowiak and Paladino 2008: 25). Love is considered important in marriage, but as Maznah pointed out, single or divorced women have sexual needs too, and they have difficulty finding a legitimate outlet for them. So too do older unmarried career women, who, according to Maznah, might find it ‘the ultimate fulfilment to have a husband’. For them, freedom through marriage is not the issue, since they are already free to set up their own home and live independently, yet: ‘even such women cannot go out publicly with a boyfriend, they must be married’. The sanction against sex outside of marriage applies to all women (and men), regardless of their marital history or circumstances. Becoming second wives might fit their lifestyles, as engaging in legitimate sexual relations might be the only pressing reason why an otherwise socially and financially independent woman might marry at all; emotional love does not require marriage in the same direct way. Men are also seen as marrying a second wife for sexual gratification, as discussed. Yet this appears less shocking and more understandable, as men’s assumed innate ‘strong desires’ must come out, and should be satisfied within sanctioned marriage.

Women Who Marry for Sex Second wives are, in the popular imagination in Malaysia, typically so associated with sexual relationships that they are often accused

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of marrying as second wives because they ‘need a man’ or ‘crave sex’. So much so that they don’t care about hurting another woman whose husband they ‘steal’ or snatch (see Chapter 13). Particularly divorced or widowed women are considered ‘man-eaters’. They use to have legitimate sexual relations in marriage, and are therefore considered in special need of resuming them. Asmah told me about a friend, ‘a housewife’, whose prominent husband married an equally prominent woman as a second wife. She suggested that the husband missed intellectual stimulation from his first wife and wanted someone to converse with. In contrast, she portrayed the second wife as a ‘husband-grabber’: ‘For her it was sex, she wanted a man; she was divorced with grown children already. She did not marry him because of his position but because she wanted a man.’ Malay women experience various constraints on their sexuality, not least through the increased importance of orthodox understandings of Islam in Malays’ everyday lives. It impacts women’s control over their own bodies and sexuality, as sexuality becomes more tied to women’s responsibility for motherhood and associated ideas of chastity and purity. In Islamic discourse, women’s active sexuality is often represented as a disruptive potential and disorder, which requires that women be controlled within marriage so as not to tempt men. Yet Western influences in urban Malaysia also provide Malay women with new opportunities regarding their sexuality. Exposure to non-Muslim, especially Western, gender relations and sexuality, particularly in the media and online, have penetrated and shaped local discourse on sexual relations and male-female relations generally, and challenged more rigid Malay sexual morals and increasingly Islamic discourses that aim at controlling active female sexuality within the family (Ong 1995, 2006; Peletz 1996; Sloane-White 2010; Stivens 1998, 2012). Women must thus negotiate their sexuality within several competing discourses of desire, as well as within real or imagined polygamous practices. For a Muslim woman, premarital sex is considered unacceptable and taboo. It brings shame not only to the woman but to her entire family. A sure way to destroy a woman’s reputation is to spread the word about her relations with men she is not married to. Fear of rumours and social ostracism may be a reason why some of Zarena’s friends ‘have gone into marriages simply to have sex, since you are not allowed to live with someone before marriage. That is why there is such a high divorce rate; people are marrying to try out things and then find they are incompatible’. Even parents who are otherwise liberal in religious matters tend to be strict regarding

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physical intimacy before marriage, and enforce stringent measures to avoid exposing their daughters to ‘risks’. It is near impossible for women to live with boyfriends before marriage, and with such strong sanctions, as Zainab explained, ‘there was no need for parental control, since I controlled myself. I always felt being involved with men before marriage was wrong, so for me there was no conflict’. Yet as Maznah noted: Women never talk about [premarital sex] but of course it is there. Unmarried women have sexual needs that need to be fulfilled too; if they go out with boyfriends of course they will have sex but might not tell. It is not talked about – there is a lot of hypocrisy.

Unmarried women living in K.L., working and playing away from parents’ prying eyes, can have relations with men without being married to them – secretly and discretely, as discussed. As one of my interlocutors dryly noted: ‘I had an abortion abroad before I got married, I didn’t want [her Malay boyfriend] nor his child.’ Younger Malay women today clearly engage in premarital sex. According to Kartini: ‘Most of my friends have had sex before marriage; even many of my friends’ mothers have done it – those who were brave enough to admit it.’ The older the woman, the less likely that she had or admits to having had sexual relations before marriage (Sloane-White 2010: 392). Women over fifty would explain that ‘in my time we were not conscious of sex; we mixed innocently with boys, at cultural and sports activities, we did not think of sex’. Whether premarital sex is becoming more common, or whether it is a case of more openly acknowledging it, is difficult to gauge. Kartini, who had premarital sex while in Europe, has made a vow to abstain from further premarital sex: ‘I am more religiously aware as I grow older, so religion has something to do with it.’ Generally, divorced women may find it easier than previously unmarried women to have sexual relations with men outside marriage, since they often live alone and are not subject to direct parental or familial control. ‘Children control’ may replace parental control for divorced women, however, as the presence of children in the house typically prevents cohabitation or even visits from boyfriends. Salbiah recounted how, in between her polygamous husbands, she made the mistake of staying over at a boyfriend’s house, which is considered taboo in Malaysia. Her boyfriend’s children got very upset when they found out and made him stop seeing her, for as he told her: ‘One can always get a new girlfriend, but not new children.’ Strong social sanctions remain in place, restricting

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even divorced women’s freedom to have sexual relations with a partner, and they may find it necessary to marry, perhaps as second wives, to have relations. Women who marry polygamously were sometimes described as gatal (‘itchy’), as mentioned. Such women are considered to strongly desire a particular man, and will marry him as his second wife as a legitimate way of conducting an affair with him. Men who encourage such women to marry them as second wives may, however, be seen as taking advantage of the women’s strong desires. It is assumed that especially career women marry as second wives for sex. It reflects Banks’ (1983: 98) observation that women occupying prominent positions are regarded as powerful individuals likely to have voracious sexual appetites, paralleling their economic and social ambitions. In a typical story, Maznah related how the second wife of a prominent man, herself of aristocratic descent, was a ‘bad woman’ who broke up marriages. Maznah had witnessed how ‘she had sex with a man while his wife was sitting outside the room’. This is often the stereotypical view of second wives, which in turn feeds urban polygamy legends of second wives’ ferocious sexual needs, prompting them to marry other women’s husbands to satisfy their strong desires. Sex may form a central part of, and reason for, marriage when older unmarried career women decide to marry polygamously. Typically in their late thirties or early to mid forties, many of them have studied or worked in Europe, the USA or Australia. Here ‘access’ to men was easier, and they may have engaged in premarital sex as do other women in Western societies, as well as lived with their boyfriends while abroad. When Zuriah returned to Malaysia after her years abroad, she married as a secret second wife. The fact that she had sex with her husband before marrying him precipitated the marriage, as her husband is ‘virtuous’. For women like Zuriah who have become used to sexual autonomy abroad, coming back to Malaysia as single women and finding themselves restricted by strong sanctions against sex outside of marriage can be a difficult transition. Here, they are forced to marry to cohabit or conceive – or just have sex. Zuriah may nonetheless consider herself to be managing her sexuality in a culturally and religiously appropriate way. Polygamous marriages are not all about sex, of course, and second wives can just as easily as first wives become neglected by their husband when his interest in them wanes. After a brief happiness as a second wife, Zuriah’s relationship with her husband deteriorated to the point where they would only meet in his office for hurried

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sexual relations, to not having any relations at all. Because her husband is well known, they could not live together, as this would alert people to their marriage; it was difficult for them to even go out together in K.L. She had discovered, like many women before her, that the time factor is crucial in making polygamous marriages work, and women who start out married life accepting little time commitment from their husbands might suffer (see Chapter 10). Polygamous wives may end up feeling trapped, emotionally and physically, in such secret marriages. Zuriah’s marriage is now faltering, and she has initiated bitter divorce proceedings against her husband, her main grievance being neglect and lack of time commitment (see Chapter 14).

Sexuality in Polygamy Sexuality’s role in Malay polygamy is complex and contested, situated between Muslim and Malay norms, between spoken ideals, personal desires and lived practice. As was the case with religiosity, sexuality and sexual relationships within polygamy are difficult to generalize about, as sex and sexuality are intensely and intimately personal domains. It is abundantly clear, however, that sexual relationships between husband and wives are some of the most contentious aspects of polygamous life, relations that can cause great strife and misery among co-wives. At issue is husband sharing, a polygamous husband’s prescribed equal sharing of his physical attention between all his wives. As with other aspects of polygamy, what is prescribed is not necessarily what is practised. And as always, there is a difference in the perspectives and experiences of first and second wives. In Islam, sexuality is acknowledged in both men and women, and sexual pleasure is not frowned upon but encouraged within sanctioned marriage (Kugle 2003; Zuhur 1995). In traditional Malay adat, women like men are seen as having a sexuality that a spouse has a duty to satisfy, and both spouses are assumed to seek sexual satisfaction. Adat involves principles of mutual needs, responsibilities and rights between men and women in marriage (Banks 1983; Karim 1992, 1998). When it comes to sex, marriage can mean freedom for Malay women in certain respects. As Nazriah phrased it: ‘In Islam, you are an equal to your husband, a partner, you do not need to be subservient to him.’ Yet for women less assertive about their rights, marriage can also mean restrictions in terms of

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sex. According to Maznah: ‘In Malay society, women’s sexuality should be suppressed if she is not married. It should exist only when married. Malay women have no sexual rights. Islam recognises that women have sexual needs in marriage, and husbands must provide for these needs. This is called nafka batin.’ Sexuality in marriage is thus not just a personal issue for women in polygamy, neither for the ‘sexually deficient’ first wife whose husband takes a second wife for sexual gratification, nor for the second wife who marries for sex. Sexuality is also a highly charged power issue (Parker, Barbossa and Aggleton 2000), as Malay women are expected to be sexually available to their husbands. In IFL (FT) Section 59, a wife is nusyuz when she ‘unreasonably’ refuses to obey the lawful wishes or commands of her husband, as mentioned, such as when she ‘withholds her association with her husband’. Not having sex with her husband if he wants it can result in loss of entitlement to his maintenance. Elite women may feel less bound by this legal specification, as they may have independent means of maintenance, yet it is a sexual premise in marriage that has a great psychological effect on women. And particularly so for Malay women in polygamy, as they may have to contend with a potential sexual rival in the form of their husband’s other wife. Sexuality can thus be a domain of great inequality in marriage, if a husband is seen as creating a sexual hierarchy among his wives, with a favourite wife getting most or all of his sexual attention. In principle, a husband always has an opportunity to initiate sex with a wife in polygamy. This is not the case for a wife, who cannot initiate sex with her husband if he is with his other wife, or if he generally neglects her and fails to live up to his marital obligations (nafkah batin) to maintain all his wives emotionally and sexually. With Islamic resurgence, Malay women’s sexuality has become more contentious, and seen as in greater need of control. Contemporary Islamic discourses increasingly cast Malay women as sexually powerful and potentially dangerous, ready to ensnare weak men by their allure (e.g. Mernissi 1987; Ong 2006). While Malay Muslim feminists might contest this constricted understanding of female sexuality (Kugle 2003), it is nonetheless reflected in Malay women’s increasing tendency to cover their hair and wear loose, non-revealing clothing, and in increasing sanctions against premarital sex. Caning is now a distinct possibility in certain states for couples caught in illicit acts, or even suspected of contemplating them. This means that many women have had no sexual experience upon marriage, as discussed. Former first wife Fauziah hence

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partly blames herself and her lack of sexual prowess for the fact that her husband married a second wife: ‘I was very naive and innocent when I married; I did not know anything about sex, and neither did my husband. I never enjoyed sex with him; I did not know how to satisfy him, and he did not teach me how. A woman should satisfy her husband sexually, then he would not stray.’ Fauziah’s feeling that her sexual deficiency led to her husband’s polygamy is in line with the general tendency to assign blame for polygamy to the women involved, rather than to the man initiating and creating the polygamous union. As discussed in Chapter 6, polygamy may in such cases be explained and legitimized in terms of the sexual deficiency of the first wife. While Fauziah acknowledged that her husband made no effort to please her sexually, she felt that it was primarily the wife’s duty to please her husband (Altorki 1986). Many of the women I worked with appear to not experience, or at least not publically express, sexual relations as pleasant or fulfilling, even though both adat and Islam recognize the importance of sexual fulfilment in women within marriage. There are of course women who find sex important and fulfilling in marriage, yet a dominant narrative is that Malay women ‘should not worry about sex’ and should be sexually submissive in marriage (and outside marriage). As second wife Nazriah phrased it: ‘When married, the wife is the second decision maker, also with respect to sex – it is the husband’s decision.’ What is a culturally appropriate ideal may not reflect actual practices, yet for many wives sex appears to become a matter of procreation rather than recreation. Achieving a more satisfying sex life is often hindered by a sometimes total lack of communication regarding intimate matters between husbands and wives. As Peletz (1996: 366) points out, sex and sexuality is de-emphasized in Malay culture, and people were reluctant to discuss sexual matters. Malay feminists, according to Ong (2006: 47), have neglected to call for women’s right to sexual autonomy or to premarital sex, based on adat understandings of women’s sexual assertiveness and pleasures; this may arguably be difficult to do in a climate of Islamization, where premarital sex is punishable by public scorn, fines or indeed caning. In a study of Malay women’s reproductive negotiations, Raj, Leng and Shuib (1998) found that many women view marriage as a pragmatic relationship, and do not necessarily consider sex pleasurable. In fact, many women did not like to have sex with their husbands, but obliged out of a sense of duty. As Noor’s first monogamous marriage deteriorated, she often had sex with her husband ‘for England’,

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as she phrased it, perceiving sex as part of a wife’s ‘duties’ towards her husband. She felt it was her duty, because ‘men generally want more sex than women, leading to marital problems’. When her husband admitted having affairs, she found it ‘understandable’, since she had not had sex with him for a long time. She divorced him nonetheless. Emancipated and financially independent women like Noor may retain a strong sense of perceived duty with regards to sex with their husband in marriage; a duty that they are increasingly reminded is enshrined in Islamic law. Allowing a husband sexual access is not just a matter of personal or moral duty for a Malay wife. If a Malay woman refuses to have sex with her husband, it can constitute grounds for divorce and for losing maintenance if divorced, as mentioned. Sexual access is also important where polygamy can be granted, if marital relations have ceased between spouses. When Zainab was younger, she suffered greatly under her husband’s infidelity, but her mother advised her that ‘when he leaves the house he is no longer your husband’. She feels her quiet acceptance of his affairs, while maintaining relations with him, has contributed to her husband not marrying another woman. Women’s sexual desires are by many Malay women considered to diminish with age; according to Rokiah: ‘Women don’t desperately need sex after a certain age. When women get older, it seems that they don’t want sex any more.’ Therefore, if a woman gets divorced or widowed she will often not remarry, the implication being that if she does not need sex she does not need to remarry. Rokiah continued: ‘A man on the other hand needs sex more and will usually instantly remarry if he has no wife, whereas a woman might accept a marriage without sex. A woman can go for months without sex.’ This is a common discourse on sexuality, with Malay men portrayed as having consistently strong desires that cannot be suppressed, whereas Malay women are seen as having less consistent, less strong desires that can be suppressed. Managing women’s sexuality within polygamous marriage may hence be seen as appropriate: wives are able to suppress or even lose their desire, in order to accommodate men’s strong desires, which cannot be suppressed, by consenting to him marrying another wife who can satisfy his sexual needs.

Sexual Lives of Polygamous Wives Many first wives, it is generally thought, have ceased having relations with their husbands altogether, or have them less frequently,

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by the time their husbands marry second wives. In fact, this is often cited as a reason why men might want to marry a new wife, in order to have regular sexual relations with a woman, even by first wives themselves. Some first wives, who have typically been monogamously married for many years before their husbands marry a second wife, might simply not want to have sex with their husbands any more and hence accept that their husband has sexual relations with his other wife, perhaps exclusively. This is a pattern found in polygamous arrangements cross-culturally; senior wives in some African polygamous households, for example, will help choose new wives for their husband, often to avoid having sex with him any more (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). Some first wives presumably stop having sexual relations with their husband precisely because he has married another woman. It might thus just as often be the case that a first wife’s lack of sexual relations with her husband is a result of her husband’s polygamy, rather than necessarily the cause. A first wife may feel that her husband humiliates her sexually through his polygamous marriage, by signalling that she can no longer satisfy him. In such situations, a first wife may withdraw from having further relations with her husband. Omar (1994: 15–16) notes that Malay women generally find it unfair for a husband to take a second wife if he feels that his first wife no longer satisfies him sexually or has becomes unattractive; she suggests that a more effective way to satisfy a man’s sexual needs than marrying another wife is to focus his energy elsewhere, such as dedicating himself to religious activities or engaging in community work, which can help reduce lust. First wives who remain unassertive regarding their sexuality in marriage may suffer in silence as they experience their husband’s progressive neglect of them and his physical attention being focused on his new wife. Yet they may also come to accept that their husband focuses his attentions on his second wife, because they no longer need or expect sexual relations with him, having come to terms with a marriage based more on financial and social support, and less on physical and emotional support. This may partly account for the seemingly low frequency of divorce in elite polygamous unions (see Chapter 15). Yet even as first wives learn to live in a sexless marriage, they are considered to be wronged by their husbands, for a Muslim man should only engage in polygamy if he can share himself equally between his wives, also sexually. Very few are able or perhaps willing to do that, however. And for first wives who still crave their husband’s physical attention it can

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become very hard to bear. First wives who appear to cope physically and emotionally with being in a polygamous marriage might still suffer under the fact that their husbands are having sexual relations with another woman. Sexual jealousy is a staple part of polygamous unions cross-culturally (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008, 2015b, 2016), as mentioned. Rashidah is a typical first wife who, although unhappy about her marital situation, has chosen to remain married to her polygamous husband. She is well established in her house and job; he pays the bills, she copes and resigns to the situation. She has not had sexual relations with her husband since the birth of their last child, and so partly understands why he married another woman, ‘since he might want to have sex with someone who enjoys it with him’. The problem for first wives like Rashidah, who no longer have sexual relations with their husbands and are married in name only, is that they are still legally married; hence, having sexual relations with other men becomes very difficult in a cultural and religious context where sex is only considered acceptable within marriage. Rashidah feels very lonely, mentally as well as physically, a loneliness many first wives probably face in loveless marriages when their husbands desert or neglect them physically (and emotionally) in favour of another wife. When women are forced into polygamy by their husband as first wives, it may spell celibacy for them, either because they cannot accept the idea of (sexually) sharing their husband with another woman or because their husbands no longer give them any physical attention. Some lonely first wives act on their loneliness and their sexual needs. Some opt for affairs when abroad on business, where contact is easier and more discrete. Unmarried Raihana has a young lover in a country in which she regularly does business, allowing her to keep up appearances and not risk khalwat charges and gossip in Malaysia. Neglected first wife Rashidah has considered this option, as she often travels abroad with her work, but is reluctant because ‘she is still married’. Some first wives do not remain as morally bound by their wows as Rashidah does. They no longer feel mentally or physically obliged to husbands who have married other women, and who no longer pay them any attention. Aisyah related how ‘neglected wives with lots of money and lots of time on their hands and no husband around will have ‘toy boys’ brought to them for pleasure’. These ‘toy boys’ are usually young pretty boys recruited from schools, who use the women as sources of income. It is seen as prevalent among affluent women when their

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husbands have a second wife, but maintain them with lavish stipends. Not just first wives may indulge themselves. I would often hear rumours about prominent women having young men sent to their house because they were ‘sex mad’. Whether or not there is any truth in these persistent stories, such rumours are a sure way to destroy a woman’s reputation. The more powerful and successful a woman is, the more likely she will be the victim of rumours – often malicious in nature – and accusations of magic (see Chapter 14). Fear of such rumours and gossip is one of the reasons first wives like Rashidah are reluctant to engage in affairs. Second wives may perceive and experience sexuality in polygamous marriages differently than first wives. A man’s first wife is considered to offer him stability, family and children, whereas his second wife may know and accept that she is more of a companion. In such relationships sex is an important ingredient. As discussed, second wives are often considered to marry ‘for sex’, as it is culturally and religiously unacceptable for Muslim women to have sexual relations with a man outside marriage in Malaysia. Even for women who do not believe in marriage or resent polygamy, being a second wife might seem more appealing than potentially being caned for having sex with a man she is not married to. For second wife Noor, it is of prime importance to her that her husband does not sleep with his first wife any more. In one of those incongruous statements typical of second wives, she has told him that she cannot share him with another woman. As long as he only remains married to his first wife because he feels responsible towards her as the mother of his children, but does not have relations with her, she can accept being a second wife. Her acceptance hinges on her belief that her husband does not have relations with his first wife any more, something which she cannot know or indeed control. Noor’s demand also illustrates the reality of many polygamous unions, which rather than seeing ‘husband sharing’ in all aspects of marriage, sees different wives getting different treatment. The first wife may remain the husband’s official wife, sharing in his public and social life, whereas the second wife may get his emotional and physical attention, leaving the first wife with a husband in name only. Yet being a second wife does not mean automatically being showered with all your husband’s affection and attention. Sometimes, as in Zuriah’s case, he returns to his first wife; sometimes he marries a third wife, and neglects his other wives. In a few cases, he is probably able to share himself equally among all his wives. But even in such ideal cases, the emotional and contentious

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nature of shared sexual access to one man can cause grief and conflict among co-wives, no matter how well they seem to cope. Whether for love or lust, women’s reasons for engaging in polygamy illustrate that women, too, can think of and use polygamy instrumentally for their own purposes, as they perceive men to clearly do. Women who enter polygamy voluntarily may justify their marriage by claiming to be obeying Islamic laws; like men, they may be using them to suit their needs, quite concretely. This contemporary form of urban elite polygamy, based as it often is on secrecy, can hence be profoundly utilitarian. As in other polygamous systems, people may engage in it for strategic reasons, to achieve particular goals or satisfy particular cravings. Otherwise monogamy might have done the trick. It is polygamy as a distinctly urban elite strategy.

Chapter 9

Co-wives

Zainab’s Story about Living in Polygamy Zainab, forty-nine, is monogamously married but grew up in a polygamous family as the daughter of her father’s third wife. Her father’s three wives and fourteen children were very close, and all lived together in the same house. They managed polygamous family life successfully, Zainab feels, because they lived in a huge compound with a sprawling house with many rooms, so each mother could get her own quarters; there were also many servants to help them. Zainab’s father’s first wife was much older than his other two wives, and after she died, the family moved to K.L. Here, the two remaining wives requested and received their own house. Zainab’s mother and her co-wives were ‘like friends’, especially the two youngest ones, who were only two years apart in age. There was no open jealousy between them; if there was, the children never noticed it: ‘It must have been behind closed doors.’ Another factor contributing to marital peace, according to Zainab, was that none of her ‘mothers’ were working; they married their husband, as did all women of that generation, because he could provide for them: ‘They did not demand anything from him as wives would today.’ The co-wives kept seeing each other and each other’s children long after their husband died; Zainab’s mother’s co-wife minded Zainab’s children for many years while she was working. Zainab attributes her childhood’s smooth polygamous family life to her father, who was ‘an extraordinary man’. He was able to be fair to all of his wives and children. He would always make sure to

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remember each wife and child; if he could not make it to their house he would send the driver with something for the wife or child from him. To Zainab, there was nothing traumatic about polygamy, her father just ’followed their culture’ when taking several wives: ‘It was our system, we grew up with it and had to accept it.’ Yet Zainab admits that she accepts the notion of polygamous marriage only as long as she does not have to share her own husband with another wife. Her husband lacks the format of her father, and would not be able to be fair to all wives, according to Zainab; she has suffered greatly under his constant infidelity and tries to heed her mother’s words ‘when he leaves the house he is no longer your husband’.

Husbands and Co-wives Co-wives and relations between co-wives are typical focal points when elite women discuss living in polygamous families, whether real or imagined; husbands, who brought the wives together and created the polygamous union, may feature less prominently. Cowives in K.L. tend to live completely separate lives, to the extent that they are sometimes unaware of each other’s existence. Cowives’ typically non-existent relations to each other may be a function of a general lack of a socially accepted framework for polygamous family life in K.L. According to Banks (1983: 99), there are accepted patterns of behaviour between Malay co-wives. The older should receive the respect of the younger and be addressed as kakak (older sister). I found little evidence of such regulated systems of deference in K.L. elite polygamous unions, where such official systems of seniority do not generally appear to be in operation. First wives may enjoy some privileges, such as being brought to official functions and receiving their husband’s title, but cannot necessarily expect preferential treatment from their husband in financial or emotional matters. Some Malay first wives act as main ‘mothers’ for all their husbands’ children, but it may not be felt as a privilege by women upset that their husbands have started another family. Generally, a Malay first wife does not have any authority over her co-wives, nor does she have any responsibilities towards them. Malay polygamy here stands in contrast to most other systems of polygamy, where co-wives’ rights and obligations are typically defined and guarantee a certain amount of equality between the wives. In African polygamous unions, for example, the senior wife is usually given special powers and privileges, distributing

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the workload among the co-wives, dividing all monetary rewards from the husband, and being consulted by the husband when he wants to take a new wife. While senior wives usually have greater authority over their co-wives and over all their husband’s children, all wives have certain powers and privileges (Clignet 1970, 1987). Regulated systems of co-wife relations mean that polygamous households can be more cooperative than conflictual. Women in polygynous families can acquire power and status through seniority, children, and various culturally prescribed achievements, and they can gain freedom, mobility and autonomy from sharing productive, reproductive and domestic responsibilities with other women. Co-wives in Mali, for example, negotiate their relative statuses within the domestic group through both competitive and cooperative strategies, thereby reducing or avoiding potential conflict. Jealousies also tend to be reduced when co-wives share domestic tasks, such as cooking and child-rearing responsibilities, as well as when there are strict rules regarding domestic arrangements, especially the husband’s sleeping rota. Some degree of jealousy probably exists in all co-wife relations, but this does not make cooperation impossible. How co-wives get along with one another may determine the degree of cooperation and competition within the household, and how successful a polygynous marriage is. This in turn depends on individual personalities and personal circumstances as they are shaped by their particular cultural and socio-economic contexts (Jankowiak, Sudakov and Wilreker 2005; Madhavan 2002; Meier 1999; Solway 1990). If Malay polygamy was regulated in similar ways in terms of rules of behaviour, powers and privileges, co-wives might be better able to develop cooperative relations among each other. As it is, competition often characterizes Malay co-wives’ relations – if they have any relations at all. Knowing what to expect and what is expected of co-wives might also reduce insecurities by making women more secure in their positions as co-wives. Some Malay first wives do feel that their senior position entitles them to more than equal treatment from their husband. One of Katijah’s uncles married a second wife with the consent of his first wife, upon certain conditions and preferential treatment. To cement her senior position and power, she has received the second wife in her house, prompting Katijah to make the typical comment that ‘she is a good Muslim’. In traditional upper class households, husbands do typically defer to a senior wife’s position and give her preferential treatment. One of my interlocutor’s father would always bring his first wife when he

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travelled with all his children from all his wives on vacation, because she was the senior wife. He would then later go on separate vacations with his other wives (Mernissi 1991). Such deference seems atypical among new urban elites. First wives may have to settle (or hope) for just getting equal treatment, as that appears hard enough to achieve from a husband who has just married the new(est) object of his affection. Banks (1983: 99) notes that polygamous wives may be called madu, or honey, to highlight in a slightly condescending way that they attract and ensnare husbands. Madu is also used in Indonesia, where Jennaway (2000:147) notes that the ‘association of polygyny with sweetness, however, would seem to represent a male perspective; for many co-wives the term madu parodies the bitterness that it almost invariably entails’. I did not come across it among my interlocutors. If they called their co-wives anything at all, it was less savoury names. Some Malay husbands do attempt to make their wives coexist or at least accept each other. This makes life easier for themselves and their wives. It also approaches the Islamic requirement of equal treatment of all wives and the Islamic ideal of harmonious polygamous family life. Many men see Islam as completely legitimizing polygamy, as mentioned, and may attempt to make co-wives accept each other by appealing to their Muslim selves. Rokiah’s friend, a secret second wife, was hence brought to Mecca by her husband to meet his first wife, who was extremely upset upon discovering the marriage. The husband hoped that in the holy city the two wives would accept the situation and each other, being under strong pressure to do so. In a similar story, Halima related how a former colleague of hers had told his first wife that he had married a second wife when they were in Mecca, standing in front of the Kaaba.1 He counted on her not being able to do or say anything to him in the holy city. But when she got home, she chased him with a parang (Malay sword) and has not accepted the second wife yet. The similarity between such stories, and their mythical content, place them in the realm of urban polygamy legends. Such legends provide women with a way to criticize men for using Islam to legitimize what is considered the hurtful act of engaging in polygamy – without criticizing men or Islam directly. Some husbands do not have to make any special effort it seems, to make their wives coexist even under the same roof, because the wives will readily accept each other. This may happen if the wives are kin or friends before their marriages, or of similar age. In Indonesia, according to Krulfeld (1986: 203), aristocratic co-wives

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are often kinswomen, which might foster friendly relations between them. She concludes that women do not object strongly to polygamy if their co-wives are related to them, and from the same caste and village. Sororal polygyny, where co-wives are sisters, is practised in some societies, as it is believed to foster greater cohesiveness among cowives; sharing socio-economic and cultural backgrounds is seen as conducive to harmonious relations between co-wives (Clignet 1970; Clignet and Sween 1981; Jankowiak, Sudakov and Wilreker 2005; Tiwari 2008). Sororal polygamy is forbidden among Malays; Peletz (1988: 57) reports that in Negri Sembilan where he worked, the most serious transgression of sexuality and marriage between people nursed by the same mother is sororal polygyny and other forms of intimacy with a wife’s sister (Karim 1998: 17). Polygynous unions with women of a single lineage or clan was considered ‘a capital offence comparable in magnitude to harboring the dreaded potential fatal spirit-familiar’. Instead, men might marry a friend of their existing wife. She was an available and known female in a time when socializing between the sexes was restricted. Not all wives tolerate their best friend as co-wife, however, for as Aminah explained, her mother divorced her father precisely because he married her best friend as a fourth wife, and her mother felt betrayed by both of them.

Co-wife Cooperation When a Malay husband achieves apparent harmony between his wives, whether directly as a result of his fair behaviour towards them or because the wives themselves accept each other, he is generally praised for what is considered his extraordinary domestic ability. Zainab attributes her childhood’s smooth polygamous family life to her father, who was an ‘extraordinary man’ and able to be fair to all his wives. She describes how her mother and her co-wives were close to one another; there was no open jealousy between them, they always stood together, and would gang up on the father if he did not treat one of them well or if they wanted something from him. When they were united, he had difficulties saying no to them. It suggests that a husband’s equal sharing of his support is key to marital harmony in polygamous families. Yet even more praise is lavished, at least by women, on the first wife who can accept new wives into her marriage, for this is considered an even more

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extraordinary ability, which goes against basic human instincts. Her sacrifice and patience, her indulgence and acceptance, may earn her accolades from her peers as ‘a good Muslim’. A friend of Aisyah wanted to marry a young widow, and begged for his wife’s consent – and forgiveness; he felt obliged to marry her as he had spoken to her a few times and she had considered it a marriage proposal and had informed her father of his intentions. After some thought the wife accepted on the grounds that ‘I’ll be a good Muslim’, even if she did not completely believe her husband’s version of events. Now the family lives in harmony and the two wives have become friends. Their friends often comment that they have never encountered a more wonderful woman than the first wife, who could accept and forgive in this way, especially as she is, according to Aisyah, ‘more intelligent, educated and beautiful than the second wife’. The story itself contains several elements that seem to place it in the realm of legend. The message seems to be that men and women who can maintain a harmonious polygamous family are seen as particularly good Muslims because they seem able to emulate the Prophet’s marriage. They have attained what only very few families can aspire to in engaging in a quintessential Muslim institution and succeeding at it. Co-wives who cooperate earn high praise because it is considered unlikely that they should be able or willing to do so. Lamphere (1974) suggests that polygyny is inherently conflictual, because women will typically attempt to build their own nuclear family with their husband within the polygynous household, often at the expense of their co-wives. A women’s position in polygynous unions does not allow them to collaborate and women must work through men to gain power. The chronic competition between wives over resources appears to enhance the husband’s dominance (Levine 1980). Lamphere’s argument builds on the assumption that a nuclear family in a monogamous domestic context can be equated with a husband-wife-child unit embedded in a polygamous domestic context. Murdock (1949: 2) suggests that nuclear families do exist in such situations, in that a man or a woman simply belongs to more than one nuclear family at the same time, linked by a common spouse. Harris (1983), in contrast, argues that polygamy creates a very different domestic situation than monogamy, in domains such as sexual arrangements and reproduction. In polygamous households, a father relates to several half-siblings through a hierarchy of wives, rather than focusing on a small group of full siblings in monogamous families. Distinctive patterns of infant care

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arise when a mother sleeps alone with her children while the father sleeps with a different wife on different nights. Elite Malay polygamy may arguably represent a domestic context where several nuclear families are embedded within a polygamous union, for elite co-wives tend to live completely separate lives with their own children, to the extent that they may be unaware of each other’s existence, as discussed. They may not necessarily see each other as belonging to the same family, linked by their common husband, however. Yet some Malay co-wives clearly see each other as part of one family, joined by a common husband; Aminah, Raihana and Zainab’s childhood memories of ‘happy polygamy’ testify to that. Studies have indeed shown the potentially cooperative nature of polygynous relationships. Control over economic resources may give men power over women and make women willing to share a polygynous husband with other women, yet the bond to other adult females, including both the husband’s female kin as well as her co-wives, may constitute a more critical relationship for a woman in a polygynous marriage than that with her husband (Anderson 2000; Madhavan 2002). This theme of harmonious relations between co-wives, united despite any grief and jealousy their husband may cause them privately, to the extent that their allegiance may ultimately be more to each other than to their husband, is found in urban polygamy legends as well as in narratives of polygamy cross-culturally. Zainab’s mothers’ strategies for obtaining something from their husband, especially if he was initially reluctant, thus echoes Little’s (1951:165) descriptions of some traditional ways in which Mende co-wives in Sierra Leone gain advantages by cooperating: co-wives may collectively, through many small nuisances, strive to make their husband’s life so intolerable that he agrees to some general demand. Furthermore, a Mende man with numerous wives can usually not control the movements of every one of them, and his wives may then cooperate in keeping each other’s secrets and covering up each other’s illicit affairs. This requires a very close and trusting relationship among co-wives, and cooperating to cover up each other’s illicit affairs may thus be less common among urban elite Malay co-wives, who are more likely to be engaged in intense competition over the husband’s attention. That is, if they even know that they have a co-wife. When Malay co-wives appear to be on good terms and live peacefully together under the same roof, the husband might be suspected of applying ilmu, a magical ‘art’ that gives him special powers to

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create such unlikely harmony in his household (Banks 1983: 99). Djamour (1965: 86) similarly reported that sorcery might be suspected when Malay co-wives were on good terms with each other, or lived peacefully together. A woman usually expected her co-wife to hate her, to attempt to poison her or cast a spell upon their common husband, to make him divorce her. Furthermore, if a man was able to retain two wives who, as is common among lower income groups, had to work to support themselves adequately, he might also be accused of using some spell on them. It was believed that no woman in her right mind would agree to being a co-wife and earning a living as well, unless she was bewitched into doing so. My interlocutors would thus deride what they saw as a new trend in contemporary Malaysia, as mentioned, where ‘even taxi drivers’ and other men who can barely earn a living nonetheless marry several wives who are then forced to work to support themselves and sometimes their husband and his other wives as well. They considered it repugnant, but most of all incomprehensible from the women’s perspective. Raihana’s mother, a second wife, partly supported herself and her children despite her husband being wealthy; she felt that open competition between the co-wives over resources from Raihana’s father was undignified and wrong, and did not ask for help. Their polygamous family was otherwise harmonious and cooperative. Raihana’s father’s brother, in contrast, may have lost his ilmu; he had four wives who lived together in the same house and seemingly got along with each other, but he nonetheless ended up dying alone, since all his wives and his many children were upset with him and none of them wanted to nurse him at the end. Raihana’s uncle may have fallen victim to balo (‘evil’), a general term for bad relationships. Men are often considered to be reluctant to marry several wives for fear of balo, with the potential of magical attack thrown in.

Co-wife Competition Relations between co-wives are often extremely cool because of the strict separation of co-wives typical of Malay polygamy. If the second wife starts out secret, relations may be even cooler. First wives often harbour strong antipathy towards the woman who ‘stole’ their husband, and have no wish to have anything to do with her. Second wives are the obvious, visible symbols of polygamy, someone

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interfering in the marriage, and become the object of hate and assignment of blame; blame in polygamy is, as discussed, almost invariably assigned to women. Polygamy narratives therefore often focus on conflicts between co-wives. Cool relations between co-wives are hence maintained by negative narratives. First wives typically belittle second wives, portraying them as evil schemers ensnaring husbands, while second wives typically belittle first wives, portraying them as neglecting their husband, as a way of legitimizing their own marriage to the husband. As the story usually goes, a polygamous husband will not interfere in the wives’ battles with each other, for they tend to ultimately benefit him, as each wife will try to cater to his whims in order to achieve his preferential support and attention. Focus on co-wife conflict is also found in Indonesian narratives of polygamy (Jennaway 2000; Minza 2009; Nurmila 2009). The narratives reflect the great tension engendered by competition between spouses, resulting in stress and insecurity for the wives. Complaining about co-wives to family or friends was a welcome stress relief for some wives, and they leave it at that. Spreading the word about your husband’s other wife can also be an attempt to drive her out of the marriage, however. Some wives go further and opt for direct confrontation with the offending rival. Intimidation and harassment over the phone can be used to great effect, for example. First wives may resort to such measures, since they initially have more to lose in a polygamous marriage, having to share what was all theirs with another wife. They may harass women they suspect of being their husbands’ second wives or mistresses in order to make life so miserable for them that they opt to end the relationship. This is seen as a more effective strategy than harassing the husband, for he may be unwilling to drop either of his wives, and may in fact grow so tired of the harassing wife that he leaves her instead of the other. Harassment may be less common among second wives, as they have, as they may themselves acknowledge, married another woman’s husband. This might change, though, if the husband attempts to marry a third wife (see Chapter 13). Noor, a secret second wife, is engaged in a war of nerves with her ‘unofficial’ co-wife. The husband’s first wife has called Noor demanding to know if she has married ‘her’ husband, just as she has called members of Noor’s and her husband’s family to enquire and complain. Noor, extremely upset, told her husband that if his first wife ever abused her over the phone again or if they met, she would assault her. While it has not (yet) come to physical violence between them, Noor feels subjected to psychological violence and

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anticipates that physical violence could happen. The first wife knows Noor and her family because they move in the same social circles. This social closeness is one of the potential ‘hazards’ faced by husbands who secretly marry second wives from their own social circle, as discussed. Zuriah, a secret second wife, suspected that her husband had a Philippine girlfriend, his former maid. So she contacted his secretary with whom she is on good terms, and made her forward a copy of his phone bill, where she found the girl’s number. Checking phone records is a common strategy by wives suspecting their husbands of polygamy or polygamous intent. Zuriah promptly called the former maid, pretending to be her husband’s sister, and scolded and abused her. Zuriah was in great distress because she felt neglected by her husband, but her friends warned her that she had become obsessed and had lost all dignity. The warnings made Zuriah reconsider her actions, and helped her decide to finally initiate a divorce. Direct confrontation may be employed by wives to prevent another woman from becoming their co-wife, not only by warning the potential wife that she knows of her existence, but also by informing her that her husband-to-be already has a wife, which she may be unaware of. When Halima’s fiancé’s wife called her, she realized she was being tricked into polygamy and immediately broke off the engagement. Unfortunately for Halima, the wife kept calling her to find out whether she was still seeing her husband, abusing her on the phone, calling her names, ‘a loose woman chasing after her husband’. Halima was scared that she would come and ‘beat her up’, adding that it is common for women to assault each other in (actual or potential) polygamous unions, defending their claim to their husband verbally or physically. What emerges from Noor, Zuriah and Halima’s harassment accounts is a theme of violence that may run as an undercurrent in co-wives’ relations with each other. I was regularly told stories of co-wives battling it out for the favour or exclusivity of their husbands. Asmah related a story that circulated around town of a prominent man who had surgery. His first wife, who is a friend of Asmah’s, came to settle the bill at the hospital, but his second wife, who is a prominent woman in her own right, was already there. She also wanted to settle the bill to affirm her place as his favourite wife, so it came to blows. According to Asmah, Malay women are usually withdrawn in public, but polygamy creates such distress that they do not shy away from making public scenes. Many such stories bear the hallmarks of urban polygamy legends. Maznah sees

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violence between wives happening because they do not live together, and when they meet, they might attack each other to vent their frustration. This is often described in folk stories and soap dramas, though violence between Malay women is not considered ‘normal’. So when it happens in real life among famous people involved in polygamy it immediately becomes the object of gossip, legends and media reports. Studies of polygyny often focus on rivalry, antagonism and jealousy between co-wives. In a survey of sixty-nine polygynous systems, Jankowiak, Sudakov and Wilreker (2005) similarly found that while co-wives may cooperate and pragmatically coexist, there remains pervasive conflicts and rivalry in most systems, including elements of verbal and physical violence as well as sexual jealousy. In elite Malay polygamy, as it is typically practised in urban Malaysia today, it may be difficult to ascertain whether a particular polygamous union is characterized more by cooperation or competition between co-wives. There is rarely a joint polygamous household, nor is there necessarily a perception that the husband and his wives are part of a common polygamous union, where co-wives have clearly defined roles toward one another and their husband. Yet despite co-wives living separate lives, polygamy narratives often portray co-wives’ fierce competition over access to their husband’s assets, for themselves and their children (see Chapter 10). Malay co-wives may thus be quite competitive in securing material benefits and preferential support for themselves and their children from their marriage, though they may be forced to develop innovative strategies to achieve them. Not least when they have to manoeuver within secret polygamous unions, and compete against covert co-wives.

Coping with Polygamy Living in polygamous families is ideally regulated by various customary rules and norms regarding how the husband should treat and interact with his wives and how his wives should interact with him and each other. But in practice, there is often little respect for such rules and norms. How, then, do wives cope with being in such fluid families? Rokiah reflected a general view among the women I talked to that ‘many unions seem to function, but perhaps the woman is okay on the outside but inside she is very unhappy’. They would emphasize that even women who seem to accept polygamy

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may be emotionally hurt, and go through personal trauma as they put up brave fronts. As Aisyah put it: ‘I have yet to meet a woman who is happy in a polygamous marriage.’ When discussing women’s emotional state in polygamous marriages, women often contrasted it to men’s state, reflecting the discussion about ‘blame’ in such unions. They lament how men, allowed to engage in polygamy, force women to lead unhappy lives. Women suffer ‘the heartache you feel as a person’ in polygamous marriage, as divorced first wife Fauziah puts it: ‘Men think they are great because they have two wives, they don’t know how we suffer.’ Indeed, most women consider the first wife to be the ‘injured party’ in a polygamous union. Yet despite the often traumatic experience of becoming a polygamous wife, few elite first wives seem to divorce their husbands. Fauziah, reflecting on her own unhappy polygamous union, which did end in divorce, noted that the first wife is usually against polygamy; she feels belittled and is desperate when her husband takes a second wife: ‘She is often older and will retreat in the face of competition. She feels her husband compares her to a younger model, so she retreats and her self-confidence is shattered, asking herself what did I do wrong, am I not beautiful any more, why does he need another wife, what is wrong with me.’ The second wife, on the other hand, might feel great because she has ‘won’ her husband from another woman. She was seen as suffering less as she (mostly) went into the polygamous marriage knowingly. Of course second wives can suffer as well, especially if their husbands start to neglect them. But unlike first wives, they are usually not pitied if they entered the union voluntarily (Rudie 1994: 159). Generally, how a woman copes with polygamy depends on her individual circumstances and resources. As Fauziah described it: ‘Women are all the same all over the world; they don’t want to share their husbands, so in that sense there is no special coping mechanism for Malay women to deal with polygamy.’ While there might be certain sociocultural or religious guidelines, Malay women have no special personal coping mechanisms available when faced with a co-wife. They are primarily individual in nature. Nonetheless, some virtues ideally possessed by Malay women are considered important in dealing successfully with polygamy. Outstanding among them are being ‘very patient’ or ‘very religious’. Asmah recounted how a friend became very distraught when her husband took a second wife. She deals with it because she is very religious and accepts polygamy as a Muslim institution. Her husband takes good care of her financially, so she has learned

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to cope. But she had no special personal coping mechanism: ‘It does not help to be Malay or Muslim, for you are a woman first and it is difficult for all.’ One coping strategy that first wives use is trying to find legitimate and acceptable reasons for their husband’s marriage to another wife. One of the most common justifications for polygamy is to prevent the husband from engaging in adultery, as discussed. A wife, it is argued, may prefer that her husband is married to another woman rather than keeping her as a mistress, as this is less morally compromising. This reasoning has only limited applicability, as mentioned, as wealthy Malays maintain mistresses as well as wives. Childlessness is another common justification for polygamy, and it is believed that the only situation in which a woman might find some peace of mind in polygamy is if she cannot have children, and accepts that her husband takes another wife to have children of his own. Women facing such a situation might not agree. Finding legitimizing reasons for their husbands to engage in polygamy might therefore work less well than simply accepting that polygamy is a potential in all Muslim marriages that Malay women must be ready for, no matter what their personal feelings are about it. Women who find polygamy unacceptable have the option of a divorce, even if the road towards a divorce can be long and difficult if the husband does not consent. Polygamy constitutes a constant source of anxiety for many Malay wives, yet it is generally not discussed in the family, being by many considered a difficult topic on par with sex or other such sensitive topics in a Malay Muslim setting. Some Malay mothers talk to their daughters about sex, yet it may be difficult to prepare a young girl for polygamy, for as some of my interlocutors would remark, ‘what can we do, there is nothing women can do about it’. Some women have made a point of talking to their children about polygamy. Katijah argued that mothers are in control of the husbands of the future, so they should teach their sons that if they engage in polygamy, they are irresponsible as husbands and neglect their responsibility to their wife. Mothers should also instil in their daughters not to enter polygamous marriages, because women are also at fault; they consent to it, so men take advantage of them. Former first wife Maznah called this the ‘mystery of women’ that women are their own worst enemy; they become second wives in spite of (usually) knowing that their husband is already married and that the first wife might be hurt by it.

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It is often assumed that the women best able to accept and potentially cope with polygamy are those who grew up in polygamous families themselves. Among my interlocutors, this was not always the case. Growing up in polygamy does not give women special coping mechanisms for handling polygamy in their own marriage. Quite the contrary happened to Zarena, who is now reluctant to marry at all for fear of one day being forced into polygamy herself. As a daughter of a first wife, she reacted strongly to her father’s polygamy, as her story in Chapter 12 illustrates. Women like her, who are not born into polygamy, may experience it as a rupture of their monogamous family. Raihana, in contrast, feels that she can accept being a second wife because she grew up in a polygamous house as the daughter of a second wife. She is not particularly happy about potentially becoming a second wife, yet she is not discouraged by her mother’s example in entering her own polygamous marriage. What Raihana would have felt if she was a first wife forced into polygamy without her consent is another matter. It is doubtful that growing up in a polygamous household can prepare an unwilling woman for that. ‘Unwilling’ first wife Rashidah stressed that ‘women who are not in polygamous unions can sympathize with women who are, but cannot empathize’. This goes for me as an ‘outsider’, as for Malay women who have no direct experience of polygamy. As Tonkin (2005) notes on the problematic concept of ‘empathy’ in fieldwork, assumption of shared feelings is illusory due to cultural, religious and indeed personal idiosyncrasies. As an ethnographer, I can try to mediate the women’s narratives of polygamy. Only a woman personally faced with polygamy can truly understand the depth of despair it can entail.

Note   1. Cube-shaped building in the centre of the great mosque at Mecca. It is the focal point to which all Muslims turn when praying (Robinson 1982: 224).

Chapter 10

Sharing

Fauziah’s Story about Leaving Polygamy Fauziah, sixty, is a former first wife in a polygamous marriage. For six years she lived ‘a torturous life’ in polygamy, keeping up a facade of happiness while experiencing great inner hurt. Fauziah’s children were likewise extremely upset when their father married another woman and brought her to their house without prior warning nor explanation; Fauziah had only just been told. Fauziah and her children were thrust into polygamy against their will, as are many first families, but unlike most elite first wives, Fauziah eventually left her husband. The fact that he forced her to share time and space with her co-wife by always bringing her over to Fauziah’s house, thus reducing her exclusive time and space with him, gave her strength to ask for a divorce after six years of polygamy. When Fauziah divorced her husband, she asked him for nothing: ‘I had my pride.’ She only took her children, telling them: ‘there will be no more driver, no more big car, no more big house’. For several years she struggled to take care of them without help from their father, whom they did not see. She only approached him again for help to pay for their overseas education. Fauziah felt she could go ahead and divorce him because she was not bound by material things. According to Fauziah, women may say they do not want a divorce because of the children, but often it is for material reasons; they do not want to lose their lifestyle. Fauziah compared her then situation to that of the late Diana, Princess of Wales. It was a comparison that was used often by

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unhappy first wives, who saw a parallel between their lives and that of Diana, who was perceived to have suffered in a loveless marriage because her husband had turned his attention to another woman. For Fauziah it was significant that Diana had apparently fallen in love with a Muslim man, who died alongside her in a horrendous car accident in Paris on 31 August, 1997; the event overshadowed the celebration of Malaysia’s forty years of independence from British colonial rule on that day. As Fauziah reflected: ‘Diana was just like me; she did not care for material things but just wanted affection. She found a man who loved her, and then it ended so quickly.’

Sharing Time Equal treatment of wives is a Qur’anic prerequisite for polygamy, and as such an ideal that both men and women refer to. I was occasionally told stories about polygamous men who appear to treat their wives fairly – that is, men who appear to manage giliran or turn-taking between their wives to everybody’s satisfaction. A friend of Salbiah was the Malay second wife of a man with an English first wife; he would spend one week at his English wife’s house alternating with one week at his Malay wife’s house. This arrangement was official, so everybody always knew where to contact him. In a different official giliran rota, Aminah’s father would stay four days at a time with each of his four wives. A polygamous husband is required to spend equal time with each of his wives. Conversely, wives have a right of access to their polygamous husband, but their claim on the husband’s time cannot necessarily be absolute and must be shared with other wives (Ali 2003). Few polygamous unions I knew first-hand or heard of saw such fair sharing of the husband’s time, however. The prescribed sharing represented the ideal rather than the practised reality. In fact, the feeling of being neglected was the most common complaint I heard from polygamous wives about their marriage, excluding comments about the institution as such. As Firth (1966 [1943]: 52–53) noted: ‘equal distribution of time is not always followed and inequality in this respect is a common cause of friction between a man’s wives.’ Second wife Zuriah explained how her and her husband had not discussed ‘arrangements’ – that is, how their time together would be managed after their marriage, because he had told her he would divorce his first wife. After they were married

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he admitted having been ‘overly confident’ that he could leave his first wife, and soon stopped seeing Zuriah regularly. She has now filed for divorce, citing neglect and lack of time-commitment as cause. It is not uncommon for second wives to seek divorce when their husband reneges on his promise to divorce his first wife after their marriage (Karim 1991: 77); in such divorces, a second wife’s main grievance is typically that she has to share her time with her husband with another wife. How a man manages his duties towards his wives is connected to the circumstances of the secondary union. If it is an official polygamous marriage, it will be easier for a man to regulate how much time he spends with each of his wives. First wives might want to negotiate how much of their husband’s time and support they are willing to transfer to their new co-wife. Second wives might similarly want to negotiate the terms of the husband’s turn-taking between wives, as they are entering a plural union where they have to carve out space for themselves within an already established marriage. Secret second wives, in contrast, may have to agree to a ‘schedule’ that allows their husband to maintain an officially monogamous marriage to their first wife. The husband can then dictate the terms of his time-commitments, since a second wife has little leverage over a man to whom she is not officially married. For a secret second wife, giliran negotiations can be extremely challenging. When Noor first married her husband, their arrangement was that he was with his first wife four nights and with Noor three nights a week. This is uncommon for men who have secret second wives, since they tend to spend most nights at home with their first wife. This has fuelled the first wife’s suspicion that her husband has in fact married Noor. Suddenly one of Noor’s nights got ‘cancelled’ because her husband’s children had complained that he was never home. Although extremely upset that one of ‘her days’ had been taken, there was nothing she could do about it except appeal to his sense of fairness. She had encountered what women would describe to me as ‘the classic situation’, where, after some initial months of ‘equality’, the husband starts spending more time with his first wife and their children. Typically, a polygamous husband’s allegiance is with his first wife and their children. Before Rashidah knew of her husband’s polygamy, he would always come home at night in the typical secret second wife schedule. Once Rashidah was aware of her cowife’s existence, however, her husband’s time-share arrangement changed to her co-wife’s favour. When I first met Rashidah, her

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husband would only come to her house on Sunday evenings, but did not sleep there anymore, nor did he have sexual relations with Rashidah anymore. He spent the entire week at his second wife’s house. Later on, her husband started coming back to her house more regularly. Rashidah calls it ‘the classic situation’, as mentioned, in which the second wife loses some of her shine and the husband goes back to his first wife: ‘who was after all a better wife’. Sometimes, he might even ‘divorce the second “gold-digger” wife’. While Rashidah, Noor and Zuriah’s stories suggest that second wives may lose out to first wives in polygamous unions, first wives are equally at risk. Yet it appears to be uncommon that husbands divorce their first wife even if they spend more time with their second wife. In such cases, it might rather be first wives like Fauziah requesting a divorce than husbands initiating it. If a husband marries a second wife because he no longer cares for his first wife, he could easily divorce her, thus removing the basis for polygamy. There must therefore be other reasons for men to practise polygamy than because they tire of (taking care of) the first wife; moral or economic responsibility towards a first wife may enter into it, as may lingering feelings. For some men, staying married to a first wife is also a matter of pragmatics, as discussed in Chapter 6. In Fauziah’s case, she as first wife ultimately lost out to her husband’s second wife, but only because she herself initiated a divorce. When her husband told her of his intentions to marry another wife, she was very upset but felt obliged to accept it in order to preserve her marriage and family. For six years she lived with polygamy, pretending she was happy on the outside while ‘torn inside, crying inside’. Fauziah’s husband kept a weekly rotational schedule between his wives, and would take them and their children out together once a week. Yet even on Fauziah’s weekends the other wife would come to her house, whereas she would stay away from the other wife’s house on her weekends. She asked her husband to make his other wife respect her weekends, but he was the one who always brought the new wife along to make them into ‘one big happy family’. Fauziah was very hurt: ‘How do you think it feels when you see your husband walk off with the other woman leaving you behind, bringing his new wife home like he used to do with me?’ Fauziah tried to be patient, but she wanted a ‘pure marriage’, and could not ‘keep up the deceit, the facade of happiness’, so she asked for a divorce. Fauziah’s husband’s second wife’s strategy to obtain the much-desired monogamous marriage was to keep the husband with her as

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long as possible, by dragging out his visits. When he finally made it back to Fauziah, she would quarrel with him and annoy him because of his neglect of her, which resulted in him spending even more time with his second wife. Trying to augment one’s share of a husband’s time as a strategy to oust a rival co-wife revolves around the assumption that equal sharing of time is of such paramount importance to co-wives in polygamous marriages. Men like Fauziah’s husband who attempt to bring their wives together at certain times may thus break the fiercely guarded customary rule that each wife gets certain days or times with the husband allocated. Violation of these rules was felt by polygamous wives to be a serious infringement of their rights. Husbands attempting to bring together their wives may not just be trying to maximize their own comfort, however. They may also attempt to come across as model polygamous husbands, able not only to retain several wives but to maintain harmony between them. This confers great prestige on men, who are seen as being ‘good Muslims’ in living up to the Prophet’s example. Rokiah’s friend is the first wife of a husband who seemingly treats all his four wives fairly. Each has her own house and he sees them on a rotational basis. They are known in K.L. for going out socially together every Sunday night. Polygamous men do not usually parade all their wives around town together, but when they do, the media will sometimes pick up on them as polygamy ‘success stories’. This in turn puts into perspective the many polygamous men who are not able to live up to the requirement of equal sharing of time with all their wives, much less keep harmonious relationships between them. As such, stories of model polygamous marriages, whether passed on between friends or in various media, may help reinforce the view that they in fact constitute the exception rather than the rule, and that men who cannot live up to these ideals should not engage in polygamy.

Sharing Space It is rare for Malay co-wives to co-habit. Customarily, each wife has her own separate residence, enabling her to build a family around her and her children, and with a husband who belongs to more than one family (Firth 1966 [1943]: 52–53). The husband typically shares a main house with his first wife and their children. Separate residence is seen as necessary to counteract the assumed inherent and incessant quarrelling, misunderstandings, jealousy and favouritism.

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Conflicts appear to be greatly lessened when co-wives do not cohabit or they live in separate villages or towns. Co-residential houses were primarily found among the nobility and upper classes, whose wealth and large homes enabled wives to be kept in separate quarters, even though they were in the same house. Among commoners, it is rare for co-wives of a polygamous husband to live under one roof, a pattern also found in Indonesian polygamy (Geertz 1961; Jennaway 2000; Jones 1994; Karim 1992; Strange 1981). Even among nobility co-residence appears to have been uncommon, for as Gullick (1987: 52) noted, ‘royal wives submitted reluctantly to polygamous marriage as a price to be paid for their privileged position. To relieve the inevitable jealousy between wives, and because convention required it, a ruler usually accommodated his wives in different places’. As Djamour (1965: 84–85) observed among Singapore Malays, it was considered humiliating for a woman to have a co-wife and even more humiliating for them to live under the same roof. In order to avoid friction between wives, most polygamous men therefore maintain separate homes for their wives if they can afford to, or one wife might stay with her parents and be visited there. This pattern of separate residences for co-wives to avoid potential conflicts and quarrels is found in polygamous societies cross-culturally (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). When co-wives appear to be on good terms with each other, or live peacefully together under the same roof, the husband might indeed be suspected of applying magical means to achieve such unlikely harmony. A man who manages to keep two women in the same house is considered to possess ilmu, an ‘art’, which, as mentioned, gives him special powers to hypnotize them into accepting a situation that viewed from outside is untenable (see Chapter 14). As Banks (1983: 99) noted, a wise husband should arrange to keep his wives as far apart as possible. As several of my interlocutors furthermore explained to me, the Prophet’s wives also lived in separate houses. A man should not force women to share a house if they do not want to, both to follow the Prophet’s example and to avoid quarrels and jealousy. Aminah’s father maintained separate houses for his four wives, with his first wife living in the main house with him; all his children had free run of his house, as is common in polygamous families in Malaysia. When her parents divorced, Aminah and her siblings settled in the main house with their father and stepmother. In contrast, Zainab’s father’s three wives and fourteen children all lived in one large house. When the family moved to K.L., however, the two remaining wives requested and got their

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own house, although they remained close. Co-residence of wives in elite polygamous houses is at the husband’s discretion and may depend on how the wives get along and accept each other’s presence. Even among traditional upper classes, where polygamy has been regularly practised, co-wives may prefer their own home if they have the choice. Malay domestic arrangements and family relations are quite fluid. Nuclear households are the most common type (Embong 2002), accounting for about two thirds of households in Malaysia; average household size is 4.1 persons.1 Residential arrangements reflect the familial arrangements of the inhabitants – monogamous, polygamous, divorced, widowed, single, with or without children, own, adopted or foster children. House composition changes as family composition changes. Apart from the ‘main family’, an unmarried or widowed female relative, or an elderly parent, might live in the house, helping with chores such as childminding or cooking. Young relatives or children of close friends might also take up residence for various lengths of time. K.L. households attract out-of-town relations because town people tend to be richer and because K.L. is the cultural, socio-economic and educational centre of Malaysia. Residence in a common household (rumahtangga) is central to a Malay sense of close kinship (Banks 1983: 136). The Malay house represents and encompasses crucial values and emotions, not least through being the place of worship. Carsten (1995, 1997) suggests that it is through living and consuming together in houses that Malays become kin. This crucial importance of houses and commensality in Malay families is one of the pivotal reasons why space and the sharing of space is so contentious in Malay polygamy. Elite families may have very large households, and may gain prestige from managing such great houses. One of my interlocutors has a household of nineteen all living together in a large building. Apart from her and her husband and their children, the household includes children-in-law and grandchildren, as well as several servants, including her husband’s driver, who has a spouse and children. The husband’s driver was by many women highlighted as an important member of their household. Some women have their own driver, of course, for as Katijah explained: ‘A driver is important in the career of a woman, since he can pick up dry cleaning and so forth, and she can think in the car; she does not need to concentrate on driving.’ Elite households are typically focused around a nuclear family, usually with at least one live-in maid, often from Indonesia.

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Indonesian maids may, based on perceived shared language, religion and culture, be integrated into the family. Aisyah’s former maid had been with her family for many years; she took care of the children when Aisyah was abroad pursuing her further education. Aisyah explained: ‘She is related to me, from a poor side of the family, this is much better, since then you can trust them.’ The maid was a widow and had grown children when she came to work for Aisyah. Aisyah’s present maid is from Indonesia. She is not happy about her work, but finds it difficult to dismiss her, as she left Indonesia and refuses to return, because her husband married another wife when she could not have children. Aisyah keeps her for another reason as well, however: It is such a hassle to get a new maid. I wanted an old maid, since young ones make for a lot of trouble; they have boyfriends and run away, they are more assertive. They might also tempt the master of the house, although that tends to be more Philippine maids. Some men even marry their Philippine maids as second wives.

Aisyah described how these maids talk among themselves, and tell their employers what other maids from other households tell them; this is one way elite women can keep updated on each other’s family affairs, including polygamous twists and turns. Maids’ stories may thus be one of the channels feeding narratives of polygamy and urban polygamy legends. The tendency among rural polygamous men to maintain wives in different villages may not be regularly practised in K.L. As Fauziah noted: ‘In the Prophet’s time he had a wife in different cities, it made sense to have a wife when he stayed there, but today men have two wives living very close to each other.’ Men who live in K.L. and appear to be monogamous may of course have second wives in other parts of the country or abroad, but such marriages would often be unknown to their local wives, and hence to me. Polygamous men living in and around K.L. might, as Fauziah suggested, instead keep second wives within easy reach. They are able to do so because K.L. offers the anonymity of a big city, in which people do not know each other, unlike in rural areas, where it might be necessary to keep a second wife in another (distant) village if one wants to keep her secret. Second wives in K.L. may have their own house when marrying, particularly if they are divorcees or career women with stable incomes. They will then typically remain in their own houses, which might be close to the house of their husband and his first

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wife, as they may move in the same social circles. Second wives with no income or still living at home when they marry may be put up in new houses by their husbands. Husbands typically place them in apartments located within easy reach of their main residence or workplace, so they can visit them regularly without having to travel great distances, which might arouse the suspicion of their first wives. In pre-digital days, for example, first wives might search their husbands’ cars to find toll receipts from highway payments, indicating out-of-town travels. Some polygamous men go to what is considered rather unscrupulous lengths to make it convenient for themselves. Salbiah married her present husband as his third wife, and while his first wife lives in their mutual house, he bought an apartment for each of his other two wives in the same building close to his main house, making it easy for him to move between wives.

Sharing Assets Of polygamous husbands’ requirements for equal treatment of wives, nafkah, or more specifically nafkah zahir, maintenance or financial support, becomes paramount in most elite polygamous wives’ minds. Management of money matters are seen as a direct sign of their husband’s affection for them and their relative position vis-à-vis their co-wives. Fair and just sharing of assets is also a prerequisite for a man’s right to practise polygamy. Financial sharing is considered crucial, because it constitutes a highly visible indicator of a woman’s relationship to her husband, whereas emotional support is more private and less quantifiable. First wives are concerned because they used to be their husbands’ sole beneficiaries, whereas second wives are concerned because they may have married for financial reasons. As discussed, it is difficult to generalize about the economic basis of Malay polygamy, because it varies according to individual circumstances. Many Malay women work and take care of themselves financially, so if they become second wives, they may look for husbands who offer support other than financial, as discussed. Raihana’s mother, as mentioned, was a second wife and a skilled entrepreneur; she had a good income and paid many of her and her children’s expenses herself, despite her wealthy husband. First wives such as Rashidah who have high incomes may also be satisfied financially if their husbands keep paying bills, especially children’s education, so their standard of living is not lowered when he marries a second wife. The requirement that a man

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does not lower his existing wife or wives’ standard of living upon marrying another wife forms or formed part of many states’ requirements when a man applies to engage in polygamy. In 1996, this provision was removed from the IFL (FT); it was removed from the Selangor IFL already in 1989. It suggests that an existing wife’s standard of living may be lowered by her husband’s subsequent marriage. Providing fair and equal financial support is one of the criteria for a polygamous husband to be ‘just’ in Islamic law, and as such the ideal to strive for in polygamous marriages (SlonimNevo and Al-Krenawi 2006). The removal of the provision is to the clear detriment of senior wives, and women might argue that this invalidates the Qur’anic injunction that a man must be fair and just to all his wives in order to (be permitted to) be polygamous (Mohamad 2011). Financial sharing is particularly contentious if all wives in a polygamous marriage are dependent on their husband. First wives who have obliged the common request from Malay men to be housewives are left vulnerable in case of divorce, abandonment or polygamy. That is one reason elite parents usually insist that their daughters get an education, so they can take care of themselves ‘in case their husbands should let them down’. For first wives, the arrival of a second wife may spell destitution, as the husband concentrates most of this support on his new wife. Elite women are less likely to suffer dramatically, as they usually have families that are able to help them out financially if they have no personal source of income. Fauziah recounted how her husband stopped all financial assistance to her and her children upon her divorce. He even stopped paying for their children’s education. She lamented that second wives usually ‘want it all’ after marriage and try to manoeuver their husband into transferring all assets to them and their children: ‘It is like a big tree with many branches; she wants the whole tree for herself, even the branches belonging to the first wife.’ Maznah, who, like Fauziah, left her first husband, in part because he married another women, described how her husband’s second wife has managed to have all his property signed over to her and their joint children. Maznah’s own children with him are thus cut off from inheriting from him, even though they remained with their father after Maznah divorced him. Maznah does not feel able to protest, however, as she initiated the divorce from her husband, and as such no longer has any claim on him. Such skewed asset sharing is considered the height of injustice by wives in polygamous unions.

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Asset sharing is particularly tricky when the second wife is secret, as demands of financial equality with the first wife are difficult to make when she has no official relations with her (Nurmila 2009). Conversely, when a first wife is asked for consent by her husband to marry another wife, or she is aware that her husband will marry another, she may make more demands. A friend of Aisyah’s got wind of her husband wanting to secretly marry his mistress as a second wife; she confronted him and set conditions for him to have her acceptance, such as: ‘are you buying her a new car, then I want a new car as well’. Aisyah added that it would not be enough for him to give his first wife an emerald ring if the second wife gets a diamond ring. The first wife’s financial demands were such that her husband gave up marrying his mistress – at least officially. Second wives who marry partly for money may hence not always get what they bargained for or were promised by their husband before the marriage, since their husband’s allegiance may remain with his first wife and her children. The competition between co-wives over their husband’s financial support can therefore be very fierce. Firth (1966 [1943]: 57) similarly observed that bad feelings between wives often arose out of economic affairs, particularly the sharing of the husband’s income, perhaps reflecting underlying personal hostility between co-wives. Polygamous husbands’ financial duties to each wife were described in very regular ways, reflecting their importance. Items such as houses and cars were usually mentioned, but one item in particular appeared emblematic of this duty among the elite – rings with precious stones. Such rings figure prominently in narratives of polygamy, as Aisyah’s account above suggests. According to Aminah: ‘Men do not know the strict rules about how to treat wife number two and three; for example, it is not enough to give a sapphire ring to the second one if the first one gets a diamond ring.’ Financial sharing is often measured by quantifiable items, which must be of equal value and not just of equal character. The flaunting of this demand is seen as a direct affront to the neglected wife, making her lose face and power to her co-wife and in society at large. If a second wife flashes a big diamond, and the first wife must make do with a paltry emerald, the first wife’s humiliation will be palpable for all the world to see. Providing each wife with exactly the same kind of house, car, ring or holiday abroad is a difficult, often impossible, task, and polygamous husbands may be unwilling or unable to do so. Women exactly seize on men’s general inability to satisfy the Qur’anic

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demand that they share their time, assets and other support equally between their wives as a reason why polygamy is wrong and should not be practised. Interlocutors in Kelantan made similar comments to Rudie (1994: 157). When men described to me why men take another wife, they tended to focus on the Muslim man’s right to take four wives. Women rarely referred to the Islamic right as a valid reason for polygamy. That right was considered conditional and next to impossible for a mortal man to live up to. Only the Prophet was able to satisfy his own conditions. Thus, while women may recognize polygamy as an Islamic institution, the fact that men are considered unable to live up to the conditions invalidates their Islamic right to practise polygamy, from women’s perspectives. Conveniently and importantly, the argument that men manage polygamy badly and therefore should not engage in it offers women a chance to reject polygamy without criticizing Islam.

Sharing Love Being equal to all wives in a polygamous union entails the equal sharing of a husband’s emotional, physical, social and financial support. Of those, equal sharing of financial support (nafkah zahir) is usually seen as the most important, yet maintaining a first wife financially but neglecting his other duties is not considered acceptable. Fauziah complained that ‘taking care of the material needs of the first wife is enough to maintain her, giving her material goods, but he does not think of her emotional or personal needs.’ In Kelantan, Rudie (1994: 157) found a similar emphasis on the ‘balancing of emotional and economic justice’ for co-wives in polygamous unions. Polygamous men must be just to their wives, and not neglect to maintain them emotionally and sexually (nafkah batin), so to speak. Polygamous husbands are generally seen by my interlocutors as unable to share their love fairly, however, for ‘a man cannot love all wives equally’. Cross-cultural research into plural marriages seems to have produced some support for my interlocutors’ belief that a husband cannot act equally in terms of love and affection for two, three or four wives simultaneously. The emotional ‘quality’ of spousal relations may be stronger in a dyadic than in a plural relationship, according to Jankowiak and Paladino (2008: 14–15): ‘one of love’s most defining properties [is] the capacity for individuals to form a pair bond anchored in emotional exclusivity. It is

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difficult, perhaps nearly impossible, to love more than one person at any one time. … This research strongly suggests that although humans are not sexually monogamous, they are emotionally monogamous.’ Cross-culturally, a dyadic relationship between two people appears to be preferred to develop a relationship based on love, yet this does not rule out that plural relationships can also be based on love, in varying degrees of strong emotional and physical attachment (Tiwari 2008: 124). It may be of a different nature and intensity, or may involve one partner feeling less love if they are forced into a plural relationship against their will. Love, as discussed, was not necessarily the basis for Malay marriages in times of arranged marriages. While some women may accept living with less love in a polygamous marriage, for the many women who feel that love has grown between them and their husband, the appearance of another wife might be a serious setback, one that directly channels most or all of their husband’s love to the new wife. To first wives, second wives will often appear to get the lion’s share of their husband’s attention. The perceived inability to love many equally is one of the reasons Malay women generally oppose polygamy, and accuse men of abusing it, particularly when they neglect their first wives’ rights (Omar 1994). Katijah explained: Provisions in the Qur’an also make it difficult for men to marry; they must have good reasons to do it. Men take the simple approach; if they can satisfy equal financial treatment they feel vindicated – for example, you can give a diamond ring here and one there, a bungalow here and one there, but can you give equally of love. That is very difficult.

Polygamy can threaten a marriage by giving rise to jealousy between co-wives, who may feel that they get less from their husband than wives in monogamous marriages. While co-wives are entitled to equal treatment and financial support from their husband, because a husband must divide his attention between his spouses, there is always the possibility that one wife will receive more attention than the other wife, or at least a different kind of attention, not least in terms of physical or emotional love (Jankowiak, Sudakov and Wilreker 2005; Jankowiak and Paladino 2008). As Banks (1983: 99) notes, Malay first wives may feel they have been turned into housekeepers, cooks and child minders and are no longer the centre of their husbands’ attentions when he marries a second, often younger, wife. It is a common assumption that the younger

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wife gets more attention than the other wives, both in terms of time and assets (Omar 1994: 15–16). Many second wives feel entitled to their husband’s exclusive love, especially those who work and are not dependent on his financial maintenance, for they may have married assuming that their husbands married them for love. Second wife Noor told her husband that if he ever took another wife she would leave him: ‘he married me for love and how could he then love another woman.’ It is one of those puzzling yet revealing statements about polygamy from a woman who had just put her husband’s first wife in exactly that position. It also reveals a strategy used by some men to engage in polygamy and the devastating emotional effects it can have on their wives. They may convince their second wives that they no longer love their first wife or have any relations with her as a way to make them marry as second wives. Second wife Zuriah found out the painful way that it is not always so; Zuriah’s husband revealed after their marriage that he felt unable to divorce his first wife. The contentious sharing in polygamous marriages – of time, space, assets, love and sex – feeds into the many polygamy stories among elite Malays. More than challenges of sharing, the cultural and social ambiguity of polygamy in Malay society runs like an undercurrent in women’s narratives. Among the many perspectives and narratives on polygamy I collected, there appears to be no ambiguity about polygamy’s acceptability at first sight – the women almost universally condemned it. As first wife Rashidah emphatically told me: ‘The worst nightmare of a Muslim woman is for her husband to take a second wife.’ Yet the ambiguous acceptability is always part of the story, for while most women condemn polygamy, they simultaneously acknowledge a man’s right in Islam to take more than one wife, granted that he meets the Qur’anic conditions for engaging in polygamy. Polygamy is only a conditional, not an absolute, right in Islam from most elite women’s perspective. It should not be engaged in unless the man is able to live up to the conditions of equality and fairness towards all his wives. That, by all accounts, requires an extra-ordinary man. Acknowledging a Muslim man’s right to be polygamous is carefully weighed against the reality of men who for the most part are seen as unable to live up to these conditions. Zainab hence distinguishes between her own potential polygamous marriage and her parents’ polygamous marriage, which functioned so well that her father, his three wives and fourteen children all lived harmoniously in the same house. She feels it could never

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work in her own marriage, not because she is against polygamy as such, but because she believes that her husband lacks the personality of her father. Her husband, Zainab feels, would not be able to be fair to both wives, and she would get neglected. That Malay men are not equipped to emulate the Prophet with regards to polygamy is a widely held view, for as Maznah told her husband: ‘The Prophet could do it because he was a prophet, it cannot be done by normal men … Muslim men abuse it, because it is impossible; there is not enough time to be equally with several wives.’ For Maznah, a husband is not a good life partner if he diverts his attention to another wife, but the second wife is equally at risk: ‘If he can do that to the first wife, who says he can’t do it to the second one?’ Maznah, like most women, feels that a polygamous union breaks the bond between husband and wife. It is tantamount to an act of betrayal towards the first wife and her children, especially when, as often happens, it involves a covert second marriage, which the first wife discovers in an accidental and humiliating way. Kartini, who is unmarried, shares many of Maznah’s sentiments, as did most of the women I talked to: The men I know are not equipped for polygamy – the requirement that all wives are to be treated equally, loved equally. It might be possible for a man to be fair to all wives, but in relationships, which are feeling-based, it is difficult to be equal to all. … If you are a good Muslim, you probably do not have time to be polygamous. … If in a polygamous marriage love is the basis, how can the man then marry someone else which he supposedly loves equally? That is against the purpose of the marriage.

Note   1. Malaysian population statistics can be found at: https://www.dosm. gov.my/ (accessed 25 May 2017).

Chapter 11

Children

Aminah’s Story about Expecting Polygamy Aminah, thirty-eight, suffers from ‘unexplained’ subfertility. She has gone through ‘all kinds of treatments’ to address her subfertility, but all her attempts at conceiving have failed. Aminah is acutely aware that her childlessness poses the threat of polygamy. Her great worry is that her husband ‘asks permission to marry someone else because he wants to have children’. She feels that on a personal level, a husband owes respect to his wife; if she has really tried to have children, there is no good reason for a man to take another wife. To Aminah, polygamy is not acceptable, even though she grew up in polygamy, as the daughter of her father’s third wife. A man might, according to Aminah, have a genuine reason to marry polygamously if his wife is sick, cannot have sex or cannot have children. She may then consent to him marrying another wife to satisfy his natural needs, as it is for health reasons and thus legitimate under Islamic law. A wife may also drive a man to marry someone else by her behaviour; she may not want to share his interests or fail to keep pace intellectually with him. Sometimes, a husband wants a mistress and follows his own needs regardless of whether his wife is good or bad. This results in secret polygamy, even if his first wife has done all she can to be a good wife. Polygamy can, then, according to Aminah, cause trauma to the first wife, because she might not feel that her husband has a genuine reason to remarry. Aminah has therefore come to the conclusion that if she has done all she can to have a child, and her husband still insists on marrying

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someone else to have children, she would opt for a divorce, since their marriage ‘pact’ would no longer be working. Although Aminah strongly feels she cannot share her husband with someone else, she nonetheless wonders: ‘if I love him so much should I let him, like some women do?’ Aminah acknowledges that her husband has been very patient with her and is willing to go all the way to have a child with her, and therefore: ‘I never take my husband for granted.’ She feels that she owes him to really try for a child, and has given up her career to devote herself to her elusive motherhood.

Planning a Polygamous Family A polygamous family starts out, in the majority of cases, as a monogamous union consisting of one husband and one wife. Malay men seldom contract a second marriage at the same time or shortly after their first marriage, whereas second, third or fourth wives may be married more closely in time. The first wife in a polygamous marriage will in most cases have started married life as a monogamous wife, and remained an only wife for some years. When a man marries a second wife, children may or may not become part of the new family unit. What reproductive decisions the spouses make in a polygamous union are influenced by various factors, such as whether the woman has been married before, whether one or both spouses have children from previous or first unions and whether the union is secret. Polygamous wives come in many significant categories – first, second, third or fourth, never married or previously married, divorced or widowed, with or without children, still capable of bearing children or past childbearing age, financially independent or dependent on their husband. A man who marries an older woman who is unlikely to be able to have children will presumably not marry her expecting children, just as previously married women with children may find that husbands do not expect to have children with them either. Some husbands may indeed find women who do not want children especially attractive as second wives precisely for that reason, freeing them from expectations that marriage entails parenthood. There are men who marry polygamously precisely because they want children, or more children. Rokiah suggested that successful men want many children, and as the trend is now towards having

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just a few with each wife, he needs more wives to have more children. Indeed, the desire to have numerous descendants is a traditional driving force of polygamy, and one of the subtle meanings of polygamy is the symbolism of having many children (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). This scenario appears to be uncommon in Malaysia, however. If a polygamous husband marries a third or fourth wife, he may choose not to have children or only have a few children with them, since the marriage may be contracted for other purposes than to beget children. It depends, as discussed, on the circumstances of the marriage. A significant factor influencing childbearing in polygamy – that is, ‘family planning’ in polygamy, is thus whether husbands have children from their first union. A childless man who marries a second wife may perhaps (though not necessarily) hope to have children with her. If the husband already has children from his previous unions, he might want his second wife more for his enjoyment than to have his children. As Aminah wryly commented: ‘a man is married to his first wife because she offers stability, family and children, then he marries a second one for fun, not commitment.’ It implies that marriage without children is less committed. A man may of course have children with his second wife regardless of whether he has children already, not least to oblige her desire for motherhood. For most women, children are a must. Motherhood, like marriage, bestows social adulthood on Malay women. Women consider motherhood a self-evident goal, if not a necessity. As Rokiah expressed it: ‘A woman must have a child to be a woman.’ Most of my interlocutors chose to marry because of children and wanting a family. Nazriah married because she wanted someone to share her life and success with, and perhaps find happiness with: ‘Deep in their hearts everybody wants to share, and the conclusion of that sharing is children – it is women back to nature.’ Katijah saw it as ‘a woman-thing to want children, not religious or cultural, it is a gender thing’. Asking the women I worked with why they had children appeared as nonsensical to many of them as asking them why they married; the two events were seen as closely connected (Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011: 1). Maznah clarified: ‘Having children is a natural extension of getting married; why get married if you don’t want children? Why work and set up house, if not to have a family?’ Younger women tended to distinguish marriage from having children. They stressed that having children is not a must, a compulsion; it depends on the individual woman if it is important for

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her to have children. To Kartini: ‘Having children is not a matter of course; a woman needs to be equipped to have children. She should not just have children to have children.’ Younger women feel less predestined to have children than older women, yet family, peers and society at large still expect and pressure them to have children. Raihana described how great value is placed on having children in Malay culture because ‘having children is expected of you as a family to produce zuriat, the next generation’. The universal desire among women to have children was reflected in the fact that none of the married working women I talked to, no matter how important their career was to them, had ever considered preferring a professional career to having children. For Katijah it was no real conflict, as she felt having children would not stop her from doing anything: ‘I wanted both a career and children,’ though she conceded that she has to accommodate her career to her role as mother. Motherhood was seen as a primary identity-creating role, and often described in terms of ‘achievement’. For Katijah, having children was ‘a natural decision’: Then at least you have a purpose in life; I would feel lacking in something if I did not have them – I would feel very depressed. At the end of the line you want to see that you have created something, no matter how much profit I make for the company, that is it, but when you have children and you die something is left behind.

Ideally, then, ‘a successful woman should have children’, and while urban women are becoming more independent and pursuing professional careers in ever increasing numbers, their desire to become mothers appears to remain undiminished. Women’s greater options of education and employment today may have affected birth rates, however, as women previously wanted and gave birth to more children than women today, reflecting the contemporary trend towards smaller families (Jones, Terence and Mohamad 2011; Leete 1996; Peng 2011). Annual population growth rates in Malaysia have fallen from 2.6 in 2000, to 1.5 in 2015.1 Elite women’s secure financial and social position means that they are not dependent on government assistance and free to pursue their own reproductive agendas. Malay cultural norms have generally favoured large families (Embong 2002), with Malay women typically bearing or ideally preferring four to five children or more, as my older interlocutors attest to. Yet young women are faced with contemporary concerns that favour smaller families. Urban working women in K.L. face many of the same problems that tend to

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limit family size in the stereotypic West: lack of child care, expensive private schools, demanding careers etc. Nazriah explained that ‘the new generation get few children, two or max three, because it is expensive and time consuming’. As with marriage, motherhood has become less inevitable, less predictable. While the emphasis is still on having children, family size now appears more under women’s individual control. Not having children is typically narrated as a result of not being able to have children. As Zarena pointed out: ‘If women choose not to have children, which is very rare, they probably would not say it directly but rather we can’t and people would accept that.’ Zarena represents a new generation of urban elite Malay woman for whom the importance and significance of marriage and motherhood are fading as their own needs and plans begin to take priority in light of their greater social and financial independence from their families. However, deciding not to have children remains rare among Malays; parents in particular pressure couples to produce children swiftly after marriage. Several women specifically mentioned the ‘mother-in-law factor’: before they had their first child, they had been under enormous pressure from their mothers-in-law, who were afraid they could not conceive. As Katijah explained: Another aspect is the mum-in-law, who reinforces the threat of polygamy to her daughter-in-law. A woman must produce a child otherwise the husband will marry another. She would say: ‘if you cannot produce a child in three–four years, my son will marry another wife’. Childlessness is seen as giving the husband freedom to marry another.

Childbirth and Secrecy Husbands and wives’ reproductive history hence influences the future composition of polygamous families; another crucial factor is secrecy. Polygamous wives’ reproductive careers are clearly affected by the secrecy surrounding many secondary unions. The likelihood that the wife has children may decrease if she is a secret second wife, but increase substantially if she is an official wife. In most cases, it is the husband rather than the second wife who is keen to keep the marriage secret and opts not to have children. The identity of a polygamous husband is more identifiable when a child is born to the union, as a child gets his or her father’s name. Malays

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do not usually have surnames or family names, but are known by their given names followed by ‘bin’ (son of) or ‘binti’ (daughter of) and their father’s name. A child’s name hence reveals paternity, if paternity is established and accepted. The secret second wife may of course also be the one who opts not to have children. Noor already has children from her first monogamous marriage. Her first husband wanted more children, but she felt it was her decision; she took birth control and did not ask him about it. She similarly feels that it is entirely her decision if she has a child in her present polygamous marriage. Because her marriage is secret, however, being pregnant and having a child would ‘blow their cover’. If she gave birth in a cultural and religious context where having children out of wedlock is completely unacceptable, it would alert people to the fact that she is her husband’s second wife rather than a close friend. For Noor, maintaining the secrecy of their union takes precedence over any desire to have children together. So she enjoys her freedom from reproductive duties, having a husband without having children. A number of secondary marriages will undoubtedly remain childless to protect their secrecy. Particularly if both spouses have children from previous unions and so feel more at liberty to choose whether or not to have children together. Women, like Noor and Zuriah, who become second wives may on some level be better able to assert their reproductive autonomy, their right to decide whether, when and how many children to have, than women in monogamous marriages might with respect to childbearing; unlike first wives, second wives are not automatically destined to have children with their husbands. Yet men who have children with their first wives and do not want more children may be in conflict with their second wives’ wish for children. And vice versa. If spouses later do have children, they may find that the birth of a child provides them with an opportunity to make their marriage public. Married status remains of critical importance to Malay personhood, as discussed, and so the secrecy surrounding many polygamous marriages in K.L. has a natural lifespan that ends, if for no other reason, when a wife needs to assert that status. That usually happens at the latest when she becomes pregnant and has a child. I was often told how the birth of children exposed secret second marriages, as Nazriah’s story in Chapter 13 illustrates. Secrecy, then, seems to be a rather uncertain indicator of polygamous family planning, which is ultimately unpredictable in general terms and only knowable in individual terms.

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The secret or unofficial nature of much Malay polygamy creates different reproductive patterns to those often found in other polygynous societies, where having children becomes essential for women if they want access to their husbands’ resources; subfertility can lead to destitution for women. The focus on children in polygynous households can result in intense reproductive competition among co-wives, who try to have as many children as possible in order to secure a larger share of the common husband’s resources and strengthen their position vis-à-vis each other and their husband (Bledsoe 1995; Madhavan 2002). In secret Malay polygamy, there can be no open competition between co-wives, yet Malay second wives who marry for financial reasons may find it important to have children with their husband to cement the relationship and stake a claim on his property. Financially independent women may not need children for such reasons and may opt not to have them. For the three wives of Zainab’s father, childbearing seems to have been as ready a consequence of marriage as for any other woman who started married life as an official and not previously married wife. Zainab called all of her father’s wives ‘mother’, and they raised all fourteen children as their own. She attributes the good relations between the siblings to the fact that they were close in age: ‘When one mother gave birth, the other would give birth soon after.’ Childbearing for each wife in Zainab’s family was not particularly influenced by polygamy, but rather followed the typical pattern of four to five children, spaced and timed irrespective of cowives’ children. Malay polygamy appears not to be related to postpartum taboos on sexual relations, in contrast to some African polygamous systems, where there is a significant relationship between the severity of postpartum taboos and plural marriages. In Gambia, a Mandinka woman’s prescribed two-year period of lactation after the birth of a child, with a resultant two-year sex taboo, is seen as a nearly impossible abstinence period for a man, which he can manage through polygamy (Clignet 1970: 29; Wittrup 1990). Sexual abstinence for new Malay mothers only involves a forty or forty-four day confinement period, also prescribed in Islam, and may be broken by one or both spouses’ wish to resume relations earlier (Laderman 1983: 204; Zuhur 1995: 36). Polygamous husbands may thus not find it necessary to space the birth of their children by different wives to take account of this short period of abstinence. Furthermore, the first wife may have stopped childbearing by the time her husband marries subsequent wives.

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Rokiah was born to a mother who was a secret second wife. Upon her birth, the first wife ‘discovered’ her mother’s existence, as is common, and later forced their husband to divorce her. She quickly remarried a twice-divorced man with five children. He never had children with Rokiah’s mother. He proceeded to marry three other women, with some of whom he had children, and she then became a first wife. When her second husband died, she married a man who had two other wives, and thus became a third wife. She had two daughters by her third husband. Rokiah’s mother has thus been first, second and third wife to different men, but just as her three marriages differed from one another, so did her childbearing. The secrecy of her first marriage as second wife did not prevent children being born, yet the birth of Rokiah ‘exposed’ her and precipitated a divorce. Her status as first wife was the least happy, and no children were born to this union. In her third marriage, childbearing ceased when her marital relationship deteriorated after the birth of two children. Aminah’s father had six official wives in all, but ‘only’ thirteen children, for he did not (want to) have children with all his wives. He had an arranged first marriage when he was quite young, but went on to marry his second and third wives closely in time. Most of the children were born within a few years of each other, except the last ‘batch’, who were much younger, the result of his later marriage to a woman ‘who could have been his daughter’. In between these two sets of children, he married and divorced two women with whom he did not have children. Unlike in Zainab’s family, marriage did not automatically lead to childbearing for all wives. In both cases, however, it is probably significant that all wives who had children were young and not previously married upon marriage, and childbearing was not restricted by secrecy. The three women’s various experiences suggest that polygamy does not lead to specific childbearing patterns, but that the spouses’ individual circumstances upon marriage seem to play an important role, as it does in monogamous unions. It might be worth noting that all their fathers belonged to an older generation of traditional Malay elites for whom polygamy was common, and where marriage meant parenthood regardless of whether it was polygamous or whether there were children from previous unions. Women who marry as second wives today are much less ‘predestined’ to have children than second wives in traditional elite polygamous unions. Urban elite polygamous spouses, due to their often unofficial unions or their pragmatic reasons for entering the union, may

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be more willing to discuss whether to have children at all; in monogamous marriage between two young adults, reproduction may be more taken for granted, culturally if not personally. A woman might marry as a second wife specifically to get children, however. One of the greatest shames to befall a Malay Muslim woman is to have a child out of wedlock, as Nazriah clarified: ‘There is still great stigma attached to illegitimacy, so if you want children you must be married first.’ Should an unmarried woman give birth, it is usually hushed up and the child swiftly transferred to a suitable married couple for fostering. The stigma is in such cases all on the mother, as a child is considered innocent and does not suffer stigma based on the circumstances of its birth. In order to have a child without infringing on moral and religious laws, a single Malay woman might thus opt to marry as a second wife. It parallels marrying as a second wife in order to have a ‘legitimate’ affair with a man. It might be a viable strategy for women who are still single when reaching what they consider their final childbearing years, and may for various reasons find it easier to marry as a second wife, as discussed. Raihana, forty-three and unmarried, is seriously considering marrying as a second wife, primarily because she wants to have a child ‘before it is too late’. Women may also opt to marry as a second wife in order to have a child without too much interference from a man (Sa’ar 2007). It parallels a Western trend of women choosing to have a child without a partner; if they conceive through anonymous artificial insemination they might avoid the biological father having a claim to the child. Polygamous marriage as a way to have a legitimate child with little interference from its father is a shaky strategy for Malay women, because it works on the assumption that the husband will focus on his ‘other’ family, which may not be the case.

Childlessness Motherhood is considered such a ‘natural and necessary’ part of Malay womanhood that not being able to have children can become a major problem for a woman, both as an individual and as a social person. If a woman has no children of her own, her familial and community status might be diminished (Strange 1981). Not having children also opens up the possibility that her husband might divorce her or marry a second wife to have children. A man might, according to Aminah, have a genuine reason to marry polygamously

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if his wife is sick, cannot have sex or cannot have children. His wife may then give him consent to marry another wife under Islamic law. Aminah here refers to the general view among both Malay men and women that childlessness is a valid reason for polygamy. Childlessness is seen as a great misfortune for which women are usually held responsible, in part because male infertility remains surrounded by stigma and silence in Malaysia, as elsewhere (Inhorn, Tjørnhøj-Thomsen, Goldberg and Mosegaard 2009). It can have devastating effects on a woman’s life. Thirty-eight-year-old Aminah is acutely aware that her childlessness poses the threat of polygamy. Aminah and her husband had assumed they would have children upon marrying, planning to have three or four. She is now suffering from ‘unexplained’ subfertility, and feels that ‘one should also discuss what if we can’t have children before getting married, but this is in hindsight’. Indeed, almost none of the women I worked with seemed to have entertained the possibility that they might be unable to have children. At thirty-eight, Aminah is living with the constant fear that her husband might marry another woman in order to beget children. She worries that her husband will ask her permission to take a second wife in order to have children, and, consequently, Aminah has never discussed polygamy with her husband. She fears that once it is voiced and established that he really wants children, which she has not yet been able to give him, they cannot turn back and everything becomes more difficult. For Aminah, the matter is better left unsaid. Discussing it would make her feel insecure, for it is ‘one thing that I cannot control, it is not like finance where I can have some influence’. Tellingly, the elite women I worked with would invoke God in connection with childlessness, something that rarely occurred in other connections. Referring to God’s will as determining how many children they have, if any, might be a coping strategy for women experiencing difficulties in reaching their desired family size. According to Katijah: Everything is God’s will; if you are not destined to have children, then that is that. You must accept that it is your fate if you cannot have children, and believe in God’s will, what is given to you. When my first son came along, we did not use family planning, it was God’s will. We didn’t really plan on how many children to have, we would take what God gave us when it happened … It was God’s will that so many years passed between the births of my children, since I did not use family planning.

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To Nazriah: ‘Children are God’s gift, you are gifted if you have children, but you have to accept if you can’t get them’. Generally, my interlocutors felt that ‘it is not a stigma as such not to have children, but people might feel sorry for you if you do not have children’. Nazriah described the devastation a childless woman might nonetheless feel in a pro-natal Muslim society: ‘A lot of women who do not have children make themselves feel embarrassed, feel they are lacking something, feel inadequate.’ For the women who did not have children of their own, there was indeed a sense of emptiness that belief in God’s will could not fill (Inhorn 1996, 2003). Zuriah, a secret second wife, was diagnosed as going through early menopause when she sought help for her subfertility. She feels it is God’s will that she did not have children in her marriage: ‘God has a design for all of us.’ She has, however, begun to blame her lack of children on her ‘wild ways’ abroad, where she indulged in premarital sex and lived with boyfriends without being married to them. She now feels that those ‘wild ways’, and their assumed negative effect on her fertility, are in turn negatively influencing her marriage and precipitating its dissolution: ‘Perhaps it might have been different with my husband if I had children with him, but he does not feel it matters.’ Polygamous wives who are unable to bear children may face the same kind of real and imagined problems as subfertile monogamously married women. When second wives do not have children, what may appear as a pattern based on choice may in fact be involuntarily childless polygamous unions. It may be a result of biological obstacles faced by older women, who make up a significant portion of second wives, or indeed by the older men who are typically their polygamous husbands. Islam’s focus on women as wives and mothers does not seem to influence elite women’s desire for children. It was acknowledged that ‘in Islam, you must be both mother and wife. Marriage is a Muslim thing, and one must propagate’. Yet women also stressed that there is no compulsion to marry and have children as a Muslim, even if it is your ‘duty’. Rather, ‘Islamic society encourages women to have children’. As Zarena expressed it: ‘As a Muslim woman I should have at least one child to use this ability God has given me.’ For mother-of-six Rokiah: ‘It was not a Muslim thing for me to have many children, it was a purely personal choice for me how many we had.’ She did not feel that Islam makes people have more children, though she did acknowledge that ‘people who do not follow Islam have fewer children’.

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The women I worked with generally did not feel any compulsion to marry and have children just because they were Muslim. This reflects the general Malay view of Islam as a guiding rather than a coercive force in their lives. To Kartini, as to many others, the Islamic aspect of marriage is to do it well rather than being married itself. When discussing religion with me, Maznah’s response was typical: ‘It never occurred to me to look at Islam this way, as telling women to be wives and mothers, that it is not stressed that way.’ Rather, she saw herself as emulating her mother and her gender in marrying and having children. Women are nonetheless under intense pressure to strive for marriage and motherhood by family and peers as well as communities and state, which exert pressure on women to marry and have children in order to become ‘well-adjusted members of society’. Such pressure takes a particularly intense form in the fear of polygamy that women like Aminah experience as a result of their childlessness; as such, fear as a powerful, basic emotion embodies their feelings toward polygamy (Wulff 2011).

Paths to Parenthood Among Malays, adoption or fostering was traditionally and is still the most common response to childlessness, providing a quick road to parenthood and personhood. Most women agreed with Katijah that ‘if a woman cannot have children the natural instinct of motherhood leads her to adopt’. Couples who have children of their own but feel they have not reached their desired family size or composition may also opt to adopt. Katijah and her husband planned to adopt a girl before their second child was born, in order to achieve their desired family size and especially composition, a child of each gender. Girls are very popular adoptees. Previously, many Chinese girls were adopted by Malay families, as there was (and is) a strong son preference among Chinese Malaysians, leading some families to abandon or give up their ‘excess’ girl children for adoption (Banks 1983: 129). The girls would then be raised as Malay Muslims; indeed, according to Raihana, some Malay families adopted Chinese girls precisely because ‘you get to heaven more easily if you convert someone to Islam’. Typically, Malay couples take in children of relatives or close friends and raise them as their own, when the children cannot be brought up by their biological parents for some reason; for example, if one or both parents die. Children may also be fostered by

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family members when new marriage partners do not want to raise children of previous unions. It is also common to foster a child if one is better off than the child’s natal family. Sometimes, children are fostered out to relatives to provide them with company. Asmah’s mother took care of Asmah’s son for some months, but when Asmah took him back, her mother ‘started to be strange, singing religious songs; she missed having the child around’. So Asmah’s brother, who had four sons very close in age, gave one of his sons to be raised by the grandmother. Malay adoptions are often not legal in the sense of being formalized but rather form a system of fosterage or informal child transfers. When the children are completely unrelated by blood or friendship they will commonly be legally adopted. Adoption or fosterage is quite common and accepted as a natural event. About one-quarter of all children in the village where Carsten (1997) worked were fostered by non-kin or very distant kin, or lived with close kin who were not their birth parents.2 Adoptions are acceptable in Islam but parents must tell children if they are adopted. Some women would not consider adopting. Aisyah related how several women in her husband’s family had adopted small children for ‘selfish reasons’ when their own children were grown, ‘then the house is not so lonely, there is much more happiness when there are children around’. It caught her husband’s fancy to adopt as well, as ‘he liked to play with babies’, but she refused. She was worried about which child she would get, ‘the genes’ of the child, and felt that she would not be able to love this child as a mother should. According to Aisyah, the children up for adoption often come from the Malay-dominated East Coast states of Kelantan and Terengganu, from destitute mothers who have many children and have been abandoned or widowed by their husbands. This genetic denouncement of adoption is at odds with the usual Malay belief that a child is not accountable for its parental heritage, and is probably more prevalent among urban educated elites. Aminah is similarly worried about adopting ‘since you don’t know what kind of child you get, what the genes are’. Aminah is now attempting to become pregnant through IVF (in vitro fertilisation), and is not considering adoption until she has completely ruled out natural birth. Women worried about genes may opt for ART, or Assisted Reproductive Technologies, to address their childlessness. ART offers an alternative to adoption among the urban elite who can afford the procedure at private clinics in Malaysia or abroad. While adoption will undoubtedly

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remain part of Malay family life, including informal fostering arrangements between relatives or friends, ART offers a possibility to counter the pressure and in some cases threats from family to produce children. While Sunni Islamic authorities allow a broad range of ARTs, using ART to assist conception is not without problems, however. Procedures such as egg donation, sperm banks and surrogate mothering are not permissible in Sunni Islam, which may limit Malays’ access to certain procedures (Inhorn and Tremayne 2016). Furthermore, some men may consider the use of ARTs as a challenge to masculinity through their failed procreative powers (Inhorn 2003, 2006, 2012). Couples who choose ART must thus accept it socially and religiously, as well as be able to afford it; if they can accept and afford ART, it can provide some urban elite women with a solution to the childlessness-induced threat of polygamy. Malay women are often, as mentioned, held responsible for childlessness in a marriage, and men might be persuaded by family or friends that taking another wife will give him the children or sons he must have. Among the educated elites, men may also be considered responsible – to blame – for childlessness. In childless elite marriages, a husband marrying a second wife to have children may thus not necessarily be condoned. As Banks (1983: 99) points out, men who claim to take a second wife to obtain the children that the first wife cannot provide are often not taken seriously, for if a man can afford to take another wife, then people expect him to be able to find a relative or neighbour whose child he could raise. He will typically be assumed to marry the second wife for sexual variety. Redistribution of children among blood kin and other family relations who can best afford to maintain them is at least as common as taking a second wife for sexual variety (Djamour 1965: 87). A first wife’s reproductive deficiency is, however, one of the most common reasons for taking a second wife. Many of my interlocutors, who otherwise condemned polygamy, found it acceptable for a man to take a second wife in order to have children if his first marriage had not produced any. In the IFL, a man’s application to be polygamous can be met if his wife is sterile, and as such it is a circumstance which some women may see as an acceptable ground for polygamy. Generally, in polygamous societies, it is considered acceptable for a husband to marry another wife if his first wife is barren, yet there is less consensus on whether it is acceptable that a husband divorces a wife for barrenness (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). Among elite Malays, divorce in cases of childlessness may for many women be preferable to polygamy.

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The gender of children is one aspect of childlessness that may become more important with the increasing prominence of polygamy and the ‘Arabization’ of Malay Islam. Traditionally, Malays stress the importance of having both boys and girls, to create a ‘balance’ in the family. If they had children of one gender only, women might attempt to have a child of the opposite gender, even if they had achieved their desired family size already. The desire to have a ‘balanced’ family means that Malays traditionally have no son preference, unlike many other Muslim groups (Inhorn 2006, 2012). Girls and boys are equally highly valued, though seen as providing different benefits to their parents. For many parents, it is essential to have girls for they are seen as better carers when parents reach old age (Peletz 1996). The desire to have a son is by no means small, however, and as Malays become more oriented towards a Middle Eastern Islam, this desire may yet increase (Frisk 2009: 178). Maznah described her joy at having a son: It was important to have a boy, because if you do not have a boy then there are problems when you die, your daughters get a share but the rest is given to your husband’s brothers and sisters, and that is not fair – that is Islamic law. If you do not have sons you can transfer ownership to your daughters while you are still alive, but you cannot write a will giving it all to them.

Malays generally follow rules of adat in inheritance cases, with girls getting more or less the same share as their brothers, but with the increasing enforcement of orthodox Islamic jurisprudence in Malaysia, the importance of having sons in terms of inheritance will also increase. A case in point was related by Maznah, whose friend took a second wife in order to have a son, as his first wife only had daughters. The story suggests that the Islam-based focus on sons might provide another legitimizing reason for men to engage in polygamy – that is, in order to have the son(s) that the first (son-deficient) wife could not provide.

Notes   1. Malaysian population statistics can be found at: https://www.dosm. gov.my/ (accessed 25 May 2017).  2. See Banks (1983) or Carsten (1997) for a description of Malay systems of fosterage.

Chapter 12

Families

Zarena’s Story about Betraying in Polygamy Zarena, twenty-six and unmarried, attributes her reluctance to marry directly to her father’s polygamy. She related how her father was exposed to a hantu or ghost in the form of an evil spirit, during a period when he was ‘a very naughty man’; he had many girlfriends and eventually married one of them as a secret second wife. Zarena’s grandmother, who was staying with them, felt the presence of this evil spirit. One night she suddenly got up and chased the servant down to open the front door ‘for the one outside’, and then started howling at apparently nobody, screaming ‘get out, get out of my house’. She then got saffron and rice and went around throwing it about the house as if pursuing some being, while still shouting for the being to get out. She then sat down on the floor, her legs shaking, in a way she had never done before. Zarena’s whole family was by now up watching the commotion and everybody agreed that the grandmother was possessed. They asked her who she was and why she had come here, and the grandmother pointed at Zarena’s father and said because of him. The consensus was that the family’s guardian spirit had entered the grandmother to root out the evil spirit attracted by her father’s bad deeds. Zarena’s father’s polygamy was the source of dysfunction in the family. Zarena, like many children of first wives, had discovered her father’s secret second marriage in a traumatic way. Zarena was never directly told that her father had married again, but found out through her parents arguing. Zarena’s mother later pressured

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her father to divorce his second wife. Zarena felt deeply betrayed by her father, but was unable to talk to either parent about it; like many children of first wives ‘forced’ into polygamy, she received little help or guidance from her parents. Zarena’s relationship to her father never recovered, and she now feels that her father’s betrayal of her mother, and of her and her siblings, is part of the reason she is afraid of marriage in general and polygamy in particular. This threat of polygamy may make young women like Zarena consider whether to marry at all, for as she explained: ‘I also despise the fact that Muslim men can have several wives; I despise this fact about Malay men.’

Growing Up in Official Polygamy The experiences of children growing up in polygamous families are, of course, influenced by whether they were born into polygamy or were brought into it by their mother’s or father’s polygamous marriage. Whether their mother was first or second wife also makes a difference, as does their age when polygamy becomes an official reality. While children’s experiences in polygamous families are different from that of their parents, they are also influenced by how their parents manage the situation. There appears to be no particular patterns of helping children to handle polygamy, and there might be little communication between spouses, and between parents and children, about such intimate and highly sensitive and potentially divisive matters as sexuality or polygamy. Malay children are considered innocent of their parents’ actions or stigma, and are not ‘punished’ for being a particular parent’s child. When the wives and children in a polygamous family know of each other’s existence, the children of different co-wives will often interact regardless of the co-wives’ relationship with each other. Salbiah, who married as a third wife, gets along well with her husband’s first wife, whereas the second wife is the common enemy – that is, ‘third wife syndrome’ (see Chapter 13). The children of the third and second wife, however, run between their apartments to play; they are the same age, as their mothers got pregnant and gave birth around the same time. Their apartments are also close to each other in the same building, to allow for easy access for the husband, as mentioned. Step- or half-siblings in polygamous unions may nonetheless not achieve the same sense of unity that characterizes siblings born of

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the same parents. According to McKinley (1983), Malay half-siblings are not clearly included in each other’s sibling set. They may acknowledge each other as half-siblings, but do not necessarily form lasting bonds beyond childhood. Parents, and in polygamous unions especially fathers, may make few distinctions between their biological children (anak betul), stepchildren (anak tiri) and adopted children (anak angkat) in how they are treated in daily life (Kuchiba, Tsubouchi and Maeda 1979: 33–34). Emotionally, however, there might be distinctions. Rashidah’s husband attempts to use his children by his second wife to make Rashidah accept the second marriage, by bringing the children over to her house. She has complained about it, but feels that she cannot be angry towards the children, since ‘they are just like any children coming through the door, they are innocent, only children’. He is also attempting to make her children accept their half-siblings. It is common in polygamous families, where co-wives maintain separate houses, that their children mix, mostly in the first wife’s house, once wives know of each other’s existence and regardless of their relationship, as mentioned. Rashidah’s husband has yet to attempt to make Rashidah officially meet his second wife, though his biggest achievement would undoubtedly be to make Rashidah accept her co-wife. Even innocent children may not be able to help him achieve this most difficult goal. Unlike children brought into polygamy by their parent’s marriage, like Rashidah’s children, children born into polygamy will often have very different and more positive experiences. How they experience polygamy depends on various factors, such as whether their mother is an official or unofficial wife, how old they are and whether there are any step- or half-siblings and co-wives to deal with. According to Rashidah, the children of her husband’s second wife seem to know what is going on when their father brings them to Rashidah’s house. Their mother has probably explained the situation to them, as most second wives striving for acceptance and legitimacy for themselves and their children tend to do. Zainab, in contrast, was born into and grew up in a polygamous family, and recalls her childhood experiences of her three mothers and thirteen siblings all living together as very positive. The children called each wife ‘Ma’ and Zainab attributes the good relations between all sibling sets to the fact that they were close in age and were all treated equally by all ‘mothers’ and their father. The children maintained close contact after their father’s death, as did the co-wives with each other and each other’s children. Today, the remaining ‘mother’ and

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children still meet regularly. For Zainab, there was nothing traumatic about polygamy; it was the natural and only form of family life she knew growing up. At the other, negative extreme are Rokiah’s experiences as a child in three different polygamous families. She is in the rather unusual situation of having experienced polygamous family life through her mother’s marriage as first, second and third wife respectively. She has no recollection of her mother’s first marriage as a secret second wife, as she was still a baby when her mother divorced her father. She has more vivid memories of her mother’s second marriage as a first wife, but has no contact with her stepfather’s children from previous and later polygamous unions; her mother was very upset that her husband had married more wives, and had no relations with them. After he died, her mother married a third time as a third wife, and Rokiah once more lived without contact to any step-siblings. Her mother had two daughters with her third husband, and Rokiah became close to them only because she was their half-sister through her mother. After the birth of the youngest sister the spouses’ relations deteriorated, mostly due to pressure from her husband’s other wives, and they were distant when he died. Rokiah’s childhood thus represents one type of experience of children born into polygamy, namely the total segregation of cowives’ families to the extent that they are unaware of or do not acknowledge each other’s existence. Rokiah was aware that her ‘fathers’ had other wives and children, but she only had limited experience of polygamous family life through her ‘fathers’ being away regularly and her mother being unhappy regularly. Raihana and Aminah’s experiences as daughters of second and third wives respectively represent polygamous family life somewhere between Rokiah and Zainab’s experiences, illustrating the variety of ways polygamous families could be arranged and experienced among the traditional Malay elites, to which they all belong. Raihana grew up in a polygamous family as the daughter of a second wife. Her father had three wives, who lived with their own children in separate houses in the same district so he could travel between them. Raihana lived in a house with her mother and her siblings, two brothers and a sister, as well as her maternal grandfather. Her paternal grandfather, who was also polygamous, stayed with his first wife. Raihana’s father’s first wife had two adopted daughters; her father married her mother in large part because he had no children of his own. His third wife had two children with

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him and one adopted child. Sometimes all nine children would sleep in the first wife’s house, as is common when co-wives have good relations. Her father treated all his children equally, so the wives did not complain and there was relative harmony between them. Her father eventually divorced his third wife, and when his first wife died, Raihana’s mother became an only wife, and remained an only wife until her death. Raihana’s family is quite close; she is still in touch with her eight siblings, although she sees her three full siblings most. Aminah, like Raihana, lived in a separate house with her mother and full siblings, as did her father’s other three wives and their children. She was, however, often in her father’s main house, where his first wife and her children lived, to play with her half-siblings. When Aminah was eight, her parents divorced, and her and her siblings moved into their father’s main house to be raised by his first wife. As her father eventually divorced all his wives except his first wife, all his children came to live with him in his main house. Aminah thus grew up with all her full and half-siblings and her ‘main’ co-mother, but without the family closeness experienced by Zainab. Zainab lived in a functioning polygamous house with all its members ‘intact’, whereas Aminah became increasingly distant from her own mother. When Aminah’s father died, his polygamous family disintegrated into its component parts. All contact with her half-siblings and their mothers was severed, and she now only sees her full siblings. The death of the husband/father may thus spell the dissolution of his polygamous family. Aminah, Raihana and Zainab all in their own way have good memories of growing up in a polygamous family. Yet the death of their father, who was the centre of the polygamous union, resulted in very different trajectories for their relations with their siblings, and for their attitudes to polygamy. Raihana’s experiences have not discouraged her from contemplating becoming a second wife herself, whereas both Aminah and Zainab feel polygamy could not work in their own marriages. Growing up in a polygamous family does not necessarily prepare a women for (better accepting) polygamy in her own marriage, as discussed.

Growing Up in Secret Polygamy In polygamous unions where the second marriage is secret, a major problem faced by spouses is whether, when and how existing

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children should be told of the polygamy. Children born into polygamy will often know that their father has another wife and children, as discussed. Children of first wives, in contrast, may not be told of their father’s second marriage, even if their mothers know about it. This is usually done to spare them the potential trauma of discovering that their father has married again and perhaps started a new family; this is a dominant narrative when women explain why children of first wives are not informed about their father’s polygamy. Children of first wives may discover their father’s second marriage in traumatic ways, and receive little help or guidance from their parents, who may be unsure of how to approach the potentially conflict-ridden subject with their children. Zarena was, as mentioned, never told that her father had secretly married a second wife and only found out because she overheard her parents arguing about it. Zarena felt deeply betrayed by her father, but was unable to talk about his polygamy or voice her frustration to either parent. She may have found it easier to deal with the polygamy if her parents had been willing to talk to her about it, but they never did. First wives faced with a ‘secret’ second wife and family may sometimes use their children as ‘pawns’ in their strategies to oust rivals, strengthen their relative position vis-à-vis their co-wife or hurt offending husbands or co-wives. A disgruntled first wife may use her children to negotiate the terms of polygamy with her husband, who is well aware of the potential consequences if she tells them about their father’s new wife and how unhappy she is. Or, as Zarena’s mother, a first wife may employ such strategies to pressure the husband to divorce his second wife. First wives may thus agree not to tell their children about their father’s second marriage, well aware that the threat that they might can work to their advantage. A friend of Raihana secretly married a second wife, as mentioned. His first wife was deeply shocked when she learned about the marriage two years after her husband had married the young girl, because the second wife had been coming to their house ever since she was a little girl, as a playmate of their children. Their five children still do not know that their father has married their friend; he is afraid of their reaction, and so obliges many of his first wife’s demands to keep her from telling them. This use of children only works, of course, if the father is close to his children. Zainab used such a strategy when she discovered that her husband planned to marry his young mistress as a second wife. He is very attached to his children, so what held him back from engaging in polygamy was not his respect for her, according to Zainab, but rather his fear of his

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children’s reaction. She was able to avoid becoming a first wife by using her children as a ‘bargaining chip’. Children may also be used to great effect once polygamy has become a reality. Halima described a friend’s strong reaction when she discovered that her husband had married another woman. ‘To pay for his bad conscience’ he bought her a new car and redid her parents’ house, but to no avail. Financial compensation, as mentioned, is not generally considered enough to make women accept polygamy. Halima’s friend emphatically did not want to be a first wife, so to punish her husband and make life more complicated for his second wife, she moved out from her marital home and left him with their five children. She felt her children would understand her reasons, and side with her and support her decision to divorce him. Polygamous husbands may assume that their various wives will take care of their own children, since (step)children may cause trouble for them and their new wives. Not being burdened with bringing up children gives husbands more freedom to indulge in their new object of affection. Halima’s friend felt that sacrificing her children was the best way to get back at her husband, who now faces five hostile children and an annoyed new wife. It was a decision made, of course, at a great personal cost. It is not just disgruntled wives who use their children against errant husbands, polygamous husbands may find equally powerful uses for their children. Through them they may seek to gain acceptance of secondary marriages or establish the seniority of one wife. It would therefore, according to Kuchiba, Tsubouchi and Maeda (1979: 36): ‘not be amiss for a husband to proudly introduce a child by his first wife to a third person in front of his second wife’. Noor’s husband’s appeal to keep their marriage secret because his first wife ‘will take his children away from him’ if she finds out, is a clear use of children to obtain strategic advantages for himself. He relies entirely on Noor’s maternal instincts and compassion, for she has no relation to his children. Some polygamous fathers choose to inform their first families about their second families by introducing the two sets of children to each other. Rashidah’s husband thus ‘introduced’ his first family to his secret second family by bringing over one of his and Rashidah’s daughters to his second wife’s house. When the daughter returned to Rashidah’s house, she told her that she had met her ‘other mother’, as mentioned. This is how Rashidah found out her husband had married a second wife, and had several children by her already. She was extremely traumatized by the news, but felt

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that her children understood that ‘in our culture, a man can have two wives’. As is common in such traumatic situations, she did not feel that she had to explain it to them, because ‘especially boys don’t talk much about these things anyway’. All Rashidah’s husband’s children by his two wives now know each other, whereas his co-wives never meet. Generally, children brought into polygamy by their mother’s or father’s polygamous marriage seem to find the experience much harder to manage than children born into polygamy. It tends to be especially hard for children of first wives, because they are usually born into a monogamous family, which then becomes polygamous, perhaps secretly and often against their mother’s wishes. This is certainly the case for Rashidah’s children, especially her daughter, who was involuntarily chosen as messenger of her father’s polygamy to her mother. Rashidah sadly related that she has talked to the school counsellor about her father’s polygamous practices. She wanted to know ‘why does he do that to my mother?’ Children of women who become second wives usually know that their mother has remarried, since her new husband will normally visit and perhaps cohabit with her at intervals. Spouses might pretend that it is a monogamous marriage by telling the children that the father is regularly away on business, an explanation also often given to children of first wives who have to accept the sudden and regular disappearance of their father. Alternatively, the second wife may meet her new husband at a secret location, in which case the children might not even discover that their mother has remarried. Second wives may be keen to have their children accepted and perhaps adopted by their new spouses to secure them socially and financially, however, so their children will usually be told about the marriage and often about the polygamy as well. It does not guarantee that the experience will be any easier for children of second wives than for those of first wives, of course. Noor became a secret second wife after divorcing her first husband, but her children are still unaware of it. She lives in an apartment that she shares with her new husband three days a week, while her children have remained with their father. She cannot take her children to this apartment, however, since they would most likely betray its whereabouts to her former husband. And he might then inform her husband’s first wife; they all know each other. Only a handful of Noor’s closest friends and family members now know about this apartment. To keep her ‘love-nest’ secret, she has bought another apartment where she can spend weekends

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with her children, and so avoid telling them that she has remarried. For Noor, having her new husband accept her children by a previous union is not important, because she does not need his financial or social endorsement of them. They are thus completely oblivious to the fact that they are technically part of a polygamous union, as is the case for a great number of children involved in secret polygamous unions.

Relations with In-law Family A very intense area of concern for women involved in polygamy is thus relations to their families – their natal as well as their in-law families. For while co-wives may not have any relations to each other, they must have relations to the families involved. Usually, the husband’s family places its primary allegiance with the first wife, if she married with their approval. The husband’s family may be as shocked and bewildered when he takes a second wife as his first wife may be. Among Singapore Malays, Djamour (1965: 87) found the same pattern of parents rebuking their sons for contemplating polygamous unions when their daughters-in-law had been good and dutiful wives for many years and did not deserve such treatment. It refers to the ‘wife-deficiency explanation’; if a wife is seen as performing her duties well, her husband is not seen as having a legitimate reason for marrying a second wife. First wife Rashidah explained how she gets along well with her husband’s family. According to Rashidah, they feel pity for her as she has been a good wife and mother. Yet they have to live with the reality that he has two wives, and so like other families with male polygamous members, they have to accommodate both families. Rashidah always gets invited to main family events because she is the senior wife, but the husband’s family will leave it up to them to make arrangements for her husband not to show up with his second wife at the same event Rashidah is attending. On one occasion miscommunication made her husband bring his second wife to a celebration Rashidah was attending. She was pleased that she had not known because she had come with confidence: ‘I sailed in looking good, I was dressed well.’ Co-wives may place huge importance on out-competing each other in looks or gifts when they show up at the same events, as part of ongoing rivalries with each other. Rashidah feels that her husband’s family supports her, yet acknowledges that ‘there is still some stigma’ attached to being a

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polygamous wife. She feels uncomfortable when going to family functions, because her husband’s family feels uncomfortable about the situation. Her husband does not try to smooth things out; in polygamy narratives it is often stressed that polygamous husbands leave it up to their wives to find their own footing in the marriage. Families are central in Malay lives, and polygamous wives will often do their upmost to be on good terms with their husband’s family, in order to secure their position vis-à-vis their co-wife. Cowives may also try to gain support from their husband’s family to oust their rival. Noor’s co-wife has thus called their husband’s mother to get her help in her fight to oust Noor, whom she suspects of being her husband’s second wife. As Noor is a secret second wife, she has little possibility of influencing her unofficial mother-in-law, or getting her support. The husband’s family tends to side with the first wife, as mentioned, unless there are particular reasons why the family does not like the first wife. If the second wife tries to make inroads into her husband’s family, in order to get accepted on an equal footing with the first wife, the husband’s family may deny her support, or even actively try to oust the second wife to protect the first wife. The husband is often the passive spectator in all of this, at least as far as women’s accounts of events are concerned. It is a battle between women in the different ‘camps’ that make up a polygamous union. A common theme in polygamy narratives is, as mentioned, the notion that husbands let their co-wives fight for his attention, battling it out with each other without his interference, because it will ultimately benefit him. Zuriah’s husband’s first wife was not informed when Zuriah became her co-wife, but his immediate family knew and accepted her as a member of their family. Now that relations between Zuriah and her husband have deteriorated, and she has filed for divorce, his sisters have turned against her, for they are close to their brother’s children and fiercely protect his first marriage. Zuriah has hence lost the important support of her husband’s family, leaving her vulnerable and disadvantaged; patching up a troubled marriage is often a family affair, with female kin helping out. When and if a husband tries to help his wives deal with his family, it is usually to try to make them accept the second wife, as first wives are usually already accepted and respected. Even in cases where his second marriage is secret, a husband may wish to inform his family about it, while keeping it secret from his first wife. Kartini related how an uncle had invited the whole family over to

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a new house, which turned out to be the house of his new second wife. Everybody was shocked, as nobody knew he had married her. Her uncle wanted his whole family to acknowledge his second wife and her child by him so that after his death she would get her dues. This was important, since his first wife did not know about the marriage. He consequently put his family in a difficult position by forcing them to deceive a woman whom they had come to love as part of their family for many years. It caused great misery in many family members, but they were forced to cope. As Kartini explained: I still treat his second wife with respect even though I am friends with his first wife. His second wife is secret and the first wife does not know, but I do not tell her because I feel this is not my place to do, so I keep up appearances. He will bring his second wife to my house for small family gatherings, and she feels natural coming, she has no sense of shame. But for bigger occasions, for example Hari Raya open house, he always brings his first wife.

Family members may become very upset when one of their male kin marries another wife, especially if it is done in secrecy, for it is seen as a betrayal and lack of respect for the first wife. In cases where the husband has married another woman without telling his wife or his family, the family’s condemnation is likely to be even more severe when they eventually find out. Halima related how it ‘brought a lot of bad blood into the family’ when her cousin had married a second wife without telling his first wife or his family, since everybody liked the first wife. When his first wife found out, she divorced him and stopped going to family functions despite still being invited. Halima, like much of her family, is still upset with her cousin, as she was close to his first wife, and so rarely sees him as she does not want to see his new wife.

Relations with Natal Family A polygamous wife must deal with not just the husband’s family, of course, but also with her own family. When a married woman becomes a first wife, either voluntarily or involuntarily, her family will usually look upon her with sympathy and pity, and if angered enough on her behalf, may choose to more or less sever relations with the husband and his family. Only rarely would they blame their family member directly for the polygamy. When a woman chooses to marry as a second wife, in contrast, there may be

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very little understanding for her choice even in her own family. Exceptions may be if she is older, widowed or divorced, or if girls from poor families marry rich men as second wives. Salbiah, fifty-one, recounted how she shocked everybody by marrying an older man as his third wife, and was initially ostracized by her family. Her father in particular was very upset when Salbiah told him about her marriage plans, as she had already been married as a second wife when she was very young, and had lost access to her two children from that marriage when her husband divorced her. Her father consequently refused to act as her wali, so she got married in Thailand where friends can act as witnesses. While her family has since forgiven her, they still have not accepted her husband, so whenever they come to see her, her husband leaves. Similarly when she visits friends or relatives, her husband just drops her off, because he knows he is not welcome. As one of Salbiah’s friends commented on the marriage: ‘What was strange was that he was neither good looking nor very rich, he was middle class. He was older and roundish; I thought he was a driver, because he was poorly dressed.’ Second or in this case third wives may thus pay a high price for their marriage, with social and in some cases familial ostracism being one of the potential hazards they face. In some cases, second wives choose not to tell their families that they have married, as they may know and fear their family’s reactions. Nazriah recounted how it caused scandal and dismay in her family when it emerged that she had secretly married a prominent man as his second wife and was pregnant by him without even her mother knowing about her condition. Nazriah kept the marriage secret from her own family, as she had agreed to the secrecy as a condition of marriage with her husband, who wanted to protect his first wife and his position. For Nazriah, who had great doubts about whether to marry as a secret second wife, it was humiliating not to be acknowledged as a wife by her own family, having to play hide and seek with them. Her pregnancy solved this impasse. It is probably rare that women who become second wives do not tell their families, since Malays live lives deeply enmeshed in familial networks, and rely on their support for everything from financial help to childminding to social identity. For various reasons, some choose to remain secretly married for a time, as did Nazriah and Noor. Second wives who, like them, live away from their families in another state may keep up the secrecy longer, though sooner or later the families will find out. Once a child is born it will usually be impossible to hide the fact any longer. It seems to be a reason

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why second wives (or their husbands) may choose not to have children, as discussed; conversely, having a child may provide an opportunity to announce the marriage, as it did for Nazriah. One profound effect of the contemporary form of urban elite polygamy, then, is that it tends to undermine the traditional role of marriage as a creation of alliances between families. As discussed, the respective families may not be involved in any aspect of the polygamous marriage or even known about it. Under such conditions, alliances between families, which Malays consider important in helping and maintaining marriages, may be non-existent. There will be little incentive to help a troubled daughter-in-law if her existence is not official or indeed completely unknown. As such, polygamous wives can have a very fragile support network. The problematic relations that polygamous wives may experience with both their natal and affinal families illustrate some of the pragmatic difficulties and emotional minefields involved in managing polygamy for those in the union, but also very much for their families. The very fabric of family may be threatened by polygamy, as people take sides, and potential divorce has reverberations. The often strong bond that exists between a husband’s female family members and his first wife can live beyond a divorce, especially if there are children in the marriage. Fauziah, a divorced first wife, still keeps in close contact with her former sister-in-law and her children. This continued bond between (former) female family members often makes acceptance of the new wife very difficult or very slow. The wife who ultimately may suffer most in polygamy, at least socially, will therefore often be the second wife. Women tend to feel solidarity with the first wife, making it an uphill struggle for many second wives to get a footing in their new in-law family or among their husband’s friends. In Malay polygamy, wives may thus be disempowered by not being able to build up alliances, either within their marriages or within the wider families. It comes back to a lack of regulated systems of co-wife relations in Malay polygamy (Jennaway 2000); cross-culturally, co-wives’ rights and obligations tend to be more carefully defined and guarantee a certain amount of equality between them. Senior wives may be given special powers and privileges, and as they age and ‘work their way up’ to a privileged position as senior wives, they may be able to exercise considerable control over junior co-wives. In some polygynous systems, senior wives may be less privileged; among Palestinian Muslims, junior wives had less economic problems, were less dissatisfied and had higher self-esteem

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than senior wives (Al-Krenawi, Graham and Izzeldin 2001). As my interlocutors experienced it, younger wives in Malay polygamy also tend to be their husbands’ favourite and get a larger share of joint resources. Elite Malay first wives typically have no economic functions or responsibilities towards co-wives, and may thus have little leverage over them – or their husband. Secrecy, a hallmark of Malay polygamy, thus jeopardizes a woman’s influence and autonomy vis-à-vis her husband through her inability to build alliances with her in-law family, or even gain support from her natal family. Both sets of families might be unaware of the marriage, or might be reluctant to accept it. Even in cases where the husband’s and second wife’s families know about the marriage, the husband’s first wife might not, making the marriage ‘unofficial’. This not only puts the second wife at a disadvantage, but can also potentially undermine the first wife’s position in her in-law family through their split loyalty. Women’s perception that there is increasing polygamy has also meant Malay women’s increased rejection of marriage altogether, as Zarena’s story illustrates. Not marrying negates creation of alliances between families, and the current perceived, if not actual, prominence of polygamy may encourage new constellations of family forms and familial allegiances in urban Malaysia.

Chapter 13

Rivals

Nazriah’s Story about Concealing Polygamy Nazriah, thirty-five, is a second wife who secretly married her husband in Thailand unbeknownst to her (and his) family. It caused a big scandal in her family when it was found out that Nazriah had married and had had a child without their knowledge; Nazriah’s family lives in another state. Her family in fact already knew her husband, as he had attended functions with her and her family before marrying her. The only member of her family who knew about her wedding was her father, who accompanied her to the East Coast, where they crossed into Thailand. Here, they met up with Nazriah’s fiancé, and Nazriah married him, with her father acting as her wali. Upon his return home he did not say a word to Nazriah’s mother or any other family member about the daughter’s wedding. Her immediate family only found out about her marriage after her sister spotted her in a K.L. shopping mall and immediately realized that she was pregnant from the way she walked. She confronted Nazriah and asked her ‘how many months?’ to which Nazriah replied ‘how did you know?’. Nazriah’s mother was informed but not the rest of the family, as her mother was too ashamed to tell them that her daughter had got married and pregnant without her knowing; the wider family was only informed about her marriage when Nazriah’s child was delivered. Nazriah agreed to keep her marriage secret at her husband’s request; he wanted to protect his first wife and his prominent position and maintain a monogamous marriage in public. She had initially

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been unsure about whether to accept the situation, but she consented because she felt she needed a husband to secure her and her two children economically; she was also in love with him. Nazriah has been married before, and has two children with her first husband, who she divorced because ‘he was possessed by spirits’– that is, mentally ill. It remains a difficult marital situation for Nazriah. During Hari Raya she was alone with her children, and was very upset because her husband was with his first wife and their family. Her cousin admonished her: ‘That is what happens when you marry a man who already has a family, you have to share and do without him.’

Husband Snatchers ‘There is some specific stigma on second wives because they are seen as “husband snatchers”,’ noted first wife Rashidah. Rokiah agreed: ‘Society has a stigma on second wives, since they are seen as stealing someone else’s husband.’ There is no real stigma attached to the first wife; it is more personal – people might feel sorry for her or angered on her behalf. Their sentiments were widely shared by the women I talked to. In general, how polygamous wives are looked upon depends on their relationship to the observer, for as Kartini pointed out, whether there is stigma attached to polygamy depends on who is looking at it. As such, there appears to be no generalized stigma on second wives in Malaysia; if people do not like a particular second wife, it might be because they know the first wife. Yet if stigma is mentioned, it does tend to focus on second wives, and women may concede that people look down on second wives because they disturb the family of the first wife. A typical comment from women not themselves in a polygamous marriage is ‘I put myself in the first wife’s shoes’, as all monogamously married Malay women may potentially become first wives. A second wife may thus not be accepted in the same way as her husband’s first wife, for women will look upon her as someone who has taken another woman’s husband. Rokiah, commenting on the stigmatization of second wives, explained: ‘The question arises why she has married him; people question her reasons – she could have married a younger man.’ Women tend to consider the first wife the ‘injured party’, and therefore second wives are usually not pitied if they face troubles; they are seen as suffering less, having

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entered the polygamous marriage voluntarily, or so it is usually assumed. Most of the women I knew were either friends with or were themselves first wives, and they tend to revile second wives. This revulsion was often not voiced directly in terms of stigmatization, their comments rather portrayed second wives as ‘bad women’ or ‘husband snatchers’. First wives often harbour strong antipathy towards the woman who ‘snatched’ their husband, and have no wish to have anything to do with her. Time and again I heard stories about the horrible ‘other wife’, how un-wifely, un-feminine, un-everything she was. Divorced women are often seen as typical second wives, as mentioned. Divorcees are considered so desperate to get a husband that they settle for being second wives (Jennaway 2000). They are hence in direct competition for husbands of already married women. Divorced or widowed women might then marry as second wives rather than attempt to find a husband of their own because of the perceived stigma and a widespread view, often shared by divorcees themselves, that their only hope is to marry as second wives. In a typical scenario, Nazriah, a divorcee in her thirties with two children, found it very hard to be a single mother and felt her children needed a father. She wanted to remarry and thought being a second wife was her best option, so she managed to find a wealthy but already married man, and had a secret wedding in Thailand. She accepted being a second wife primarily because she wanted a father for her children, as she recounts it. Such stories feed the gossip mill and generate more narratives about divorced women strategizing to become second wives. First and second wives might both be described as ‘bad women’, depending on where the narrator’s allegiances lay. However, whether a woman is a first or a second wife does generally make a difference in how she is viewed, just as it makes a difference in how she herself views her polygamous status. Gender also makes a great difference, as men and women engaging in polygamous unions are looked upon very differently. Because of the rigorous separation of co-wives typical of Malay polygamy, relations between co-wives are often extremely cool, as mentioned, especially when the second wife starts out secret. First wives might find it beneficial to belittle the second wife in order to portray themselves and their husbands as innocent victims of that other evil woman’s conniving. For second wives, belittling the first wife may be a way of legitimizing their own marriage, by emphasizing how the husband was suffering in his first marriage and had no love for his first wife any more.

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It is nonetheless clear that much of the unacceptability of polygamy revolves around the second wife. The second wife is considered the main ‘culprit’ in polygamous unions, and hence bears the brunt of the stigma associated with polygamy. It has to do with the threat of polygamy, the fear many elite Malay women express that their husband might take a second wife. Since the husband is not usually publically assigned the blame, it must be the fault of the second wife, who lures the husband into her trap and ensnares him. First wives may similarly be seen as the victim of the cunning second wife or indeed the deceiving husband. In effect, all married Malay women in monogamous marriages have the potential of becoming a ‘first wife’, as discussed, and so tend to sympathize with other women who find themselves in that situation. This is a trend reported in polygamous societies cross-culturally, where marriages may potentially become polygamous (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008; Mernissi 1987). Commenting on the ambiguous acceptability of being a second wife, as well as on men and women’s different perspectives on polygamy, Asmah summed matters up: It is difficult to be successful as a second wife, since she has to spend all the time winning over the husband from the other wife. She might succeed but people will always see her as the second wife; she is not accorded the same dignity as the first wife. There is some stigma and she might feel inferior; she is looked at as someone who takes another woman’s husband. It is mostly other women who look at her this way; they have the most at stake, since their husbands can do that to them. Men mostly don’t care about polygamy; men are never blamed for doing it – in men’s eyes they don’t see it as a problem.

Men are thus not stigmatized in polygamous unions in Malaysia, quite the contrary. Among urban Malay elites, polygamy may be taking on a prestige function that moves beyond its economic or political functions; display of wealth and conspicuous consumption may be a crucial aspect of modern urban polygamy, as mentioned. The apparent paradox that a secret second marriage can confer prestige on the husband is not paradoxical in the sense that such marriages are usually open secrets. The husband’s peers will most likely know of the marriage. It may be a case of prestige being gained in small circles of powerful people who are ‘in the know’ about each other’s positions and possessions, including second wives. Prestige polygamy in contemporary Malaysia no longer stems primarily from public polygamy as practised by traditional Malay

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upper classes. It has been joined by a new urban and often secret polygamy as practised by the new upper middle classes. The practice of keeping secret second wives instead of practising public polygamy may represent some elite Malay men’s attempts to embody global monogamous mores of urban life. Elite women, typically first wives, do not generally accept polygamy, and may disapprove of both secret and public forms, which from their perspective are often indistinguishable. Men thus have good reason to keep their secret polygamy hidden and ambiguous. The ambiguous nature of secret polygamy also makes it easier to manipulate, allowing both men and women to claim one sort of relationship on one occasion, and another relationship on another occasion, to suit their needs. While secret wives may benefit from the arrangements to a certain degree, Malay men’s attempt to combine monogamy with polygamy has nonetheless negatively impacted many elite Malay marriages. Husbands and wives’ conflicting conceptions of what modern marriage entails stems from the continuous tension between monogamous and polygamous ideals in Malay society, a tension which is intensely gendered. As such, social reproduction through polygamy reflects particular needs of contemporary elite Malay men concerned about becoming or remaining elite. Simultaneously, it allows men to address certain shortcomings that their first wives may be considered to have – being too prominent or not prominent enough, for example. As such, polygamy can be used to create a powerful elite image – men can demonstrate that they have enough wealth and power to have different women serving different needs, and they can generate the status and prestige in being able to display this wealth and power in such a conspicuous way.

‘Third Wife Syndrome’ A story widely discussed among the women I knew was of ‘one of the first Malays to become super rich’, who was married to a Malay first wife, ‘one of those who had met her husband in university and married him there’ as well as to a Chinese second wife. As Rashidah put it: ‘There were few problems between the two wives, since the first accepted the situation in the typical Malay way, whereas the second did not bother the first wife, since she had taken her husband.’ The husband then married a third wife, however, upsetting the balance between the co-wives. The second wife, as the story

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goes, proceeded to assault the third wife to try to oust her. The only effect of this violence was that the husband divorced his second wife and now lives abroad with his third wife. In such cases, violence between wives in their competition over the husband and his favours may ultimately achieve the opposite of what the instigator(s) planned for. A subtext running through this theme of violence between cowives is the ethnic element of polygamy narratives in Malaysia, discussed below. Chinese co-wives are seen as particularly prone to violence by Malay women. As Maznah put it: ‘Chinese women will fight to the death to keep what they feel is theirs, even when they have taken their husband from another wife.’ As with many ethnic stereotypes, the claims may have more to do with appeasing Malay sensitivities than reflecting actual realities. It is difficult to gather concrete evidence on women-to-women violence in relation to polygamy; some stories may be urban polygamy legends. Another intriguing subtext that runs through women’s descriptions of co-wives’ conflict-ridden relations to each other is what my interlocutors called the ‘third wife syndrome’. The ‘third wife syndrome’ is when the first wife will encourage her husband to marry a third wife in order to get back at the second wife who hurt her and took her husband. Hence, Rashidah has been urged by her sister to encourage her husband to take a third wife, now that he is unhappy with his second wife, as revenge over her for wrecking Rashidah’s marriage. Belief in the reality of a ‘third wife syndrome’ appears to be widespread, regardless of whether it ever moves beyond a narrative of polygamy. It is seen as proof of the first wife’s inner hurt, her feeling of betrayal and bewilderment when her husband married a second, perhaps secret, wife. Not all women subscribe to the story; Katijah, very pragmatically, found it a rather unlikely scenario because there would then be even less assets from the husband to go around among all wives. When a husband does take a third wife, a form of ‘third wife syndrome’ may actually apply in co-wives’ relations to each other, however. Typically, women would describe how ‘the first and third wife get along fine, but the second one is the common enemy, she gets ignored when they see her’. Fauziah explained that the reason why the first and third wife stick together is that by the time the third wife arrives on the scene, the first wife is not so hurt anymore and may already have accepted the situation. So she might gang up on the second rival with the new third wife. A ‘third wife syndrome’ thus seems to exist among certain co-wives, irrespective

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of whether the husband was encouraged to marry the third wife by his first wife. As Clignet (1970: 31) notes of African polygamy: ‘since three is conducive to the formation of coalitions, four is considered the optimal number of co-wives.’ The notion of a ‘third wife syndrome’ illustrates that tensions in polygamous marriages are not just products of individual maladjustments, but also of the co-wives’ internal hierarchy. Co-wives’ position within the household hierarchy, their internal ‘ranking’, is one of the most salient features of co-wife relations in polygynous systems cross-culturally (Al-Krenawi, Graham and Izzeldin 2001; Al-Krenawi, Slonim-Nevo and Yuval-Shani 2008). A polygynous wife’s ranking determines how she relates to her husband and to the other wives, as well as typically dictates her specific rights and obligations in the household. The most common way wives are ranked within a household is by order of marriage to their common husband, with the one married to him the longest becoming the senior wife. A wife’s rank may also be based on her achievements in the household, or her husband’s preferences. There might be significant status differences between senior and junior wives, and high rank may entail control over lower- ranking wives. In such systems, senior wives will usually organize and distribute the workload among their co-wives, divide all monetary rewards from the husband, supervise his sleeping rota, and be consulted when the husband wants to take a new wife. They also have greater authority over all children. There will usually be significant age differences between high- and low- ranking wives, reinforcing status differences. Co-wives, depending on their rank, will thus perceive the integration of a new wife into a polygynous household differently. An older high-ranking wife might feel less threatened by the addition of a new young wife than a low-ranking one will, as her position is more secure (Clignet and Sween 1981; Smith 1981 [1953]; Whyte 1980). That second wives may feel more threatened by a new third wife than the first wife is clearly the case in some Malay polygamous unions. It is related not only to the notion of a ‘third wife syndrome’, but also to the fact that second wives tend to be the most reviled part of any polygamous union by women inside and outside the immediate family. They will therefore often have friends who are also second wives, especially if they share some characteristic, such as all actresses or all European, and particularly if they are secret. A second wife may introduce one of her friends to a friend of her husband who is looking for a suitable second wife, and so

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‘second-wife networks’ grow. Through mutual friends in K.L., I met a European woman who had secretly become the second wife of a Malay man after being introduced to him by another European second wife. After I was made aware of the fact, she began to make subtle hints and finally offered outright to arrange for me to marry a friend of her husband, since young European women were always in high demand as particularly prestigious second wives. I gracefully declined her offer on the perfectly acceptable ground that I was already married. As I lived alone in Malaysia without my husband and did not yet have children during the almost two years of my original fieldwork, many assumed I was unmarried and pretended to be married to move about more freely. While the marriage inquiry was a somewhat disconcerting experience on a personal level, especially when it was repeated a second time with another acquaintance, it did reveal some of the subtle workings of urban elite polygamy to me. Whether there are similar ‘first wives’ clubs’ is possible but more doubtful; it is an intensely private matter for many first wives. Shame, depression and perhaps ignorance of their husband’s polygamy might prevent women from talking to other women about their predicament, much less join them in fellowships based on such shared agony. Nor may such clubs be relevant for ‘official’ first wives who accept their husband’s polygamy. First wives may feel some sense of relation to other first wives, including those women who have left a monogamous marriage, as they are now also their ex-husband’s ‘first wife’. Though their marital situation may have been different, the end result may not be that different from the point of view of ‘first wives’ – whether polygamous or monogamous, second wives are now getting a share, perhaps even a lion’s share, of what used to be exclusively theirs.

Malayness The imagined characteristics of subsequent wives that a husband might marry is a topic of great interest to women, especially to first wives, who often struggle to comprehend or accept that their husband marries a second wife. First wife Rashidah, forty-five, highly educated with a high-flying career, claims her husband married a young uneducated Chinese girl as a second wife because he felt threatened by Rashidah’s success and her personal and professional power, even though he has a high-ranking position himself.

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Rashidah and her husband met at university, married immediately after graduation and worked their way up professionally together, a common scenario among urban elites. She considers herself to have been very supportive of her husband’s career while becoming professionally successful in her own right, and she imagined that they had a marriage based on complementarity, a traditional hallmark of Malay marriages. Yet her husband fits the mould of a contemporary Malay polygamist, an affluent upper middle class man, with an often equally accomplished wife, who after fifteen to twenty years of marriage takes a subsequent wife. Rashidah narrates her story not only within a power framework but also within an ethnic framework. It is significant to her story that her husband married a Chinese second wife. If real stigma is to be found in polygamy, it may revolve around ethnicity. When elite Malay women narrate polygamy, it is often with a strong ethnic undertone. As in all other aspects of Malaysian lives, ethnicity is pivotal in polygamy. When women told stories of polygamous loves and lives, ethnicity is often interwoven into the very fabric of the narratives. Such ethnic undertones partly stem from clearly drawn ethnic lines in polygamy; polygamy is considered a Malay practice. It is through Islam that a man is granted the right to marry several wives, and as being Muslim in Malaysia is typically considered synonymous with being Malay, polygamy is seen as a Malay practice by Malays and non-Malays alike. The close association between polygamy and ethnicity has to do with the formulation of ‘what is a Malay’, an infamous question in the literature on South East Asia (e.g. Barnard 2004; Kahn 1998, 2006; Milner 2008; Mohamad and Aljunied 2011; Nagata 1985, 2011; Shamsul 2001). Under Article 160 of the Malaysian Constitution, a Malay is defined as a person who professes the Muslim religion, habitually speaks Malay and conforms to Malay custom. Malays do not constitute a uniform ethnic group. People who are today classified as Malays have a mixed ethnic heritage as a result of several centuries of dynamic influxes of migrating peoples from neighbouring areas, primarily from what is now Indonesia, and from Indian, Chinese and Arab traders who intermarried and sometimes settled with the local populations in what is now Malaysia. Malay culture is truly hybrid, and not easily territorialized, and Malayness cannot be located in colonial categories of ‘race’ or culture. It has evolved over time from cultural interactions with itinerant traders, settlers and colonialists from the region, wider Asia and Europe (Kahn 2006). The Muslim faith rather

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than a clear ethnic identity binds that vast majority of Malays who self-identify as Muslim together as a group. When Malaysia gained independence from Britain in 1957, the new state took over a well-defined racialized society established under colonial rule, and institutionalized colonial racial identities. A primary legacy of colonialism in Malaysia is indeed the ‘racial’ ideology of the country, which permeates every part of Malaysian life, including interpersonal relations. The primacy of race extends into cultural affiliations, where people are thought to belong to racial cultures and possess immutable cultural identities. Ideas of racial primordialism re-enforce notions that cultural and racial transcendence is to be avoided if interethnic peace and harmony is to be maintained. Vision 2020, aiming to transform Malaysia into a fully developed country, envisioned a united Malaysian nation made up of one bangsa Malaysia, or Malaysian race. Vision 2020 had eight cultural goals in addition to the focus on economic dynamism, including a liberal and tolerant society in which all colours and creeds would be free to practise and profess their customs, cultures and religious beliefs. This bangsa Malaysia multiculturalism has never materialized, and deep racializations continue to fracture Malaysian society (Baker 2008; Goh and Holden 2009; Kahn 1992; Mandal 2004). The Malaysian state uses ‘race’ as an operational category in social and political life, as do scholars and commentators that see Malaysia as primarily constituted by mutually exclusive racial categories: ‘Malays’, ‘Chinese’, ‘Indians’ and ‘Others’. This MCIO racialization has become the ‘common sense’ way through which Malaysians tend to see themselves and their identities. As Mandal (2004: 53) points out, the way ‘race’ as a concept is used in Malaysia, and the contingent racialization process by which ethnic groups are categorized, selectively privileged and marginalized, does not necessarily involve claims of supremacy, violence or repression typically associated with racism; the racial governmentality permeates all of Malaysia with little sustained criticism from its citizens. The Malaysian use of ‘race’ is more akin to the notion of ethnicity, which in scholarly discourse has replaced ‘race’ and its problematic association with biological categorizations of people (Hoffstaedter 2011; Jenkins 2008). For some Malay, racial discourses are exclusive and repressive, particularly when articulated in relation to Islam; as Sloane-White (2014: 33–34) suggests, highly pious Malay Muslim corporate figures may deny that they practise racialism, but their vision of a more Syariah-run and Islamic Malaysia leaves ‘the

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inequities of the NEP’ looking slight in comparison. There would be little room to manoeuver for non-Muslims – that is, non-Malays. In 2016, Malaysia’s population numbered 31.7 million, of which 28.4 million were citizens, roughly divided into 68.6 per cent Malays (‘Bumiputera’), 23.4 per cent Chinese (‘Cina’), 7 per cent Indians (‘India’) and 1 per cent ‘others’ (‘Lain-lain’). Malaysia’s population size has thus more than doubled since 1980, when there were 13.7 million Malaysians.1 The ethnic division established during British colonial times has meant that all people living in Malaysia are assigned to an ethnic group in government records, cementing their ethnic identity regardless of whether they were born in Malaysia or how many generations their families have lived in Malaysia. The Malaysian state has thus retained a colonial emphasis on racial distinctions and maintained detailed ethnic classifications in order to distinguish ‘immigrant’ groups from Malays, or ‘bumiputera’, to assert their primary rights in and to Malaysia. Postcolonial preferential treatment of Malays, which unevenly favoured middle and upper classes, has according to Ong (2006: 80): ‘created the world’s first affirmative action system tied exclusively to ethnicity … [T] his system of ethnicity-based governmentality has come to racialize class formation and naturalize racial differences in the country’. Ethnicity is pivotal in Malaysia not only as a result of migration and colonial history, but because it correlates closely with religion. In Peninsular Malaysia, most Malays adhere to Islam, whereas the indigenous peoples of peninsular Malaysia and Malaysian Borneo, though categorized as bumiputera, are not uniformly Muslim. The ‘Other Bumiputera’ category contains a detailed classification of forty-seven ethnic groups, contrasted to the ‘Malay’ group, which is not subdivided. ‘Other Bumiputera’ adhere to various religions, including Christianity, to which 9.2 per cent of the population professed in 2010. This is reflected in the statistical fact that while Islam is the most widely professed religion in Malaysia with 61.3 per cent, the number of bumiputera was estimated at 67.3 per cent. Chinese mostly adhere to Buddhism, accounting for 19.8 per cent, as well as to Taoism, Confucianism and traditional religions, accounting for 1.3 per cent. Most Indians adhere to Hinduism, accounting for 6.3 per cent; Christian and Muslim minorities exist among Chinese and Indian groups.2 Religion largely coincides with ethnicity in Malaysia, and so tends to reinforce communal divisions. Marriage has generally been endogamous, a pattern reinforced among Malays by the rule that marrying a Malay woman necessitates conversion to Islam. It

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rules out non-Muslim men who are not willing to convert to Islam as marriage partners for Malay women, as discussed. In contemporary Malaysia, intermarriage between Malays and people from other ethnic groups remains challenging due to religious issues, not least with respect to religious upbringing of children and to divorces (Mohamad, Aziz and Chin 2009; Lindenberg 2009).

Polygamy as Ethnic Marker Polygamy has thus emerged as an ethnic marker of Malays in a still deeply racialized Malaysia. The imagined close association between being Muslim and being Malay leads to an association between Malays and polygamy. This both creates and re-enforces the strong ethnic element in polygamy discourses and narratives of Malay polygamy. Daughters of non-Muslims, for example, are often warned against marrying a Malay ‘because he can take more than one wife’. When it happens, the stereotype of the polygamous Malay man is reinforced in non-Malay minds. Yet polygamy is not an exclusive practice of Malays. All major ethnic groups engage in it, as elite Malays are often at pains to point out. However, while it is practised among all groups, it is only officially legal for Muslims in Malaysia. In 1982, the Law Reform (Marriage and Divorce) Act 1976 of Malaysia abolished the practice of polygamy for non-Muslims (Raj, Leng and Shuib 1998: 112). Only Muslim marriages are regulated by the Islamic Family Law in contemporary Malaysia. Lines are now clearly drawn between Muslim and non-Muslim men with respect to their legal right to marry more than one wife, which in the popular Malaysian imagination translates into lines between Malay and non-Malay men. Members of most ethnic groups in Malaysia could and did engage in polygamy before the 1982 implementation of the 1976 Act. Rich Chinese men, for example, customarily had more than one wife. With the advent of the marriage law abolishing polygamy for non-Muslims, the practice did not disappear but simply took another form. As a Chinese man can be married only to one wife legally, he can marry a second ‘outside wife’ by performing a traditional ceremony through which they are married according to customary laws of the Chinese community (Lang and Smart 2002). Muslim couples may do the reverse to keep their second marriage secret, as mentioned – namely, be married by Islamic officials in a religious ceremony, but not go through the community-based

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marriage ritual of the adat ceremony (Stivens 1996: 194), as this would alert the community to their marriage. The notion of informal ‘outside wives’ is common in postcolonial settings where the advent of Christianity or adoption of Westernbased laws during colonial times lead to legal abolition or moral degradation of polygamy in that country. ‘Outside’ marriage may occur when a man marries one woman by statutory law, as well as forms extra-legal domestic and sexual unions with other women. In many urban areas of Africa, for example, such outside marriages are now more common than officially polygamous ones, helping to maintain high polygamy levels, despite a monogamous marriage norm becoming predominant. Though such unions may be considered modern manifestations of polygamy, technically they are not polygamy. Such marriages are not legally recognized by civil authorities, yet there might be social recognition of the unofficial second wife within the spouses’ cultural or religious community, and her marriage to her husband may be solemnized in a communal religious or cultural ceremony. Informal polygamy is thus socially based on the principles of polygamy, but without the transference of legal rights and obligations involved in formal marriage.3 For non-Muslim Malaysian men who want to marry more wives, the question of whether ‘outside wives’ are a form of polygamy or not is, of course, rhetorical. That they de jure cannot marry a second wife may not prevent them from doing it de facto. Legally speaking, then, Muslim and non-Muslim Malaysians have unequal options with regards to official polygamy, yet socially and culturally the differences are less clear – acceptance of polygamy does not necessarily follow ethnic or religious lines. An interesting aspect of polygamy in urban Malaysia is indeed that many of the women who are part of such unions are non-Malay. For example, a pattern claimed to be common among affluent Malay men, and which I did encounter, is a Western first wife, perhaps English or Australian, acquired during the husband’s studies abroad. The second wife is Malay, a concession to local alliances and customs. The third wife is Chinese, a young trophy wife or simply young wife acquired later in life. It is seen as a good system because the ‘Western lady’ may return to her own country; she does not always divorce her husband but just lives separately because ‘she gets tired of the situation’, so the husband only has two or one wife to deal with. In the popular Malay imagination, however, polygamous marriages are often composed of a Malay husband, a Malay first wife and a Chinese second wife. I encountered this constellation numerous

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times. There are several reasons why Chinese women appear to be considered quintessential second wives. One reason has to do with colour. People imagine that Chinese women, with their fair skin, have an advantage. Such imaginings mean that white women were seen by my interlocutors as enjoying particular favour among Malay men. I was often warned that a European wife was the ultimate trophy and that as a young white Danish woman I should be careful about advances from Malay men. One of the reasons I had difficulty interviewing Malay men about polygamy was indeed that my intentions in seeking out elite interlocutors and talking about polygamy could be misunderstood by the men, their wives and the people around us. It forms part of the challenges female ethnographers alone in the field potentially face. A second reason Chinese women are thought to commonly be second wives has to do with religion. While a Muslim man can potentially marry a non-Muslim woman, a Muslim woman can only marry a Muslim man. So a non-Muslim man who wants to marry a Malay woman must convert to Islam first. I was often told that Chinese men typically refuse to convert to Islam if they have Malay girlfriends, whereas Chinese women will convert to Islam and become wives and increasingly second wives of Malay men. There are of course Chinese men who convert to Islam to marry Malay women, but in the popular Malay imagination, they are considered reluctant to do so. In contrast, I would often be told that Chinese women ‘don’t care about religion’, they are seen as readily converting to Islam to get a rich Muslim man. Chinese Malaysians are often heavily stigmatized by Malays (and vice versa); such cultural stereotypes, firmly embedded in Malay public imagination, stem from colonial encoding of people through race, religion and culture, as mentioned (Goh and Holden 2009; Khoo 2009). A third reason has to do with money. Malay women will claim that second wives ‘are always Chinese, because they are so materialistic’. Such statements betray an underlying stigma not only against Chinese people but also against second wives. Chinese women are considered oblivious to what a man is or if he has a family already, as long as he is rich and will provide for them. They ‘grab on and don’t let go’; if they want the man they will get him, as seen from a Malay woman’s perspective. Incidentally, as third wife Salbiah admonished: ‘Many European wives put up with their Malay husband’s philandering and polygamy because they want the position and the money.’ Wanting money at any cost is thus

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not just a Chinese desire, then, though in many Malay minds it is mostly a Chinese desire. There might, of course, be a multitude of reasons beyond looks, religion and money why Malay men marry Chinese women as second wives. Yet Malay women tended to focus on those ethnically linked aspects in their narratives, and ‘the Chinese second wife’ has become one of the dominant narratives of elite polygamy (Bruner 1986). The notion of dominant narratives suggests that there are other, perhaps conflicting stories about typical second wives; clearly not all second wives are Chinese. Yet as the narrative about Chinese second wives becomes widespread, it may suppress, replace or otherwise overshadow alternative stories about typical second wives. In a multicultural and multireligious country like Malaysia, such ethnic claims are not uncommon. It is a version of events that may give affected Malay first wives some comfort, providing them with clear scapegoats, and absolving themselves as well as their husband from blame in entering polygamous unions. Yet it is clear that Malay women are as concerned about potential polygamy in their own or their daughters’ marriages as are non-Muslim parents of daughters who might marry Malay men, so much so that it increasingly influences their perceptions and practices in marriage, as discussed. The fact that non-Muslim men may also engage in informal polygamous unions is not emphasized to the same degree; it is seen as the unfortunate weakness of the individual man rather than as a collective marker. It is only in relation to Malays that is has become the focus of attention, in part because of the present public prominence of polygamy and the subsequent debates and new narratives it has generated. Polygamy receives much attention in contemporary society, yet it has always loomed large in the consciousness of Malays, no matter what its actual prevalence. It has mostly been seen as a burden that a Malay woman must bear and be ready for in marriage. As monogamously married Asmah, fifty-six, recounted, her father encouraged her to get an education before marrying, because he was concerned that she would be left disadvantaged if her husband let her down: ‘Your husband can marry four wives, you will be left with four walls.’

Notes   1. Malaysian population statistics can be found at: https://www.dosm. gov.my/ (accessed 25 May 2017).

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  2. Malaysian population statistics can be found at: https://www.dosm. gov.my/ (accessed 25 May 2017).   3. For a discussion of ‘informal polygyny’ see Bledsoe and Pison (1994) and Koktvedgaard Zeitzen (2008).

Chapter 14

Magic

Zuriah’s Story about Regretting Polygamy Zuriah, forty-two, is a successful career woman turned secret second wife. She liked the arrangement because it gave her room for manoeuver; she could live on her own but still have a man in her life and say to people that she was married. Zuriah sees it as basically incompatible for Malay women to be married and have a big career, because they would be restricted by wifely duties and motherhood, and not be able to concentrate fully on work. Highly successful career-wise and now in her forties, she finally felt able to marry in a sort of crowning glory. She chose polygamous marriage because she believed it would give her more freedom to pursue her career and other interests, while also providing love and sex. After a brief happiness as a second wife, Zuriah’s relationship with her husband deteriorated. They had never officially agreed on how much time her husband should spend with her, a crucial issue when he is publically maintaining a monogamous marriage to his first wife. Zuriah felt neglected by him, a neglect that developed into a complete cessation of relations between them. Zuriah feels her life has been put on hold; she can no longer go out with friends, since she is a ‘married woman’, and she fears social events because ‘my marriage was announced so everybody knows it and will ask where my husband is’. Zuriah’s emotional and physical limits have been reached, and she is taking steps to divorce her husband. Their relationship has suffered, she feels, partly because there were no children born to

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their union. The deterioration of their marriage is hence a double failure, for she has failed in the two areas essential for social adulthood, marriage and motherhood. For Zuriah, the price of marrying as a second wife has been very high. She bitterly regrets it. She regrets it every day as she fights to obtain a divorce in a Syariah court where polygamy is not accepted as grounds for divorce. She regrets it in resigning to the fact that she has ‘lost out’ to her husband’s first family who are ‘powerful’ and use malevolent magic from Indonesia against her. She spends thousands of ringgits protecting herself from her co-wife’s magic attacks, magic attacks that have been actively used to oust Zuriah from her husband’s affection and attention, and cause her pain and sickness.

Polygamy Magic The inherent tensions engendered by polygamy, the emotional minefields sowed with discontent, frustration, sorrow or even hate, make magical practice rife in polygamous unions. Magic becomes a way of dealing with extremely stressful situations where husbands and (co-) wives may be pitted against each other in irreconcilable differences. Magic refers broadly to beliefs and ritual activities involving the manipulation of the material world through supernatural means (Winzeler 1983: 438). It may be used as a last resort when all other options have failed, or it may be used from the onset as a direct and useful way to gain an upper hand in a marriage. It can be used at all stages of polygamy, from courting a potential second wife or an already married man, to making a woman look more beautiful than her co-wife, to trying to get rid of a despised co-wife or husband. Malay magic, according to my interlocutors, may take two primary forms: ilmu putih or white magic, good or benevolent magic that seeks to enhance a person’s own success, or ilmu hitam or black magic, bad or malevolent magic that seeks to curb another person’s success. Sometimes the two intertwine, as when one’s success depends on another’s failure. As Nazriah notes, whether magic is good or bad depends on what motives people use it for. Usual methods include casting spells or using charms as well as placing potions or poisons where the victim will ingest or come in direct contact with them. Most people are quick to point out that if they use magic they always practise the benevolent kind, mostly in the form of ‘protection’, whereas others would use malevolent magic against them.

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Ilmu, according to Winzeler (1983: 438; quoting Winsted 1963), most literally means ‘knowledge’ or ‘science’, and scholars writing on Malay magic in terms of beliefs and rituals generally do not use the concept as directly equitable with ‘magic’. Yet while ilmu may not represent a central notion or coherent domain within Malay culture, the notion of magic is generally implied in the Malay use of the concept, as it was for many of my interlocutors. Some used it; some did not. During my initial stay in K.L., I associated magical practice with rural life as described in the literature, an impression confirmed by people’s scattered reminiscences of magic in their childhood kampung (village) or among rural family members.1 My interlocutors generally denied that magic was practised in K.L. Once I was ‘trusted’, however, everybody seemingly had a story to tell; magic and spirits were all around me. Indeed, according to Zarena, people have much more use for magic in cities because there are so many more things to achieve: In the kampung you might use it to make your padi grow or get the person you want but not much else. In K.L., it happens all the time, everybody uses it, politicians use it to get power, businessmen use it to get money, employees use it to get a promotion, women use it to get a man, wives use it to keep their husbands, women use it to stay young, students use it to get better grades, sportsmen use it to win games, there is always use for it.

People’s ambivalent relationship to magic had mostly to do with their Muslim selves. Islam always figured prominently in people’s discussion of magic. Magical practice was universally described as neither acceptable nor permissible in Islam: ‘because you are not supposed to mix with the other dimension’ as Nazriah phrased it. While magic was considered unequivocally forbidden in Islam, it was acknowledged that many people practise it (Frisk 2009: 103). According to Zarena, it is because Malay culture allows magic and so people find ways of making it acceptable in Islam. Rashidah, for example, suggested that minor things like consulting bomohs (shamans or traditional healers) to get treatment, or taking a ‘mandi air bunga’ (bath of flowers) to wash off bad luck and achieve something in particular, such as a husband or a child, is not magic and therefore permissible in Islam. Rather, it is the active use of it to affect someone else, for example, to retaliate against an enemy, which is forbidden and should be avoided.

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Women stressed the difference between faith and ‘magic, which is like voodoo’; it is using ‘voodoo’ or ilmu hitam (black magic) that is not Islamic. As Katijah explained: ‘You are asking for something from a source other than God, if you want something you must pray to God, if he does not grant it you must not use other ways to obtain it.’ If one is in trouble one should rely on one’s faith. Katijah herself dealt with the magical attacks against her and her business only by praying: ‘If you believe in God, he will take care of you.’ One might seek the help of religious specialists, to ask for certain prayers, but basically one must pray oneself ‘for forty nights’ to address the problem: ‘There are verses to recite in the Qur’an.’ People generally claim that all they do is pray to counteract magic, but may secretly consult bomohs to actively fight off magic or spirit attacks. It relates to the ambiguous status of magic among urban elite Malays. It is officially denied and decried as a relic of rural life, religiously unacceptable, yet seemingly unavoidable and quite useful. Modernity has expanded the domains within which magic is expressed in Malaysia, as Karim (1998: 26) notes, while Islamization has given bomohs more tools and strategies for helping people under magical attack or who are out of balance somehow. Today in K.L., many bomohs promote themselves as Islamic bomohs, deriving their power from Islam rather than from traditional sources such as their ability to manipulate angin (wind) within them to handle various hantu (spirits) that attack their clients. Nazriah therefore considered bomohs in K.L. to be less good and in it for the money, whereas the real ones are found in the kampungs, but city folk do not have access to them. She quickly added, as did most women, that magic is not allowed in Islam: ‘I ask myself “where are people’s religious beliefs when doing this?”’ The women I worked with were generally sceptical of magic, especially of love magic. According to Nazriah: ‘Some people believe in charms, especially in love, they always want to have reasons for certain behaviours, maybe a physical attraction.’ Rokiah commented that if women use love magic on men, it might not be the magic that attracts them but rather the accompanying behaviours that women exhibit to attract them, such as dressing up nicely. No woman, no matter how sceptical, could discount magic completely, however: ‘When people get desperate they may use the dark forces’ as Rokiah pointed out. I was therefore often cautioned that, as Noor phrased it: ‘because of all the magic, whether you believe in it or not, it is always wise not to be unkind to people, since you don’t know what they will do to you’. The source of the

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magical knowledge was often located outside Malaysia, in Thailand or Indonesia, where ‘the power is strong and Malays will go for spells and charms’. For example, Indonesian women are seen as particularly adept at taking care of themselves to keep a husband, through potions and charms, just as Thai women are considered adept at controlling husbands and ousting co-wives through magical means. Much of the magical practice I heard about concerned business and money matters, probably because most of the women I worked with were wealthy and successful career-wise. In this domain, benevolent magic might be aimed at succeeding in one’s business, passing an exam, getting a job, obtaining a promotion or making more money. Malevolent magic might involve actively trying to hurt a rival’s business interests. A common claim was to have been conned out of money or business through magical means. Maznah related how her jewellery business failed after she was ‘mesmerized’ by a lady from Borneo who tricked all the jewellery away from her. Another common claim was that business rivals would use magical means to hurt one’s business or career. Several of the career women I worked with had experienced such direct magical ‘attacks’. A thriving business for bomohs is providing ‘protection’ for the many business people in K.L. who have been exposed to magical attacks from rivals. For Raihana, protection is vital after suffering a year-long spell put on her by ‘a Chinese lady’ who was jealous of her business success. Her symptoms included not feeling like working, being depressed, a strained relationship with her top boss, a hurting body and terrible looks. So she sought help from bomohs, who ‘made her do things’, pray regularly and recite certain verses from the Qur’an. They also went to her office to cleanse it of evil forces, and discovered that someone had put a substance on the office threshold that she crosses every day to continuously affect her. After one year she had enough and quit. A female bomoh, a close family friend, now provides protection in her present business venture through chants, which she has to recite before going to sleep, and through charms. One reason businesswomen may perceive themselves as victims of magic, or themselves use magic to achieve certain aims, is that the more powerful and successful a woman is, the more likely she will be the victim of rumours, often malicious in nature, and accusations of magic. As Sloane (1999: 18) comments, autonomous women in Malay entrepreneurial society induce a certain cultural ambivalence about the true source of their powers, and rumours

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of sorcery may be used to demolish them if they are perceived as too self-serving. Magic thus appears rife among successful businesswomen, whether as victims or agents of magic. Another main area where magic is used in K.L. is in matters of politics and power. K.L. is home to some of the most economically and politically powerful people in Malaysia, the very people who may also practise polygamy. There was consensus that especially politicians ‘use it all the time to get power’. This may involve benevolent magic aimed at being elected to or maintaining office, or increasing one’s power base through promotions or appointments. More malevolent practices include attempting to oust political rivals or achieve personal gain through others’ loss. Jealousy was often cited as a reason why politicians are involved in magic. Such tales of spells and spirit attacks, charms and protection abound in domains of love, power and money. And thus they abound in elite Malay polygamy, where love, power and money flow together in a potent maelstrom of emotion and desire.

Love Spells A main area of magical practice in K.L. indeed concerns love, lust and marriage. There is an endless use for magical assistance in the affairs of the heart, since they can only with difficulty be subjected to any control. It might involve anything from obtaining the favour or attention of a particular person to holding on to a failing marriage. There are benevolent and malevolent kinds of love magic, as well as many ways in which such magic can be procured. Much love magic revolved around polygamy, a domain rife with love and lust, and hence with great potential for conflict and revenge. People may use love magic against partners or co-wives who have incurred their wrath by wrecking their marriages, revenge being a potent driving force for magic. Antagonism between the sexes brought about by polygamy is indeed crystallized in the practice of magic. The notion that people became part of a polygamous union only because they were under the spell of their future spouse when they married is one of the most common themes in polygamy narratives. Otherwise, it is claimed, they would never have voluntarily entered such stressful marriages. Malay co-wife relations are seen as inherently conflictual, and it is generally considered against women’s ‘nature’ to accept a co-wife. Suspicion of magic therefore abounds when people maintain seemingly harmonious

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polygamous unions, particularly if they live peacefully together in the same house, as mentioned. Among Singapore Malays: ‘a woman usually expected her co-wife to hate her, to attempt to poison her, or to secure some means of casting a spell upon her or upon their common husband which would cause him suddenly to take her in abhorrence and neglect or divorce her’ (Djamour 1965: 86). Men may indeed be considered reluctant to marry more than one wife because they fear balo or ‘evil’ (i.e. bad relationships), which can lead to magical attacks. A common claim, typically made by first wives or their friends and relatives, was that women put spells on married men to become their second wives. Particularly if women were divorced, widowed or beyond the normal marriageable age (thirty plus), they were considered desperate enough to use magical means to obtain marriage. Zainab described how the neighbour of a friend, a ‘Siamese woman’, had taken a fancy to her friend’s husband, and so put a spell on him: ‘It was very difficult to remove, as Thai magic is very powerful; Indonesian magic is also very powerful because it is based on “Indian roots”, the Mamak [Tamil Muslims living in South East Asia] use it a lot.’ She explained that oil from a dead person’s chin can be used in this sort of love magic. In broad strokes it involves digging up a corpse and putting a candle under the corpse’s chin; an oil will drip from it, which if you somehow transfer to the person you desire through some kind of bodily contact, you will become irresistible to him. Women who use love magic are often seen as marrying a man for lust, suggesting that in such cases, women take the initiative to marry for their own benefit. Firth (1966 [1943]: 55) similarly reports the claim that a man may take a second wife because she has used a spell to entrap him, but interprets this claim in non-magical terms to be the female equivalent of a man taking an additional wife for a further sexual outlet – as the story about the ‘Siamese woman’ lusting after her married neighbour may suggest. A narrative of women’s active sexuality channelled via magic into marriage with other women’s husbands is a powerful discourse in a cultural setting where women are neither supposed to be sexually aggressive, nor supposed to dabble in un-Islamic magic. It is, tellingly, particularly with regards to love and lust in whatever form that the practice of magic comes up in connection with polygamy. Polygamy narratives abound with stories of second wives bewitching husbands into marriage. Their spells may necessitate that a first wife consults a bomoh to seek an effective counter-charm to a

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second wife’s spell in order to bring the husband back to his senses and make him divorce his new wife (Djamour 1965: 86). In polygamy narratives, magic between female rivals is indeed often aimed at the husband rather than at the other woman/wife. The aim is typically to make the husband dislike, reject or divorce the co-wife, often the first wife. In such narratives, second wives may typically use magical means to make their husband suddenly find his first wife unattractive and reject her. Maznah related how she was under magical attack from her former Indonesian maid, who put a charm on her to make her face look ugly so that her husband Zainuddin would not look at her any more, and instead look at the maid, who charmed herself to look more beautiful. Maznah’s evidence was that during this period people commented that she looked ill when in fact she felt fine. The maid also put a charm on Zainuddin by putting ‘something dirty’ in his food (i.e. menstrual blood) to make him desire her (Stivens 1998: 102). The maid’s attempts to ensnare Zainuddin backfired and failed, however, as he suffered from diarrhoea for a month. In Maznah’s narrative, there was no suggestion that Zainuddin had shown undue interest in the maid and neglected Maznah; inappropriate behaviour was solely blamed on the maid. First wives’ claim that their husband did not really want to marry another wife and only married a second wife because she put a spell on him to ensnare him is a common theme in polygamy narratives. It once again squarely assigns polygamous blame on women, and offers the husband a convenient ‘excuse’ for his behaviour if his first wife complains – women are here narrated as active agents and men as passive victims in polygamy. Magic, spells and spirit attacks thus form pivotal parts of blame discourses in elite Malay polygamy. Magic may also be aimed at women in polygamy, however, sometimes at women’s own instigation. Women keen to become second wives, or first wives keen to keep their husbands to themselves, may attempt to direct some love magic at themselves. Halima explained that a certain kind of magic concerns staying youthful and keeping your appearance beyond your years; it involves applying a thin film of diamond or gold dust under the eyes, then you will look young and beautiful forever. She claimed that many actresses and ‘women who live off their looks’ use it. The danger is that it will be difficult for you to die, because it keeps you artificially young, so it has to be removed before you can die. A friend of her mother was very old, and should have died from old age, but kept looking young and not dying. They called in a bomoh, who recognized that

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she had this procedure done. When he removed the magical matter, she suddenly looked her age and died shortly afterwards. Magic may also be aimed at women in polygamy through the instigation of men. Unhappy second wives would typically claim that their husband had used spells to ensnare them into such stressful marriages; the blame is here reversed, with men as active agents and women as passive victims in polygamy. Salbiah, who married as a third wife ‘for love’, now feels that her husband put a spell on her to make her marry him. She was in a daze, ‘love makes you blind’, as she phrased it, but now that she is out of the daze, she cannot understand why she married him. She has thought of leaving him, but the husband is ‘clever’ and has refused to register the marriage in Selangor where they live, as mentioned. So she cannot get help from the courts, since in effect she is illegally married, or worse, legally unmarried. She also feels that she cannot divorce him because they have a daughter and she is afraid that he might take her child; Salbiah lost her two children to her first husband when she divorced him. For polygamous wives trapped in unhappy marriages, shifting the blame from oneself to having been under a spell when they entered the marriage might provide some relief from otherwise stressful domestic situations with no immediate solution. While attracting co-wives may be the man’s domain, repelling co-wives is primarily women’s. A man can, after all, divorce a troublesome wife, whereas women have fewer options of either leaving an unhappy marriage or getting rid of a rival. Magic spells and charms, then, become an option – either directed at the offending husband or more commonly at co-wives (Jennaway 2000). It revolves around the assignment of blame, and second wives are prime targets, since they are visible sign of polygamy, intruders in the marriage – from the first wives’ perspective. First wives’ use of magic against second wives is often driven by lust for revenge over the marriage ‘wrecker’. Yet first and second wives usually turn to magic for similar ends, primarily to oust their co-wife or obtain their husband’s exclusive attention. Salbiah, before her present marriage, had a short affair with a married man who: ‘was then already on his second wife, the first one was an English lady, but she had been ousted by the second one, who is from Kelantan and used “Thai magic” to control the husband’. When Noor’s brother married a third wife, his second wife resorted to ‘black magic to get at the third one; nasty stuff to physically hurt her and make her sick.’ Her brother has since divorced

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his second wife. Noor herself has never believed much in magic, but points out that victims cannot always tell that they are under the influence of magic. She has given some thought to the possibility that she might become the victim of her husband’s first wife’s jealousy. The first wife has accused Noor of ‘doing something’ to their husband to make him desire her. Noor has therefore told her husband that if she ever acts strangely, he should call her brother, who would know where to take her; her brother experienced polygamy magic first hand in his own marriage and knows ways of addressing it. Magic may be not only an accepted but perhaps even an expected practice in situations of dysfunctional polygamy.

Spirit Attacks Magic thrives among urban elites in modern Malaysia, as people with power and influence attract rivals and enemies, as well as admirers. Powerful and influential people are hence often victims of spirit attacks, according to Halima. Her father holds a powerful public office, which sometimes exposes misconduct; he is therefore the target of people’s vengeful hatred. She vividly remembers once when they were watching TV in the living room, that his white shirt suddenly started to ooze with blood; he tore it off and there was no scar or wound. Blood was only coming out of a single pore. So they took him to his uncle, a powerful bomoh; he saw that her father was under a spirit attack, so he helped him and gave him protection. The next day he and his uncle went to see the man whom they believed had instigated the spirit attack, since he had recently been exposed for fraud; he was very surprised to see her father alive, as the aim of the attack was death. In fact, according to Halima, a lot of people who suffer what doctors say are heart attacks are in fact victims of malevolent magic sent by rivals. Spirits, however, can also be harnessed for protection. Halima’s father’s uncle was very capable in the art of providing ‘protection’ for people or property, and made protections for their house. One night Halima heard the sound of a roaring tiger outside her window, very clearly; she was very scared and screamed, waking her father up, but he could see nothing and said it must have been a dream, since no one else heard it. The next day they could see signs that someone had tried to enter their compound over the fence, and it then became apparent that what she had heard was one of the house ‘protections’, in the form of a tiger spirit. Her father’s

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bomoh uncle had the ability to travel through the air on a wind (angin), with his Hantu Belian or tiger spirit familiar. Sometimes he would say to her father ‘let’s meet at the house, but you go ahead, I will come later’, but when the father arrived he would already be there, having travelled on an angin with his tiger spirit. A tiger spirit can ‘possess’ a shaman to aid him in his work; there are numerous forms of hantu ghosts or spirits, some benevolent and some malevolent (Endicott 1991 [1970]). The bomoh later died without passing on his knowledge; he could not find a successor, as it brings with it huge responsibility, a heavy burden. Halima has thought about it, as she has a special gift to see protection and spirits. It is said, Halima explained, that a middle girl (between two siblings) has a third eye that sees, and she has that gift. She related how on a trip with some colleagues they were sleeping in a hill resort, rumoured to be haunted, so they were all anxious. Very early in the morning she woke up because she heard kompang (wedding drums); she later found out that the spirit world was holding a celebration. There had been an old surau (small Islamic assembly hall), which had been torn down and a new one built. This had angered the spirits, which then haunted the place. When she and her colleagues walked up there in the evening, she could indeed see a jinn (spirit), a white apparition following them up out of the corner of her eye, but did not say anything in case she frightened the others; the next night no one slept at all. Halima has decided that she does not want to use her gift as bomoh, since it is too much of a burden. Yet it gives her access to knowledge about how to seek protection if she is attacked; for example, by the wife of her treacherous fiancé, who had neglected to mention to her that he was already married and was about to trick her into polygamy. Spirit attacks indeed figure prominently in polygamy magic. Zarena related how her father was exposed to a hantu in the form of an evil spirit during a period when he married one of his many girlfriends as his secret second wife, as mentioned. Zarena’s grandmother, who was staying with them at the time, felt the presence of this evil spirit, and proceeded to exorcise it from their house. Zarena explained that she had help from the ‘family guardians which Malays have’. A protective spirit had entered the grandmother to root out the evil spirit attracted by her father’s bad deeds. Such spirit possessions offer ways of addressing difficult domestic situations where direct accusation is not possible, making problems visible in a culturally acceptable manner (Ong 1987). Similarly, narratives of women ‘going mad’ when their husbands marry second

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wives shows parallels to the phenomenon latah, a form of temporary insanity or cognitive disassociation displayed by Malay women frustrated and disempowered in the face of adversity (Kenny 1990), as discussed. Such narratives can, like spirit possessions, help deal with the extreme stress experienced by some women in polygamy; men like Zarena’s father who engage in (secret) polygamy can be the source of dysfunction and intense suffering in the family. The most extreme example of ‘polygamy magic’ I came across was in Zuriah’s marriage, which was also the most troubled polygamous union I encountered. Zuriah believes her husband put a spell on her to make her marry him without him first divorcing his first wife. She has filed for divorce, but not only is obtaining a divorce difficult (see Chapter 15), Zuriah also feels under massive magical attack from her husband’s first wife and her family. They are ‘from a lower group’, as she describes it, and seek to protect their daughter’s marriage at all costs, since her husband supports their whole family: ‘They have spiritual powers, and go to Indonesia to see spirit mediums to gain even greater powers.’ Zuriah moves around in a constant state of vigilance and pays bomohs thousands of ringgits every month to protect her and her apartment against evil influences: ‘They put up charms and chant.’ Zuriah suspects that her husband’s first wife found out about her and then put a charm on their husband to make him forget her – this would explain why she rarely sees him or hears from him. Zuriah tried to break the spell by going to his office so that he could physically see her. Once, after Zuriah had a heated argument with her husband, he walked right into a glass wall instead of the door and got injured, which Zuriah interpreted as a sign of the first wife’s spell on him. Zuriah also feels manipulated by the first wife personally. She gives her severe headaches, which she normally never has, and uses her voice as a vessel to say angry and aggressive things to her husband to break up their relationship. Another effect of the spell was to make her face look ugly so her husband did not recognize her. Zuriah’s descriptions of magical attacks, their aims and means, appear in their narrative form to spring from a conventionalized Malay conceptualization of magic (Endicott 1991 [1970]; Skeat 1967 [1900]). I heard many very similar stories, suggesting an established pattern, at least in love magic. Such was the intensity of magical attacks against Zuriah that she had to undergo an impromptu exorcism during a celebration at a friend’s house, to release a malevolent spirit sent by her cowife and her family. The exorcism started with Zuriah lying on the

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floor, while the female bomoh pressed Zuriah’s forehead several times as well as her toes, all the while speaking intimately to her, chanting, coaxing the spirit. For a while, not much more went on, Zuriah got up and walked around. At some point, she started to feel dizzy, and stretched out on the floor again. The bomoh squatted beside her, reciting over her, deeply concentrated. Zuriah was lying still but with flickering eyes, now going into a trance. The bomoh started to coerce the spirit out, starting from the top of Zuriah’s head, then moved down to her feet again, pulling the ‘spirit-form’ out of Zuriah’s toes.2 It was a very intense experience sitting on the floor directly next to Zuriah, yet initially difficult to decipher, as everybody seemed to ignore the seance. To my one side she was being exorcised, to my other side, a bit off, the karaoke machine was in full session with guests singing their hearts out. Across the very large living room people were eating at a dining table; outside in the front yard people were barbecuing chicken and walking in and out of the house; children were running around playing. Enquiring Zuriah about her wellbeing the next day, she explained that the bomoh could see that she was possessed by a very strong spirit and therefore agreed to help her because she felt immediate action was needed to avoid further danger. The bomoh was able to block out all the party guests and disturbances because her power of concentration was very strong. Zuriah explained that spirits enter people through their toes, which is why toes are the places to check for their presence. One way is to use black pepper corns and apply it to the toes, which will make the spirit talk, since it cannot stand pepper. This way a bomoh can coerce it to say who it is, who sent it and why. Spirits can be sent through the wind, and these winds (angin) move in and out of the body through the head and feet. This is why the bomoh had to manipulate Zuriah’s head and toes, to coax the spirit to talk. The malevolent spirit that had attacked Zuriah had travelled on a wind to possess her body, at the behest of her co-wife and her family. It is said, Zuriah added, that it does not work across oceans, so if you are abroad you are safe. Zuriah had experienced a magical attack while abroad on business, however, so she was not quite convinced that spirits could not travel on winds across oceans. Zuriah now feels clear of the danger, for after the exorcism she went to the bomoh for seven days: ‘She monitored my veins, and took out the evil influence, now I can think straight again.’ Zuriah’s belief that she was possessed, and her subsequent release from this possession, may have offered her a way of dealing with her very

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stressful marital situation. Magical possession shifts the blame for the failure of her marriage away from herself. It enabled Zuriah to ignore the fact that she had been abandoned by her husband, and instead see herself as the victim of the first wife’s jealousy. It might be a coping strategy for some distraught and desperate wives trapped in deeply unhappy polygamous marriages.

Notes   1. For studies of Malay magic, see, for example, Endicott (1991 [1970]), Gimlette (1991 [1915]) and Winzeler (1983).  2. See Kessler (1977) or Laderman (1991) for fuller descriptions of Malay exorcisms.

Chapter 15

Divorce

Maznah’s Story about Ending Polygamy Maznah, fifty-six, is now monogamously married, but was previously a first wife. Her mother pressured her into her first marriage at seventeen, because her husband’s family was very powerful, and she dared not say no. She had three children by him, and their marriage was good in the early years. Later on he became a playboy, seeing other women and maintaining mistresses, and finally married a Chinese lady as his second wife. What made Maznah leave him was not his polygamous marriage, although she was very unhappy about it, but rather his abuse; he would sometimes strike her. As Maznah was having more and more trouble in her first marriage, an old Malay lady who knew her family came and offered her advice on where to go and what to do and which bomohs to consult in order to get her husband back and oust the other women. Maznah wondered why this lady was involved with such things, because ‘she was an “upper class Malay” who knew all sorts of people, and at the same time highly educated and rational’. She did not take her advice, preferring instead to divorce her husband. In her present marriage and in her business ventures, however, Maznah has been under magical attack a number of times, and following the old lady’s advice, she has flown back to her home state several times to consult ‘holy men’ about precautions, protections and cures.

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Maznah’s divorce from her first husband was ‘easy because in [her home state] there are more grounds than in Selangor’, where she now lives. She could not use as grounds that her husband had taken a second wife, since that is legal, so she cited the abuse and was granted a divorce. She renounced all money from him, although he wanted to give her some, since he still wanted to be married to her; if she had accepted the money, she could technically still be married to him. Maznah reluctantly agreed that her husband should keep their three children. She felt they would be better off with him; she ‘could not take care of their educational needs’ as well as their father’s family. Her own father had passed away, and could hence not help her. She had very little access to her children as they grew up, but she has re-established contact with them as adults.

Polygamous Divorces When magic fails, divorce is the ultimate option for ending unhappy polygamous marriages. In Malaysia, polygamy is commonly expected to lead to divorce, usually when economic support or emotions become problematic, though it is unclear whether more husbands than wives, or more first than second wives, seek divorce because of polygamy (Hassan and Cederroth 1997; Mohamad 2011). Among the women I worked with, and heard about, few first wives appear to divorce their husbands, despite their often traumatic experiences; for some, polygamy may be preferable to divorce (Abdullah, Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015: 143). My interlocutors, including Maznah and Fauziah, who were themselves divorced first wives, generally agreed that many (elite) first wives in K.L. did not want to divorce their husbands. Some elite women in polygamous marriages do of course attempt to obtain a divorce because they find polygamy unacceptable or because their polygamous marriages do not function. They face all the same personal, procedural, economic and social obstacles to divorce that monogamous wives face. They also face problems particular to polygamous unions. Zuriah feels she has to beg her husband for a divorce, ‘since I cannot just get one’. Her problems in obtaining a divorce move beyond a reluctant husband, however. She faces the major procedural complication of having had a civil marriage abroad, which requires termination without her husband’s cooperation. Her husband did not register the marriage in Malaysia ‘to make it harder for me to get a divorce’. So she is

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attempting to register the marriage with the Syariah court in K.L. to make it ‘valid’ and ensure a ‘Muslim divorce’; this marriage would then require termination as well. Zuriah’s problems are shared by many of the women who secretly marry as second wives abroad or out of state. A marriage that is not approved and registered in one’s state of residence is not legal, as discussed, making divorce in polygamous marriages a double jeopardy for many women. It may pit various law systems and legal cultures against each other and women are caught in between. In principle, ending a marriage through divorce is the prerogative of a Muslim man; he only needs to proclaim to his wife that he wishes to divorce her – saying the talaq. Malay men hence traditionally had easy access to divorce. After the new Islamic Family Law was implemented in 1984, Malay divorce rates fell, because men can no longer simply talaq their wives but must pronounce it in court and file an application (Karim 1991). IFL (FT), Part IX: Penalties, Section 124, on Divorce outside Court and without Court’s permission, states that ‘Any man who divorces his wife by the pronouncement of talaq in any form outside the Court and without the permission of the Court commits an offence and shall be punished with a fine not exceeding one thousand ringgit or with an imprisonment not exceeding six months or both.’ A woman can apply for a dissolution of her marriage, but must go through judicial orders based on specific conditions or grounds provided by the IFL (Endut 2015: 277). Malay women have several options in principle when seeking to obtain a divorce, but various procedural obstacles and perceived male-biased courts can make the road to divorce long and torturous for women. Firstly, the IFL (FT), Part V: Dissolution of Marriage, Section 47, on Divorce by talaq or by order, states that a wife (or husband) who desires a divorce shall present an application to the court accompanied by an iqrar (statutory declaration) containing particulars of the marriage history etc., as well as statements regarding reasons for desiring divorce, steps taken towards reconciliation and agreements regarding maintenance etc. Secondly, a woman can apply to have her marriage annulled by the Syariah court. Section 52, on Order for dissolution of marriage or fasakh, states that a woman (or man) married in accordance with Hukum Syarak shall be entitled to obtain a fasakh based on several grounds, including a husband’s failure to provide maintenance for his wife for three months, as well as ‘that the husband or wife has failed to perform, without reasonable cause, his or her … marital obligations (nafkah batin) for a period of one year’, and that the husband or

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wife treats him or her with cruelty, which might include physical assault, forcing a woman to lead an immoral life or obstructing the observance of religious obligations or practice. Polygamy can be cited as grounds for divorce, but only if the marriage is not accepted by the court. Women cannot get a divorce simply because of polygamy, even if they strongly object to it and are involuntarily or secretly drawn into it. However, among the ‘cruelty’ grounds in Section 52 of the IFL (FT) for obtaining a fasakh divorce, it can be obtained if a husband who has more than one wife does not treat her equitably in accordance with the requirement of the Hukum Syarak. Women in polygamous marriages may find it very hard to use this as grounds, however, since it would require proof and witnesses, which may be difficult to come by. It would also be handled by Syariah courts, which from a women’s perspective give men permission to marry polygamously, seemingly without them having to establish to the Court’s satisfaction that they can treat all their present and future wives equitably. Not being compatible is not admissible grounds, even though a main reason why Malay women choose to divorce their husbands is personal incompatibility (Hassan and Cederroth 1997). It took Katijah’s cousin five years to get a divorce, because her husband did not want it. At the end the kadi asked her husband to divorce her on humanitarian grounds. The court can pronounce a divorce for a woman without adequate proper grounds if counselling fails, in effect taking over the powers of the husband. As Zuriah pointed out: ‘If you do not love a man, it is torture in your heart to be with him. The courts might grant you divorce if you can somehow prove that.’ It is generally considered contemptible for a husband to hold a wife against her will, and traditionally, husbands reluctant to pronounce the talaq could be goaded into doing so by their wives shaming and insulting them in public. Such tactics were driven by women’s difficulties in obtaining divorce from husbands unwilling to grant it (Banks 1983; Djamour 1965; Karim 1991). It is less likely to occur among K.L. elites. For a woman, the first step in initiating divorce proceedings is usually to go to the Syariah court. Once an application for divorce has been filed, her husband is called in for counselling, and there will be consultations between the spouses. However, the courts are considered to make it very difficult for women to get a divorce; it is very time-consuming, ‘because you have to go through so much counselling first’, according to my interlocutors. The problem is compounded by the number of men counsellors far exceeding

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women counsellors, and by the fact that until recently there were no female Syariah judges. Syariah courts were hence seen by most women as being gender-biased and working for men only, since male judges are thought to be more inclined to take men’s needs into consideration than women’s (Endut 2015; Foley 2004; Karim 2009; Stiles 2009). In 2010, the first two female Syariah judges were appointed in Malaysia, to serve in Syariah courts in federal territories. Initially they were not allowed to judge in divorce (and certain other) cases, but partly following on from a public debate, they were given full powers on par with male Syariah judges, in principle if not in practice (Endut 2015: 287–88). Women thus do have access to divorce under the IFL (FT), yet they are hindered by a low level of knowledge about divorce laws and marriage rights under Islamic law. To address this problem, the IFL (FT) has become part of K.L. premarital courses, required of all Muslims about to get married (Hassan and Cederroth 1997; Peletz 2002). Lack of knowledge about their rights might be less of a problem among the well-educated women I worked with, but their rights may not be claimed due to various obstacles and especially procedural barriers.

Economic Obstacles Economic deterrents to divorce are generally not strong, especially among the well-to-do elites, because women can rely on their close kin for support after divorce, whether or not they approve of it. This has traditionally meant high divorce rates among Malays (Djamour 1965; Firth 1966 [1943]; Hassan and Cederroth 1997; Rudie 1994). Not all elite women who live in K.L. have familial networks to fall back on in case of divorce, however; they may be alone in the city if they have come from rural kampungs and have achieved an affluent lifestyle through marriage. If they divorce their wealthy husband, they risk losing everything. If a woman has her own source of income through work or inheritance, she may be completely independent of her family, and can decide on divorce without involving family. As Rokiah succinctly put it: ‘If you have no money you must stay married, so it is important for a woman to be financially independent.’ Financial independence may help women gain divorce from their husbands, for as Aminah explains: ‘It helps if you have money, since you can then pay back the money you got in pemberian [bridewealth] to the husband.’

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There are two forms of marriage payments from the groom to the bride at Malay marriage solemnizations or nikah. Mas kahwin (‘wedding gold’) is money meant as a consummation of the marriage and belongs entirely to the wife. She is not supposed to use it for household expenses, because if she inadvertently uses it to buy food, her husband would be ‘eating’ the money and that is haram – forbidden. Pemberian (bridewealth) is negotiated between the two families, and may run into thousands of ringgits or more among upper class families. Paying back marriage payments is one way a woman can seek to be released from her marriage. It allows a woman (who can afford it) to redeem her freedom by so-called ‘tebus talaq’, in effect exchanging money or assets for a divorce pronouncement. The IFL (FT), Part V, Section 49 on Khul divorce or cerai tebus talaq, states: ‘Where the husband does not agree to voluntarily pronounce a talaq, but the parties agree to a divorce by redemption or cerai tebus talaq, the Court shall, after the amount of the payment of tebus talaq is agreed upon by the parties, cause the husband to pronounce a divorce by redemption, and such a divorce is ba-in sughra or irrevocable.’ Aminah’s cousin, who was desperate to get divorced so she could marry another man, gave up her house to her husband to secure a divorce from him. The women I worked with would all be able to take care of themselves financially in case of divorce, yet economic concerns were nonetheless major reasons for elite Malay women not to seek divorce from their husbands. A major economic obstacle is nafkah or maintenance, defined as shelter, food and clothing. As Halima pointed out: ‘If women get divorced there is no guarantee of support; even though the judge orders it, it will usually never be given or enforced, so if they remain married they are more sure of support.’ Nazriah’s first husband pays neither alimony, ‘one does not have to in Islam’ according to Nazriah, nor child support, as none was awarded to Nazriah by the Syariah judge upon her divorce. This lack of financial support from her first husband precipitated Nazriah’s marriage as a second wife to her present husband, as a way to secure herself and her children financially. If maintenance payments were strictly enforced, divorce would probably become far more difficult on a practical level (Hassan and Cederroth 1997; Kuchiba, Tsubouchi and Maeda 1979; Mohamad and Shuib 2011). Judges may award some maintenance to women seeking divorce, especially if there are small children, yet with little chance of courts enforcing such maintenance rulings, a woman’s decision regarding divorce often ends up depending on whether she feels

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she can survive without financial assistance from her former husband (Abdullah, Abdullah and Ferdousi 2015; Mohamad 2011). Economic concerns clearly influence elite first wives’ decisions to remain in dysfunctional polygamous marriages, for as Maznah phrased it: ‘If the basis of their marriage is creature comforts, it may be enough for some women who have fallen out of love with their husbands and don’t care if they marry someone else; they just want to retain a luxury lifestyle.’ First wives’ concerns about divorce move beyond economic maintenance and standard of living, however. What I found was an anger that second wives should reap all the benefits of prominent husbands’ social and economic position if the first wife just bowed out. This determination to keep what they felt was theirs kept some first wives in marriages. As Katijah pointed out: If a man marries a second wife, women may feel they have gone a long way together with their men, built up the men, so they don’t want to divorce them and make some other woman get the benefit. Status is important for many women; for example, titles. Why should they lose their title and the second wife gets the title?

This explanation is partly age-driven, for women see themselves as having invested many years in a marriage. Among young people, divorce might be more closely linked to polygamy. According to Aminah: ‘Today, polygamy is less accepted among young men, it is also an economic question; it is too expensive to pay for several wives, so they will probably divorce the first wife before marrying the second. Young women also tend to accept polygamy less; they would rather divorce him first.’ The likelihood that divorce follows upon polygamy might thus be age-related to a certain degree. Younger women who believe they can remarry and have the means to support themselves may be more likely to divorce their husbands if they do not approve of his polygamy. Older women who may not believe that they can remarry or support themselves may stay in a polygamous union because they do not want to lose the financial and social security they have been enjoying. It may also be related to the changes in Malay attitudes to marriage described earlier, having become more of an individual choice and considered less sacred, less inevitable. A young woman who chooses her own partner because she wants to marry, not because she has to, is less likely to accept her husband behaving solely according to his own whims.

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Young affluent urban women today know that they can build an existence without husbands. Indeed, women have the option of putting a decree in their marriage contract, the so-called ‘satu talaq’, to have the marriage dissolved (with the possibility of reconciliation) if the husband should do something they object to, like marrying a second wife. Section 22 of the IFL (FT) gives room for prescribed particulars and ta’liq/talaq to be entered in the Marriage Register immediately after the solemnization of a marriage. Section 49 of the IFL (FT), Part V, on Divorce under ta’liq or stipulation, states that: ‘A married woman may, if entitled to a divorce in pursuance of the terms of a ta’liq certificate made upon a marriage, apply to the Court to declare that such a divorce has taken place.’ Such forms of prenuptial contract may gain ground among women who do not want to face perhaps years of anguish in obtaining a divorce from recalcitrant husbands. It requires, though, that they feel comfortable negotiating such a ta’liq certificate with their future husband before their marriage, something some women may find very difficult and see as a sign of lack of trust. It should be noted that polygamy might appear less of a threat to young women, not least because their husbands may not yet have achieved the social and economic prominence that would allow or encourage them to marry a second wife. These young women’s perceptions might change once they are middle-aged and maybe face polygamy directly in their own marriages.

Custody of Children Custody of children is a major reason why women, whether elite or not, choose not to divorce their polygamous husbands. In Malay divorces, both parents and their respective kin usually have freedom of access to the children. The traditionally high frequency of Malay divorce means that a large proportion of Malay children are not with one or both biological parents on a daily basis and live with their grandparents or other relatives instead. As a rule, their permanent residence is determined by their own expressed wishes, as the child’s personal happiness and not the convenience of parents is considered paramount (Carsten 1997: 139–40; Kuchiba, Tsubouchi and Maeda 1979: 33–34). When a husband contests a wife’s application for divorce, and counselling does not produce any settlement, the custody of children can become a major issue, however. So much so that many women mention their fear of losing

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their children as a main reason for staying in unhappy marriages (Jennaway 2000). Maznah and Salbiah, both in their fifties, share similar marital histories. They were both married very young into powerful families and had children in their marriages as first and second wives respectively. Both of them divorced their husbands because their polygamous unions were dysfunctional; both had to give up any economic claims towards their husband; and more traumatically, both had to give up their children in order to secure a divorce. They both later remarried and had children. Their divorces were very different, however. Maznah chose herself to divorce her first husband because he abused her and had other women; in her home state, divorce was less cumbersome to obtain than in K.L. She accepted that her husband kept their children, because she felt that he could take better care of them financially, and they would grow up in a powerful family. Maznah was allowed little access to her children after the divorce, but has re-established contact with them as adults, as mentioned. In contrast, Salbiah was divorced by her husband because his jealous first wife succeeded in turning him against her. She was thrown out of her home, with no maintenance and without her children, and barred from ever seeing them again. Sadly, Salbiah has never been able to contact her children from her first marriage again. At the time, she felt she had few options of seeking justice, because her husband was unwilling to settle a divorce amicably, and he had a powerful family to back him up. Today, women are better able to seek information about their rights in Syariah law, online for example,1 and Salbiah might have had more options for contesting the divorce or securing access to her children. This does not mean that women actually seek out and act on such information. Stories such as Salbiah’s make other women think twice before initiating divorce; they fuel women’s fears that they may lose their children if they divorce their husbands. Salbiah is thus reluctant to seek a divorce from her present husband precisely because she is afraid of losing her young daughter if he gets custody of her; so she lingers as his third wife in a loveless marriage. The same fear may incidentally fuel some men’s decision to divorce their second wife when their first wives do not approve of the polygamy. They fear losing if not custody of the children then their love and respect; Zarena’s mother used his fear of losing the love and respect of his children when she pressured Zarena’s father to divorce his secret second wife.

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In Malaysia fathers are not automatically granted custody of children. Women generally do not trust the courts in matters of divorce, however, because of the perceived male bias, as discussed above. A bias that becomes all the more apparent if the husband is a powerful and influential member of the Malay elites. Such men are seen as getting much more lenient treatment than ordinary men by the courts. Women are also concerned that husbands can take the children with little fear of punishment. At present, if a wife gets custody in one state, her husband can take the children to another state, which will not enforce the custody order of the first state. Various federal and state departments have for several years worked on streamlining Syariah laws in order to have one law in all of Malaysia, which would allow different states to implement rulings from other states. It is a controversial move, as it is seen by some as the governing elites’ attempt to break state sultans’ control over religion, established during colonial rule, since they would no longer have a final say in religious matters in their states. There is hence strong resistance against streamlining Syariah laws from rulers (who are often polygamous) and from religious leaders and conservative Malay nationalists keen to preserve the constitutionally enshrined protection of Malay sultanates (Baker 2008; Nagata 1997; Shamsul 1999). In polygamy narratives, it is a common theme that women stay in polygamous families for their children’s sake, even if they suffer in the marriage. Zainab related the story of a friend who could not accept that her husband wanted to marry his mistress, so when he married her out of state, Zainab’s friend got a divorce granted from court. The youngest son, who was very attached to his father but was away at school in England, had a nervous breakdown, however. To Zainab, the moral of the story is that children suffer when their mothers seek divorce. Zainab often talked about her own early marriage as pure hell, yet she remained for her two children’s sake: ‘It was better that one person suffers than three persons suffer.’ Women might of course have a variety of personal reasons for staying in polygamous marriages even if unhappy. There are first wives who still love their husbands and wish to remain their wives. This could be part of the reason why some older women are theoretically willing to accept polygamy if their husbands marry again ‘for the right reasons’, even if they are often not keen on becoming part of a polygamous union. Their acceptance often has to do with their, in their own words, ‘greater understanding of Islam’, as discussed. It might also have to do with the fact that polygamy

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becomes more of a threat or reality for older women as their husbands look for a younger second wife. Another deterrent to divorce was the feeling that polygamy is part of a Malay women’s life, something to be prepared for in marriage. Rokiah reminded me that a woman ‘does not have monopoly on a man; the sooner she realizes that the better’. Many polygamous wives seem to settle into their role even if unhappy about it, resigning to their polygamous fate, as it were (Tiwari 2008). Elite women might also fear the financial and social fall from grace that being without a wealthy and prominent husband might entail, or indeed the loneliness. Several women expressed a fear of ‘being alone’ if they divorced their husband. Katijah explained: ‘If you are not married or divorced, then there will be no one to talk to, no one to share your little problems with, comfort you, give you different ideas.’ First wives like Rashidah know that polygamy can be even more lonely than being divorced, however, as they might not get any attention from their husbands any more and are unable to form new relationships because they are still married. The perception that remarriage is implausible for a middle-aged divorcee seems to be a further strong reason why some older wives stay in polygamous marriages. Rokiah felt that sharing a husband might be less difficult for an older wife: You would be too lonely if you got divorced, so it is better to share your husband with a second wife. … When women get older, it seems that they don’t want sex any more. So if they get divorced or widowed they will not remarry, so they might as well stay married to a man when he marries another woman, for if they don’t want anything from him except that he pays her bills then it is acceptable to her and there is no need for divorce.

Maintaining Status Malay divorce has been described as relatively easy and stigma-free (e.g. Rudie 1994). The reality I encountered among urban elite Malays was quite different. There are differences between the various states’ legal provisions for divorce in the Islamic Family Laws, and how they are administered by Syariah courts. Yet few women would claim divorce to be ‘easy’ for women in a male-dominated Islamic legal system, or that it was stigma-free. Noor, herself a former divorcee, felt there was no stigma attached to divorcees: ‘It is

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normal’, so ‘when women see divorced wives as stigmatized it is their personal beliefs, not a general belief in the population.’ Yet my interlocutors generally felt that there was some stigma in divorce. As Asmah explained: ‘Divorced women are called “mak janda” [divorcees or widows]. It is not so much degrading but it is considered bad; the community looks down on such women.’ Aminah explained that it ‘does not look good for women to be divorced, especially if twice or more’, because women who could not keep two or more husbands must have serious defects, and their reputation would suffer. One reason divorcees are stigmatized is that women are typically blamed for the marital break-up. If a woman walks out on her husband she is seen as a failure as a wife, and so a divorced woman is looked upon as someone who has failed, someone who ‘can’t take care of her husband’. A man may also be seen as a failure if he walks out on his wife, but generally, women are blamed (Djamour 1965; Hassan and Cederroth 1997; Peletz 2002), as with polygamy. As Aminah noted: ‘Often it is women’s own attitude to divorce rather than society’s, since to be known as a divorcee is worse for women than for men; they feel they are failures – they failed to make their marriage work and do not want to make it public and admit that their marriage had trouble.’ An often repeated explanation for why divorced women are stigmatized is that they are seen as ‘loose’, ‘available’, ‘easy’ women. Other women may consider them ‘husband snatchers’, as mentioned. Consequently, divorcees might be shunned by married women who are scared that they will take their husbands. Rokiah describes how women may be suspicious of divorcees when they go to functions alone: ‘Divorced women are generally considered bad and “dangerous” by other women, who think they will take their husbands, especially if they are still young.’ As a result, women may not help each other; they may not support each other, as many women are wary of helping divorced friends for fear that they will poach their husbands. According to Kartini, married women feel intimidated and jealous because they see divorced women as women on the prowl; if they are used to a certain lavish lifestyle they might need another man to take care of them. Therefore, according to Aisyah: ‘If a divorced woman is independent, if she can take care of herself; for example, if she has her own firm, then there is not so much stigma’, because she might not be seen as such a threat to other women. Nonetheless, there is widespread suspicion among married women that their husbands might take divorcees as second wives. As Asmah explained:

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Divorced women are considered more clever and experienced, having been married before, and are a bigger threat than unmarried women, in the eyes of other women. They have that look. Divorced women are viewed as a threat in the community because everybody knows each other, it is not just that women fear their husband will marry her as a second wife but the husband might also take advantage of a divorcee, and not marry her.

Some of the stigma attached to divorcees originates among men rather than among women, who might conceivably understand why a wife would leave an unhappy marriage. Many of my interlocutors would describe how divorced women were ‘looked at by men as easy targets’, because ‘Malay men see them as desirable, they are considered more sexually experienced’. According to Salbiah, herself a divorcee who remarried as a third wife: ‘It is the men who think bad things, like such women being “easy”, and not the women, who found it “a natural thing”.’ Divorced women make up a sizable part of second wives, partly explaining why second wives may be stigmatized by other women, or indeed by men. An effect of such a pervasive, cross-gender stigma of divorce is that elite Malay women may be hanging on to unhappy marriages, whether polygamous or not. Elite women anxious that their husbands may secretly marry second wives hence become suspicious of divorcees, who are considered the quintessential second wives. The effect is to stigmatize divorce and divorcees further. This apparent social unacceptability of divorce among urban elites may discourage women from becoming divorcees themselves, and thus potentially reduce divorce numbers. A central reason why divorce has generally been considered easy for Malays to obtain is due to a kinship pattern without a strong extended family system or a cohesive structure to uphold it. This means that marriage is easily dissolved if either spouse does not want to maintain his or her share of tasks and responsibilities (Karim 1992). It may be that urban upper middle and upper class Malays in K.L. and Selangor have never had such easy and stigma-free divorces as those described in the non-elite, rural-based literature from Kelantan and Terengganu (e.g. Rudie 1994). Researchers in both Malaysia and Indonesia have noted that divorce may be seen as more shameful among upper middle and upper classes, and is avoided due to greater potential economic and social fallout; divorce has generally come to be seen as less acceptable and less ‘modern’ than previously among Muslims in South East Asia (Blackburn 2004; Jones 1994; Nurmila 2009; Peletz 1995).

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In K.L., run-of-the-mill divorce cases coming before the judge will be handled in open court for everybody to hear; usually the next cases to be heard will be waiting there. If large sums of money or prominent people are involved in the divorce, it might be held in closed court. Noor had goaded her first husband into divorcing her, because it is much easier when a man files for divorce. They were then called to court to proclaim it together before the judge, but they dreaded going, because it was an open court. So Noor hired a Syariah lawyer, ‘I am willing to pay for that’, to get their case heard in chambers. They succeeded in their quest because of their prominence and legitimate interests in avoiding publicity. Yet details of such prominent divorce cases often slip out in the gossip stream. Syariah court rulings, mostly involving divorce and custody battles over children, regularly spark debate in the media, and are followed avidly by the public when they involve royalty, celebrities or foreigners. Cases involving polygamy are particular public favourites; Malaysian Syariah courts handle a fair number of marital disputes arising out of polygamy (Hassan and Cederroth 1997; Peletz 2002). Such public exposure may further discourage some elite women from seeking divorce. Rashidah has like many first wives remained married despite being deeply hurt and humiliated by her husband taking a secret second wife. She admitted that stigma had some bearing on her not wanting to get divorced, not least because of her children: ‘They often have to fill out forms where it says parents’ marital status, and what shame if they had to write divorced.’ Rashidah grew up believing that ‘marriage was everything’, she would be willing to remain married even if there was no love or no sex; the important thing was to remain married. She nonetheless considers her marriage a failure, and is not interested in ‘resuming’ it; for her it is completely over and has been since her husband devastated her by marrying another wife. After ten years of polygamy, her marital situation has assumed an air of permanency. She copes and does not challenge it, yet: ‘Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine what happened to me would happen: what my husband did, his second marriage – it is the worst nightmare for a Muslim woman.’ Status as a married woman is a pressing reason why elite Malay women like Rashidah choose to remain in unhappy polygamous marriages. According to Aisyah, Malay women may be conditioned into not seeking a divorce, as it is considered bad for a woman to initiate. The conditioning is so strong that when they are divorced and do not get maintenance or other support from their former

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husband they do not fight it. Rashidah indeed feels she cannot divorce her husband because ’marriage is holy’ for Malay women, and therefore, ‘when women ask for a divorce heaven shakes’. Such Islamic discourses on divorce are slowly but steadily replacing Malay adat discourses, which do not revile divorce (Ali 2003). Rashidah stated that she did not want to get divorced until it was absolutely necessary – that is, until she wanted to marry someone else, so she could marry him right away and thus reduce the time she was divorced to a minimum. This was a strategy practised by many women she claimed, and it did form part of many polygamy narratives about divorce. Second wife Zuriah, who is seeking divorce from her husband, initially went through a period of not wanting to proceed, having turned to religion in her anguish. She felt a Muslim woman could not initiate divorce, because ‘it soils the doorstep of heaven’. She would hence not need to do anything until she met another man who wanted to marry her, and he would then help her go through with the divorce: ‘He will walk up the stairs of the Syariah court with me.’

Note   1. There is now a Malaysian Syariah Court web portal at http://www. esyariah.gov.my/ (accessed 27 May 2017).

Conclusion To Be or Not to Be Polygamous

Kartini’s Story about Not Accepting Polygamy Kartini, twenty-nine and unmarried, ‘frowns upon polygamy’, and would not accept it in her marriage. To Kartini, there are no legitimate reasons for a man to take a second wife if his first wife is committed to their marriage, and is a good partner to him. Her parents had a monogamous marriage, but her grandfather had four wives and Kartini’s grandmother was the youngest wife. She explains that it was common at that time among that class of Malays, but in today’s world, she would personally feel betrayed if her husband took another wife: ‘If in a polygamous marriage love is the basis, how can the man then marry someone else which he supposedly loves equally. That is against the purpose of the marriage.’ Polygamy may be acceptable in Islam, but marriage for her is supposed to be a partnership of two equals who love each other. Kartini’s sister-in-law’s brother, ‘who is lower income group’, married a second wife because he felt his first wife did not serve him any more and he felt neglected. For Kartini, he had no good reason to marry a second wife, as his first wife performs her wifely duties by working to make ends meet; he married purely for egoistic reasons, which is not condoned by the Qur’an. To make matters worse, he cannot afford a second wife, and they suffer hardship: ‘His decision was difficult to understand from the outside, because his first wife is beautiful and the second one is big and ugly. … His first wife is out making money to pay the bills so she cannot also be his house slave; the second one just stays home to take care of him.’ Not marrying a woman whom one has relations with as a second wife may create a different set of problems, however. She once

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met one of her uncles with one of his mistresses in a restaurant. She was deeply embarrassed, but he felt no guilt and introduced his mistress to her. He later explained: ‘Once they become wives they start nagging, they demand things, as mistresses they have no rights and they tend to please men more to get things.’ It made her reconsider the common argument that polygamy is preferable to adultery, making ‘honest women’ out of men’s mistresses and preventing sin; clearly, her uncle did not believe in the moral power of polygamy. Nor does she any more.

To Be or Not to Be Polygamous To be or not to be polygamous – that is the question for more and more urban elite Malay women in contemporary Malaysia, or at least so it appeared with the women I worked with. From their many narratives emerged a sense of how profoundly polygamy is impacting longstanding Malay perceptions and patterns of marriage as well as gender relations more generally. Urban elite Malay husbands’ and wives’ often conflicting conceptions of what modern marriage entails have resulted in continuous tension between women’s mostly monogamous ideals and men’s polygamous ideas. In elite women’s narratives I found polygamy’s perceived creation of disequilibrium and inequality to be key aspects of contemporary Malay gender relations, as some Malay men’s attempts to combine monogamy with polygamy negatively impact elite marriages. So why does an institution that according to my interlocutors goes against the grain of Malay marriage by challenging a traditional emphasis on complementary and reciprocity, on ‘like marrying like’, seem to attract more and more elite Malays either in principle or in practice? I am not able to establish conclusively whether or not there has been a statistical increase in polygamy in Malaysia, though there might have been. What I can establish is that among the urban elite Malay women I worked with, the psychological impact of polygamy far outweighs its statistical presence in their lives. The prominence of the idea of polygamy, if not the actuality of it, is profoundly impacting their lives and loves. Traditionally, all Malay marriages were arranged, but there was general consensus among my interlocutors that, although still occurring, few marriages today are arranged, because ‘it is difficult to do in modern times’. Few urban elite women would consent to marry a person unknown to them. This is partly due to young

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people’s contemporary opportunities for meeting and interacting with members of the opposite sex. Most of the older elite women I worked with would also have found arranged marriage inconceivable, however. They were taught to be independent in school and at home by independent mothers or grandmothers. While none of the women I worked with had arranged marriages, some women related how their parents, especially mothers, had forced them to marry their boyfriends. Going out with a man for a long period was seen as compromising a girl’s dignity and her family’s reputation. The transgression requiring them to marry was typically not actual indulgence in prohibited acts, but rather their potential if the relationship continued in non-controllable forms. Malay parents will typically encourage passion to be curbed and both sexes are conditioned into marriage when a serious relationship develops (Karim 1990). Forms of arranged marriages still occur, not least among elites keen to keep social and financial capital intact. Aminah’s sister had an arranged marriage to the son of their mother’s close friend; the son had been told by his mother that he could marry either Aminah or her sister, so he chose her sister, as he found her a more suitable match. This is in some way a classic elite arranged marriage; both families are of similar social and financial status, and the mothers are personal friends. Friendship between families has traditionally been considered an ideal basis for a marriage, often more important than whether the young couple are in love. For Aminah’s sister, a major difference to traditional arranged marriages was that the couple knew each other beforehand, and that communication about the marriage was mostly between the couple rather than their families. Women who were the vanguard of free-choice marriages thus still consider it appropriate to arrange marriages for their children when deemed necessary. ‘Covert arranged marriage’, where parents ‘introduce’ their children in various ways to potential spouses, is also common in urban areas, in lieu of traditional arranged marriages. Asmah, who chose her own husband for love, worries that her children will not marry or will marry the ‘wrong’ partners. As is the case with many other worried mothers: ‘I not so much set up the whole thing but just do the introductions.’ Her various well-planned but so far unsuccessful attempts to set up her son with different girls, often in co-operation with their mothers, made for entertaining stories; she found it somewhat comical herself. At twenty-six and unmarried, Zarena emphasized that she will not follow friends who upon reaching her

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age give in and let their parents find partners for them or at least accept an introduction by parents if they cannot find a suitable partner themselves. She described how one of her friends had requested help from her family: ‘She totally panicked when a report came out that in K.L. there are fifteen women to each man.’ This widespread but statistically false notion of a skewed gender ratio is often used to legitimize and encourage polygamy, as discussed. A woman’s advanced age with regards to an expected marriage age may thus precipitate her (request for an) arranged marriage. Zarena added that ‘such women are usually not highly educated’, showing perhaps that this practice is today associated with rural backwardness by some urban and educated women. Zarena associates love-based marriage with more ‘Westernized, liberated women like herself’, who choose their own spouse based on feelings. She considers marriage less important for Malay women now; they can be independent and stand on their own two feet. Yet marriage may become a necessity for young women like Zarena or Kartini, because no matter how ‘Westernized and liberated’ they have become with respect to testing their compatibility with a partner before marriage, an increasingly orthodox application of Islamic jurisprudence in Malaysia makes it increasingly difficult for a Muslim woman to have a relationship with a man outside of marriage. It makes some women choose polygamy. The increasing public prominence of polygamy in Malaysia depends to a large extent on women’s apparent increased willingness to live in polygamous marriage. Traditionally, being a polygamous wife of a wealthy man would secure a woman a high standard of living as well as assistance for her family. Contemporary forms of urban Malay polygamy may bestow few such traditional benefits on women. For an elite Malay woman to choose polygamy, the advantages would have to outweigh the negative aspects that many of them associate with polygamy today. Elite women may be discouraged by female kin’s or friends’ experiences; they may fear the quarrelling, jealousy and emotional tensions potentially involved in sharing a husband with several women, as well as the higher potential for divorce in polygamous marriage. The success of a polygamous union depends not only on the relationship between a wife and her husband, but also on the relationship between the co-wives, as discussed. A husband-wife relationship might be very good, but the marriage might fail if the wife is unable to accept or function with her co-wives. Tensions and conflicts between cowives are also often considered to lead to accusations and practices

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of magic, which may act as another deterrent for women with respect to polygamy. For many if not most elite Malay women, monogamy may still appear preferable. In discussing reasons and motivations for entering polygamous unions, women will often focus on instrumental or pragmatic motives – to achieve social or economic status, to get children, companionship or sex – rather than expressing a particular personal preference for polygamy. Polygamy can be a pragmatic choice, because it may reflect a freer partner choice and less familial involvement, trends in marriage arrangements associated with the spread of Western notions of individualism, as against Malays’ traditionally more communal identity (Jones 1994). Polygamy can be thought of as expressing such individualism, reflecting increased freedom to choose whether or not to marry – when, with whom, and under what circumstances. Urban elites can choose polygamy as one of several marriage options, a deliberate choice to satisfy particular, individual needs. Spouses can be even become objects of consumption to be used and displayed, as trophy husbands to successful, economically independent women or as trophy second wives to men keen to project a certain image of a modern successful Muslim man. Simultaneously, polygamy is acceptable as a marriage form, an elite form and a Muslim form, satisfying important criteria of personhood and identity in the process. As such, polygamy can be an eminently suitable and very modern marriage form for some urban Malay elites. Reducing polygamy to a lifestyle choice among urban elites does not give credit, however, to the complexity of matrimonial choices made by contemporary Malays. Practising polygamy may also become a profession of faith. Practising polygamy sets Muslim apart from non-Muslim Malaysians, as only Muslims are allowed to practise polygamy in Malaysia. Representing polygamy as a Muslim marriage, and its practice as a profession of faith, is but one of the ways the increasing Islamization of Malaysia is shaping contemporary Malay women’s perception and practice of marriage. The many Malay women now taking Qur’anic classes, and brides-to-be taking premarital courses, may be told by their teachers to accept polygamy as a Muslim institution. Yet being Muslim does not mean accepting polygamy as inevitable, among my interlocutors it was highly contested. While recognizing polygamy as a Muslim institution, the fact that men cannot live up to the conditions stated in the Qur’an invalidates men’s Islamic right to practise polygamy for many elite women. Elite women’s condemnation of polygamy

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is indeed based mostly on their objection to men not following the tenets of Islam when practising polygamy. It offers women a chance to reject polygamy without overtly criticizing Islam. The dominant narrative among my interlocutors was that polygamy was not fully accepted, because men may mismanage it with respect to Islam, and not necessarily because polygamy was considered unacceptable in and of itself. People who maintain harmonious polygamous families are therefore seen as particularly ‘good Muslims’, because they seem able to emulate the Prophet’s marriage. They have attained what only few can aspire to, by engaging in what a contemporary discourse casts as a quintessential Muslim institution and succeeding at it. Elite women who consider polygamy completely unacceptable on a personal level may hence refrain from criticizing it outright – in today’s Islamic climate in Malaysia, condemning an institution identified as a Muslim marriage form may be considered tantamount to criticizing Islam, an unthinkable prospect for most Malays, whether elite women or not. As Aisyah carefully phrased it: ‘Islam allows it, but people read the Qur’an in different ways.’

Polygamy as Muslim Marriage A sense of transformation, a rupture with the past that challenges tradition, is often seen as intrinsic to the experience of modernity, yet it has not dominated Malay roads to modernity. Culture and ideas of cultural difference are constitutive features of modernity, and in its drive to build a modern Muslim Malaysia, the Malaysian state has attempted to define itself in cultural terms, engaging in various projects of ‘culture-building’ alongside its intense promotion of ‘indigenous’ Malay economic elites. The process has placed Malays in a cultural predicament of sorts; while the state promotes cultural transformation of Malays that purges fatalistic and feudalistic Malay values, it simultaneously celebrates Malayness and ‘Malay tradition’ as part of Malay modernity. Cultural subjectivities are central in people’s experience of modernity, and Malay traditional beliefs and practices may be reappraised rather than devalued, and seen as both necessary and desirable to modern life. Modernization is not equated with Westernization, imposed on Malays as part of colonial and postcolonial life, as it is often considered to be. It is embedded in Malay social and cultural forms, an ongoing culturally creative process, incorporating local as well

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as global elements. Many markers of Malay culture are extra-local in origin, and an openness towards new ideas and incorporation of new cultural elements has fundamentally shaped Malay identities and nationalisms (Andaya 1997; Kahn 2001; Mee and Kahn 2012; Roff 1994; Shamsul 2001). The state focus on Malay culture coupled with economic affirmative action has spurred new rich middle and upper middle classes to reinvent ethnic Malay culture, engaging with, but not necessarily incorporating, state discourses on ‘Malay culture’. A dominant strand within this reinvention of culture celebrates ‘feudal’ Malay customs, ‘traditional’ Malay crafts and dress styles, and preserves ethnic differences at societal level. Some of the ‘new rich’ Malays may indeed be aspiring to a feudal aristocratic lifestyle, including the ‘feudal’ custom of polygamy (Brenner 2012; Stivens 1996, 1998). Religious authorities, as professed defenders of the Malay cultural community, re-enforce this ‘re-traditionalization’ of Malay customs as a way to maintain their dominance in formulating proper ethics and cultural behaviour for Malays, particularly women (Hassim 2017). This resurgence of traditions to meet the new challenges of modernity is supported by ruling elites anxious to free up Malay Muslim potential while maintaining Malay identity through indigenous historic and geopolitical traditions. Malays could, in Karim’s (2009: 179) words: ‘like anyone else, be capable of social and economic achievements which are astounding. They could, indirectly, be reproducing those incredible moments in the pre-colonial history of civilization when Islam was a Renaissancelike experience, invigorated with the spirit of the creative sciences, art and existential intellectual activity.’ Such narratives and their concomitant cultural assertiveness herald the preservation and primacy of Malay ethnicity and culture (Kahn 1998, 2003; Nagata 1997; Othman 1994, 1998; Wichelen 2007). The renewed concern with Malay heritage is fuelled not only by the state’s ambition to construct a home-grown Islamic capitalist modernity, it is also fuelled by Islamic revivalism. Malays’ increasing understanding of Islamic identity in a global perspective, through their participation in international Islamic networks and activities, means that there is now a greater focus on practising ‘authentic’ Islam. Some Malays, for whom Malay Islamic identity has largely been expressed through adherence to rituals, outward appearances and behaviour, may suffer theological insecurity and feel religiously disempowered by an often limited Arabic language literacy. They may increasingly regard Malay Islam as peripheral compared

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with Islam from the centre – that is, from the Arab Middle East. In a global Islamic world, Malays may become self-conscious about the authenticity of their syncretic Islamic identity and the relationship between being Malay and being Muslim. This has in turn led to contested interpretations of what constitutes ‘Islamic’ behaviour (Khoo 2009; Milner 2008; Nagata 1997), as well as entanglements between an increasingly prominent publically and privately practised Islam and ethnic identity politics (Hoffstaedter 2011). Malays may then orient themselves towards what they see as ‘authentic’ Islamic culture and lifestyles. Malay religious leaders are likewise attempting to define what is ‘authentic’ Malay Muslim culture, through religious rulings and punishments (Mohamad 2010). Attempts to impose their Islamic vision of Malay-Muslim modernity are particularly apparent with respect to gender norms (Wichelen 2007). Malaysian Islam was traditionally expressed within a liberal adat, tolerant of gender difference and cultural diversity. To religious leaders (and Islamic revivalists), big cities like K.L. are full of potential vice; in particular, large numbers of unmarried working women are seen as representing a moral threat to the community (Ong 1987; Stivens 1998). Religious leaders may thus seek to implement, in accordance with ‘authentic’ Islam, a strict separation between male public and female domestic roles. It is partly done by using non-indigenous Islamic practices to validate increased male authority over women, to counter women’s increased participation and prominence in public life, which is seen as not in line with ‘authentic’ Muslim culture. Religious leaders articulate a globalized, often hyper-masculine discourse, calling for ‘re-traditionalization’ of unruly women to revive feminine virtues of marriage, homemaking and childbearing. It includes accepting polygamy, which may be used as a mechanism to re-localize women within marriage and male control (Blackburn 2004). Ong (1995, 2006) has aptly described what she calls an ‘Arabization’ process by which Malays invent or formulate ‘Islamic’ traditions in their everyday practices, borrowing mostly from Islamic Middle Eastern societies (Kahn 2003). People begin to adapt their Malay Muslim heritage to enact practices from a mythical, homogeneous Arab Islamic past. Muslim feminists have, as discussed, likewise argued that ‘Arabocentric’ readings of Islamic laws following different understandings (and schools) of Islamic jurisprudence increasingly inform religious leaders’ and kadis interpretations and applications of Syariah law. They are ostensibly protecting Malays

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from the temptations of modern society, yet are in practice seeking to formulate ‘proper’ Islamic gender roles and performances that may run counter to Malay adat gender roles. Malays who have an affinity with the moral community of the global Islamic ummah (Muslim community) are not only influenced by Arab Muslim worlds; South and West Asian Muslim sociocultural influences likewise filter into emerging Malay Muslim cultures (Karim 2009). As Middle Eastern and South and West Asian cultures are generally strongly patriarchal, the ‘Arabization’ processes have created and re-enforced divisions between Malay Muslim men and women. As part of this ‘Arabization’ process, some Malays now distinguish sharply between adat and Islam. Adat and Islamic practice represent alternative culturally available solutions, and have traditionally been seen as complementary versions of what is right and proper in local Malay thought. For example, zakat (alms) payments are an Islamic obligation, but their method of payment is regarded as adat (Kling 1997). Islamic revivalists now claim religious purity by not practising adat, which based on its perceived partly Hindu origins may be considered a dilution of ‘proper’ Islam. They believe that Malay Islam must be purged of its assumed pre-Islamic, and thus un-Islamic, elements in their move towards a more ‘authentic’ Islam. Pre-Islamic ‘Hindu-Buddhist survivals’ were generally considered South East Asian Islam’s most distinctive characteristic, though the importance of ‘survivals’ has been questioned (Woodward 1989). Malays often refer to a presumed Hindu origin of adat customs such as sitting in state on a throne (pelamin) during traditional Malay wedding ceremonies (bersanding). Moves towards practising a more ‘proper’ Islam have thus been particularly visible in rites of passage, which are performed according to Muslim rules adapted to local cultural contexts. At weddings, ‘Arabization’ of Malay Islam may mean removing elements such as local dances, music or sitting in state, which are considered not in line with original Islam as it is believed to have been practised in an Islamic Arab past. Among elites, this trend has also caught on, in line with greater pressure to publically display Muslim piety. Yet at an elite wedding I attended a few years ago, music and dancing had reappeared, for as my interlocutor (the bride’s mother) assured me: ‘[A very powerful elite hostess] had it at her daughter’s wedding last month, so I felt it was okay.’ She explained that music and dancing had always been part of Malay wedding celebrations, but less so in recent years because

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of fears it would be perceived as un-Islamic. She was hence very happy to reintroduce it. The great variety of cultural experiences of Islam in South East Asia make attempts to identify clear distinctions between ‘true’ Islam and ‘local’ adat difficult, though this does not prevent ‘religiously correct’ Malay Muslims from attempting to do just that (Ellen 1983; Hefner 2000; Milner 2008; Nagata 1997). The performance and expression of what some consider authentic Muslim identity is very visible in Malaysia; for example, in dress styles, where men commonly wear ‘Middle-Eastern’ rather than Malay clothing (Kahn 2003) (see cover photo). ‘Arabization’ is not a new trend in Malaysia, or in South East Asia; historically, Malay societies have incorporated and adapted a great variety of religious and cultural streams, including Arab Muslim influences. South East Asian Muslim culture already contains a body of Arab tradition: Arabic script and Arabized lexicon and literature, certain modes of dress, a musical and oral culture and a morality and social organization geared to commerce. In the nineteenth and early twentieth century, an influx of Arab traders in the region gave rise to cultural centres that were neither distinctly Arab nor Malay, but rather creole (Mandal 2004: 67). Creolization has a long history in the region; already in the seventeen century it was debated in Javanese courts whether a good Muslim should signal his religious allegiance by following an Arab style of dressing (Andaya 1997: 402). The ‘Arabization’ of Malay Muslim culture, perspectives and practices may have contributed to the prominence of polygamy. Contemporary polygamists can tap into a Muslim discourse by appropriating what is seen as a distinctly Muslim (read Arab) marriage form in a climate of Islamic revivalism among urban, educated elites. Malay polygamy today, as practised by a certain segment of the population, in some ways reflects more of a Middle Eastern than a classic South East Asian phenomenon. Elites may tap into what they believe is an Arab-oriented Muslim lifestyle, in tune with the ‘reinvention’ of Malay culture by the ‘new rich’ urban middle classes. It allows men to unequivocally establish that they are Malay, Muslim and elite, polygamy being a custom traditionally associated with Malay feudal lords and upper classes, and now allowed only for Muslims in Malaysia. Polygamy stands out because it is not what ordinary people typically do, but by tapping into a Muslim discourse it becomes mainstream and acceptable.

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Polygamy and Modernity Modern and premodern Malaysia do not represent two distinct cultural worlds. Modernity’s emancipatory ideals can coexist with cultural institutions, practices and beliefs, which to some people might appear to contradict these ideals, such as polygamy. The notion that modernity would make the ‘traditional’ practice of polygamy disappear has a long history in Western thought. It forms part of a progress-oriented world view and is based on a belief that polygamy subjugates women, and that women’s emancipation, following upon social and economic development, would supposedly eradicate it. Socialist states therefore often banned polygamy as contrary to women’s emancipation and equal rights (Moore 1988). Early Western observers of the non-Western world, such as missionaries and later anthropologists, believed that man’s inevitable progress as a consequence of economic development and its concomitant processes of social and cultural change would destroy traditional customs like polygamy as inconsistent with the modern world. A similar belief is found in many former colonies, where polygamy used to be practised, but where sustained efforts by colonial administrators and Christian missionaries to eradicate such ‘archaic’ (and un-Christian) institutions have made polygamy seem incompatible with modern life, even by local populations (Koktvedgaard Zeitzen 2008). Polygamy, magic and other such ‘dark sides’ of Malay modernity, as some would see it, are hence not manifestations of premodern ‘survivals’, but rather correlates of modernity itself. There may furthermore be, as Kahn (1998: 20) notes, a postmodernization of cultural identities in South East Asia in the sense of an increased focus on a limited set of signifiers of identity, or ‘cultural simulacra’, such as dress or diet, rather than a focus on cultures as ‘ways of life’. One might envision polygamy as a Malay Muslim cultural simulacrum: Malay men may practise polygamy as an authentic Islamic marker, in order to articulate their claims to elite status and Muslim identity. Contemporary Malay polygamy is thus not a traditional cultural ‘survival’ in a modern Malay world; it is a very modern marriage form, albeit with a long local history. The contemporary prominence of polygamy fits uneasily within the Malaysian state’s vision of moderate Muslim modernity, where corporate towers may overshadow mosques in big urban centres like K.L. Ong (2006) argues that Malaysia is largely run by a class of superficially Westernized Malay professionals, who live lives still

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more distant from Malay adat-influenced culture and from ordinary Malay factory or farm workers, and who are more culturally in tune with elites in other countries in the region. Contemporary K.L. is a showcase of modern Islamic capitalism, and according to Ong (2006: 81): ‘outward symbols and forms of Malaysian urban elite culture are shaped more by Madison Avenue and Hollywood than by local culture. … Kuala Lumpur has caught up with Singapore as a city of shopping malls.’ Not all elites are so clearly ‘Western’ in their approach to capitalism; Sloane-White (2014: 29–30) has worked with a group of highly pious Malay Muslim corporate figures, agents of what she terms ‘corporate Islam’. They seek to redefine what it means to be Malay, replacing an ethnic identity with what they argue is a more purely Islamic one. The state is increasingly drawn into such discourses, and, more concretely, draws in urban space in their material Islamization of Malaysia. There is a growing mass of large-scale Turkic- and Arabic-influenced Islamic architecture in Malaysia, particularly visible in the administrative capital Putrajaya (Kahn 1998: 12; Khoo 2009: 114). The Malaysian state has promoted seemingly contradictory secular and Islamic elements in its drive to create an ‘authentic Muslim culture of modernity’. It has, despite increasingly orthodox Islamic discourses presently permeating every aspect of Malaysian life, generally sought to ‘de-feudalize’ Islam in Malaysia and align it with the modern multicultural multireligious world. Polygamy is, as mentioned, seen as a ‘feudal’ custom by many Malays, including members of the ruling elites. Yet unlike in Indonesia, where the state has attempted (yet not necessarily succeeded) to regulate polygamy (Minza 2009), the Malaysian state leaves the regulation of polygamy to religious departments and courts, which thereby become the official arbitrators of polygamy discourses in Malaysia (Mohamad 2010, 2011; Othman, Anwar and Kasim 2005). Today, social media provide a strong forum for polygamy discourses. Such polygamy discourses affect urban elite Malays as all other Malays, and while elites may often ‘transcend’ Malayness through their cosmopolitan lifestyles, they may also incorporate re-traditionalizing narratives of modern Malayness in them. Various Islamic groupings have indeed publically promoted and practised polygamy as a way to strengthen Malay Muslim culture and identity in the face of what is seen as the undermining of Islam by secular and feminist groups. Feminism is considered by some Islamic thinkers and groupings as linked with Western colonialism in its epistemological origins, as colonial powers were seen as

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unduly focused on the subjugation of Muslim women. Approaching the complex and polymorphous gender dynamics in Islam through feminist or women’s rights activism is hence considered by many in Malaysia to be ideologically charged and divisive, as the often strong polemic (and at times more direct confrontation) against Sisters in Islam bear witness to (Ahmed 1992; Foley 2004; Mohamad 1998; Shaikh 2003; Shukri and Owoyemi 2014; Stivens 1998). An at times acerbic rejection of feminist and women’s rights activists’ claims forms part of Islamic discourses casting polygamy as part of Muslim heritage. It may lead husbands to accuse their wives of betraying their Muslim roots if they do not consent to polygamous marriage. Women (and men) may face accusations that they are disavowing Islam if they denounce polygamy, as practising it becomes associated with being devout Muslims. Similar discourses equating a rejection of polygamy with a rejection of Islam and Islamic law are reported in Indonesia (Brenner 2012; Kuypers 1993, in Blackburn 2004: 135; Minza 2009). For some Malays, then, the practice of polygamy may become a Muslim act no longer anchored to a Malay identity or form of marriage. Downprioritizing Malayness and Malay nation-building rests upon an allegiance to a global Muslim community rather than a local Malay one (Milner 2008). For others, polygamy can become a way of expressing allegiance to their version of traditional Malay culture as well as to a modern Islamic identity, which may be perceived as under threat from the encroaching globalizing and secularizing world (Stapa 2016). Polygamy can thus provide Malays with a powerful statement that they are modern Muslims. Being polygamous becomes a marker of religious (and by implication ethnic) distinction (Bourdieu 1992), clearly setting Muslim apart from non-Muslim Malaysians, who are not allowed to engage in polygamy. According to Mernissi (1987: 7), practising ‘anachronistic institutions’ like polygamy may be part of Muslim reactions to Western prejudice against the Muslim world, and elite Malays may find it opportune to ‘reinvent’ Malay Muslim traditions (Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983) as a way to free themselves from their colonial past, which is considered to have suppressed Islamic customs. They can now assert their Muslim identity within a modern global Islamic discourse, tapping into a resurgent global Islam, which has among other things led to a ‘resacralization’, and its associated desecularization, of Malaysian modernity (Hefner 1998; Kahn 2003; Othman 1998; Othman, Anwar and Kasim 2005; Peletz 2013; Stivens 2012). For some elite Malays,

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practising polygamy may form part of a Malay Muslim cultural renaissance, based on principles rooted in what they consider Muslim traditional cultures. Polygamy may have gained public prominence in contemporary Malaysia precisely because for some urban elite Malays it can become a way of expressing allegiance to their version of traditional Malay culture as well as to a modern Islamic identity. My interlocutors’ narratives about Malay men’s false management of polygamy, and the lax way Syariah judges apply laws regulating polygamy, have highlighted how polygamy primarily benefits men in Malaysia. While Islamic revivalism and cultural claims by religious leaders may not be a direct reason for men to engage in polygamy, they may encourage it through their articulation of polygamy as part of a global Islamic masculine order. Polygamy is cast as a quintessential Muslim marriage form, where to accept and practise polygamy is to accept and practise Islam. Contemporary elite Malay men may thus experience little tension between being modern or moderate Muslims and practising polygamy. Katijah, forty-two, provided a little vignette: There are definitely more people practising polygamy now; many have three wives – even bus drivers who cannot afford it. If you go into the central mosque on a Friday and the imam asked everybody with more than one wife to raise their hand they all would; you could put people in camps with two, three or four wives. There would be no man in the group with only one wife!

Among the many concomitants of modernity are changing attitudes and definitions of marriage. In Malaysia, the practise of polygamy was traditionally regulated by a variety of factors such as wealth, prestige and power, which acted as barriers to the number of practitioners. Today, members of the affluent urban middle and upper middle classes pay their way past such barriers and practise polygamy precisely because it represents wealth, prestige and power. In countries where colonialism, revolution or legislation has banned traditional polygamous practices, rapid industrialization and economic growth may bring it back. In China, where polygamy is not permitted, the communist regime seemingly turns a blind eye to the reappearance of the age-old ‘antisocial and unequal’ practice of concubinage in the wake of a burgeoning economy. As in pre-revolutionary days, it serves important prestige purposes for the newly powerful classes in Chinese society (Lang and Smart 2002). The prominence of polygamy among contemporary urban elite Malays

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may hence represent both a reinforcement of a ‘traditional’ elite marriage form as well as a departure from ‘traditional’ Malay marriage. Yet urban elite Malay women’s experiences and perspectives in relation to polygamous marriage, and marriage generally in contemporary Malaysia, are characterized by intense ambiguities. Some of them view polygamy as a backward traditional marriage form oppressing women, in line with common Western perspectives. Those women may reject or delay marriage for fear of becoming part of polygamous unions, representing a significant change in a society where marriage was early and universal. Most threatening is the prospect of a husband’s secret polygamy, undermining marriage by stealth. It may lead to secret lives, forcing women to live and love in ‘un-Islamic’ ways. Other women may herald polygamy as a modern marriage form expressing Muslim identity, in line with Islamic understandings. Such ambiguities feed the undercurrent running through the many stories women told me about polygamy – that they may be forced to expect and accept polygamy as Muslims, but that they mostly condemn and reject it as women and wives. My interlocutors’ conflicted sentiments with regards to polygamy, oscillating uneasily between their personal and their religious convictions, put into perspective the practice of polygamy as a contemporary lifestyle choice among the new urban upper middle classes. While they generally accept polygamy as a Muslim marriage form, they usually consistently condemn Malay men’s false management of polygamy and mostly reject it in their personal lives. Such ambiguities underscore the very complex ways in which elite Malay women must address, in their own lives, whether to be or not to be polygamous.

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Index

accepting polygamy, 17, 23, 65–66, 86–89, 96, 164, 198, 237 adat (customary law), 9, 53–54, 56, 73, 129, 131, 180, 207, 239, 247–49, 251 adoption, 42, 157, 177–79 affairs, 22, 44, 52, 60, 71–72, 120, 128, 132, 134–35, 143, 174, 219 alliances / allegiances in polygamy, 20, 41, 45, 193–94, 197, 207 ambiguity of polygamy, 22–23, 36, 40, 47, 66, 86–87, 89, 96, 119, 164, 198, 199, 254 ambitious women, 9, 40–41, 81–82, 84, 100, 108, 113–16 angin (wind). See under magic in polygamy anxieties. See polygamous anxieties application to practise polygamy, 66–70, 76, 179 Arabization of Malay Islam. See under Islam aristocratic families. See royal and aristocratic families arranged marriage. See under marriage Assisted Reproductive Technologies / ARTs, 178–79 balo (evil), 36, 144, 217 betrayal in polygamy, 25, 85–86, 107, 141, 165, 181–82, 186, 191, 200, 240

blame in polygamy, 17, 24, 78–92, 101, 103, 106–7, 130–31, 144–45, 148, 191, 198, 209, 218–19, 224 bomoh (traditional healer), 104, 111, 213–15, 217–18, 220–23, 225 bumiputera (‘sons of the soil’), 37–38, 72, 205 caning, 58–59, 72–73, 130–31, 135 career women, 7–10, 50, 78, 80–82, 91, 104, 108, 111, 113–17, 119, 121, 125, 128, 157–58, 169–70, 202–3, 211, 215 childbearing in polygamy, 121, 166–80, 247 childbirth and secrecy, 120, 170–74, 192 family planning in polygamy, 167–71 childlessness, 1, 2, 28, 46, 91, 103–4, 149, 166–67, 172, 174–82 children in polygamy, 166–80 growing up in official polygamy, 138–40, 142–43, 151, 156, 159–61, 164, 182–85 growing up in secret polygamy, 64–65, 153, 185–89 as pawns in polygamy, 186–87 reactions to polygamy, 20, 21, 63, 67

270

children out of wedlock, 73, 120, 171, 174 Chinese second wives, 64–65, 84, 99–100, 119–20, 200, 202–3, 207–9, 225 concubine. See mistress consent from first wife, 21, 23, 62, 66, 68–71, 81, 123, 132, 139, 142, 150, 161, 166, 175, 252 conversion to Islam. See under Islam coping with polygamy, 14, 17–18, 22, 44, 64, 117, 134–36, 147–50, 191, 224, 238 cosmopolitanism, 4, 57, 251 co-wives, 7, 33, 44–46, 64, 86, 122, 129, 137–50, 188–89, 212 competition, 139, 142–48, 161, 172, 200 conflicts, 136, 139, 142, 145–47, 155–56, 169, 200, 216, 243–44, 254 cooperation, 50, 139, 141–44, 147 co-residence, 155–59, 183–85 equal treatment, 70, 103, 129, 133, 135, 138–41, 151–65, 190, 193, 207, 240 fair treatment, 8, 28–29, 70, 137–38, 141, 152, 155, 159–60, 162, 164–65 hierarchy, 109, 130, 138–40, 142, 186, 189–90, 193, 201 jealousy, 93, 137, 139, 141, 143, 147, 155, 156, 163, 220, 224, 233, 243 relations, 137–50, 155, 182, 183, 185, 193, 197, 199–202, 216, 243 rights and obligations, 42, 56, 138, 193–94, 201, 207 rivalry, 44, 145, 147, 155, 186, 189, 190, 195–210, 218–20 violence, 19, 145–47, 199–200 cross-border polygamy, 30, 36, 62, 66–68, 74–77, 124, 195 cultural ambiguity. See ambiguity of polygamy

Index

custody of children. See under divorce desires, 40, 71, 90, 102, 122–36, 154, 168–69, 171, 176, 180, 209, 216–18, 220 disempowerment, 7, 9–10, 25, 193, 222, 246 divorce, 7, 33, 103, 124, 126, 132, 160, 196, 206, 225–39 custody of children, 93, 219, 232–35, 238 divorce and childlessness, 103, 167, 174, 179 divorce and first wives, 43–44, 47, 64, 83, 133, 148–49, 151, 154, 225–26, 229–32, 235–39 divorce and polygamy, 35, 76, 87, 88–89, 144, 173, 185, 193, 207, 211, 217–19, 243 divorce and second wives, 20, 32, 41, 93–94, 105, 113, 123, 141, 152–53, 164, 181–82, 186, 200, 222, 226 fasakh (dissolution of marriage), 227–28 satu talaq (form of prenuptial contract), 87, 232 talaq (divorce pronouncement), 227–28, 230 tebus talaq (divorce by redemption), 230 divorcees / divorced women. See under second wives dress styles, 60, 104, 189, 192, 246. See also Islamic dress dysfunctional polygamy, 33, 189, 220, 222, 226, 231, 233, 243 economic obstacles to divorce. See divorce economy of polygamy. See wealth education, 30, 35, 37–39, 81, 86, 97, 104, 110–12, 114–16, 160, 169, 209 England, 10, 68, 119, 131, 234 elites and elite-ness, 32–47

Index271

hereditary elites, 11, 19, 36–37, 80–81, 109, 128, 140–41 political elites, 33, 37–39, 80–81, 216 emancipation, 1, 4, 8, 18, 39, 79, 114, 132, 250 emotions in polygamy, 13, 25, 28, 30, 36, 83, 123, 125, 129, 134, 138, 148, 159, 162–64, 177, 216, 226, 243 emotional neglect, 83, 103, 130, 133–35, 162 emotional turbulence, 14, 17, 18–19, 24–25, 92, 135–36, 148, 193, 211, 212 empathy, 22, 103, 150 engagement, 48, 74, 111, 146 ethical concerns. See under polygamy, study of ethnicity ethnic element of polygamy narratives, 119, 200, 203–9 ethnic identity, 55, 204, 246–47, 251–52 European second wives, 28, 46, 201–2, 208 false management of polygamy. See under Islam and polygamy families in polygamy, 137–50, 151–65, 166–80, 181–95. See also children in polygamy harmonious polygamous families, 50, 140, 141–44, 155–56, 164, 185, 216–17, 245 in-law family, 20, 63, 74, 110, 170, 189–91, 193, 194 natal family, 8, 44, 63, 67, 85, 118, 178, 189, 191–94 femininity, 60, 101, 197, 247 financial independence, 40–41, 66, 78, 81, 100, 114, 116, 125, 132, 159, 167, 170, 172, 189, 229, 230 Five Pillars of Islam, 56, 59, 60 fostering, 72, 157, 174, 177–78, 179

gatal (itchy), 97, 128 gender complementarity in Malay gender relations, 24, 41, 79, 203, 241 gender and children, 168, 177, 180 gender and Islam, 56, 59–60, 119–20, 247–48, 252 gendered view of polygamy, 5, 27, 61, 197, 199 Malay gender relations, 6–10, 50, 56, 79–82, 90–91, 126, 216, 241 giliran (turn taking between wives), 152–55 global Islam / Islamic identity. See under Islam gossip, 3, 11, 19–20, 21–23, 27, 40, 43, 81, 92, 106, 134–35, 147, 197, 238 growing up in polygamy. See under children in polygamy handling polygamy. See coping with polygamy hantu (spirit). See under magic in polygamy harassment, 48, 145–46 Hari Raya (celebrations after Ramadan fasting), 48, 64, 191, 196 harmonious polygamy. See under families in polygamy hate, 85, 144, 145, 212, 217 hereditary nature of polygamy. See under polygamy hierarchy of wives. See under co-wives hijab (veil). See under Islamic dress humiliation in polygamy, 2, 7, 43, 48, 72, 156, 161, 165, 192, 238. See also under sexuality in polygamy husbands. See men’s access to polygamy. See also families in polygamy

272

husband sharing. See under sexuality in polygamy ilmu (magical art). See under magic in polygamy Imam. See religious leaders Indonesia, 3, 25, 36, 45, 51, 53, 76, 105, 140, 156, 157–58, 203, 237, 251, 252 polygamy discourses, 3, 6, 36, 51, 90, 98, 99, 101, 102, 145 polygamy magic, 212, 215, 217, 218, 222 inequality in polygamy, 6, 79, 82, 130, 152, 241 informal polygyny, 206–9 inheritance rights, 42, 160, 180 instrumental polygamy, 41, 43–44, 49, 94, 136, 244 instrumental use of gossip. See gossip Islam and polygamy, 5, 33–36, 48–63, 69–70, 80, 101, 140, 206, 240, 245–49 false management of polygamy, 2, 5, 77, 82, 253–54 Islamic legitimacy of polygamy, 1, 28–30, 42, 78, 88–90, 96, 98, 136, 140, 160, 162, 164, 166, 203, 234, 244–45 manipulation of Islam, 2, 60–63, 96 Islam in Malaysia, 8–9, 73, 203–5, 213–14, 217 Arabization of Malay Islam, 50, 180, 247–49 conversion to Islam, 119–21, 177, 205–6, 208 Islamic resurgence / global Islam, 8, 51, 54–55, 60, 71, 79–80, 130, 246–49, 252–53 Islamization, 50–51, 54–57, 89, 126, 131, 214, 244, 251 Malay Muslim identity and life, 4, 48–63, 245–54 Muslim piety, 57, 248

Index

syncretism in Malay Islam, 53–54, 57, 247 Islamic bomoh. See bomoh Islamic dress, 59–60, 249, 250 hijab (veiling) and tudung (head scarf), 5, 57, 60 Islamic Family Law (Federal Territories) Act 1984 / IFL (FT), 3, 67, 69, 75–76, 91, 119, 130, 160, 227–32 Islamic law. See Syariah law joking about polygamy, 36, 52 junior wife. See co-wives kadi (Islamic judge), 70, 77, 228, 247–48 kampung (village), 1, 213–14, 229 Kelantan, 35, 68, 83, 105, 162, 178, 219, 237 khalwat (close proximity), 12, 72, 120, 122, 123, 125, 134 latah. See under madness in polygamy Law Reform (Marriage and Divorce) Act 1976, 206 legitimate sexual relations, 71–73, 99, 117, 121, 125–26, 128, 174. See also under polygamy life histories. See under polygamy, study of love love and marriage, 9, 73, 112, 123–25, 152, 228, 240–41, 242–43 love and polygamy, 22, 41, 94, 125, 136, 167, 191, 195–96, 203 love sharing in polygamy, 1, 70, 122–23, 134, 162–65, 197, 231, 233, 234, 238 love life management, 18, 71–73, 117–21, 132–36, 188–89, 211, 254 love magic. See under magic in polygamy

Index273

lust. See under sexuality in polygamy madness in polygamy, 25, 221–22 latah, 25, 222 magic in polygamy, 86, 211–24, 226, 243–44, 250 angin (wind), 214, 221–23 hantu (ghost / spirit), 181, 196, 214, 221 ilmu (magical art), 143–44, 156, 212–14 love magic / spells, 214–15, 216–20, 222 magical attack, 36, 144, 212, 214, 215, 217, 218, 225 spirit attacks, 181, 214, 216, 218, 220–24 spirit possessions, 221–24 maids, 7, 137, 146, 157–58, 181, 218 maintaining official monogamy. See under monogamy maintaining status. See divorce maintenance (nafkah), 91–92, 130, 132, 227, 230–31, 238 nafkah batin (marital maintenance) 103, 129–32, 162–65, 227 nafkah zahir (financial maintenance), 159–62, 230 Malay cultural identity, 4–5, 23, 26, 54–55, 245–53 Malay heritage, 203, 246–47 Malayness, 29, 202–6, 251–52 Malay Muslim modernity, 2, 4–5, 8, 39, 52, 54, 214, 245–54 male bias in interpretation of Islam. See under Syariah law manipulation of Islam. See under Islam and polygamy marriage arranged marriage, 32, 81, 108, 110, 115, 123–25, 163, 173, 184, 241–43 elite marriage strategies, 40–44

equality and autonomy in marriage, 6, 8–9, 130, 139, 194 marriageable age, 51, 85, 110–11, 113–17, 217, 243 marriage as partnership, 1, 6–10, 22, 56, 81, 87, 240 marriage pressure, 73, 80, 108–21, 177, 225 status as co-wife, 7, 66, 105, 113, 139, 173, 197, 201 status as married, 40, 41, 74, 109–13, 116, 171, 238 marriage celebrations. See under secret polygamy masculinity. See under polygamy MCIO racialization, 204 Mecca, 56, 59, 140 media polygamy in media, 18–19, 21, 52, 68, 72, 126, 147, 155, 238 polygamy in social media, 13, 58, 59, 67, 126, 251 Melayu Baru (New Malay), 11, 55 men’s access to polygamy, 62, 77, 80, 93–107 men’s marital status, 67, 74–75 Middle East, 50, 57, 180, 247–49 mistress, 25–26, 28, 33, 60–61, 71–72, 89, 97–99, 145, 149, 161, 166, 186, 225, 234, 241 modern Malay marriage. See marriage modernity. See Malay Muslim modernity modesty, 12, 60 monogamy, 40, 49, 121, 136, 142, 150, 154, 163, 202, 207, 226, 244 maintaining official monogamy, 66, 153, 158, 191, 195, 199, 211 monogamy and children, 167, 171, 173–74, 176, 188 monogamy as normal marriage, 24–26, 30, 33, 49 moral order, 26, 40, 52, 90, 112, 247

274

motherhood, 80, 81, 110–11, 116, 120, 126, 166–80, 211–12 mother-in-law. See families in polygamy myths of polygamy, 22–26, 140 nafkah. See maintenance nafsu (passion), 8, 108 narrating polygamy, 17–31, 89–92, 150, 206–10 dominant narratives, 35, 101, 107, 131, 186, 245 narratives of polygamy, 2, 5, 8, 12, 36, 43–44, 50–51, 59, 63, 83, 85, 94, 99–100, 103, 105–6, 115, 123, 143, 144–47, 158, 161, 164, 190, 197, 200, 203, 216–21, 234, 239, 241, 253 nation-building, 55, 80, 90, 204, 245–54 neglect of polygamous wives, 28, 49, 62, 77, 103, 128–29, 130, 132–36, 146, 148, 151–65, 211, 247 Negri Sembilan, 53, 71, 141 networks business and political, 22, 41, 44 familial, 118, 192, 193, 229 friendship, 21, 22, 27, 68 Islamic, 55, 246 second wife, 201–2 new rich Malays, 11, 20, 36–40, 96–97, 199, 246, 249 non-Muslim partners, 117–21, 205–10 nuclear family, 80, 142–43, 157 nusyuz (refusing wishes of husband), 91–92, 130 out-of-state marriages. See cross-border polygamy outside wife. See informal polygamy patriarchy, 5, 7, 61, 89–90, 248

Index

permission to practise polygamy, 29–30, 63, 67–71, 75–77, 91, 98, 166, 175, 228 pilgrimage hajj (pilgrimage to Mecca), 56–57, 59, 88 umrah (minor pilgrimage to Mecca), 59 political patronage, 35, 38 polygamous anxieties, 1–16, 27–28, 91, 106, 149 polygamous arrangements, 19, 71, 117, 123, 133, 139, 142, 151–65, 189, 199, 211 polygamous intent, 20, 75, 97, 106–7, 142, 146, 154, 208 polygamy as conspicuous consumption, 40, 96–97, 198–99, 244 as destiny / hereditary nature, 82–86, 97–100 as ethnic marker (see ethnicity) as feudal custom, 36, 246, 249, 251 as legitimate way to have child, 108–9, 174 as legitimate way to have lover, 71–73, 99, 121, 125, 126, 128, 174 as lifestyle choice / coping strategy, 3, 4, 39, 43, 82, 117, 125, 231, 244, 254 as masculinity and virility symbol, 89–90, 100–1, 247 as material security, 42–43, 85, 147, 151, 162, 208 as Muslim marriage / profession of faith, 4, 5, 49–52, 244–49, 250–54 as status symbol, 39–40, 94–97 as strategy, 16, 41, 71–73, 121, 136 polygamy and modernity. See Malay Muslim modernity polygamy intelligence, 20–21

Index275

polygamy magic. See magic in polygamy. See also under Indonesia polygamy packages. See cross-border polygamy polygamy protocol, 44–47 polygamy publicity. See media polygamy, study of access to elites, 3, 10–15, 29, 202 access to men, 28–29, 106, 208 ethical concerns, 13, 68 interlocutor privacy and protection of identity, 13–14 life histories, 5, 12–14 meanings of polygamy, 5, 18, 23, 27, 168 polygyny, 6, 102, 140–42, 147 postpartum sexual taboos, 172 potential of polygamy, 21, 23, 27, 30, 33–34, 80, 82, 80–89, 142, 149, 196, 198, 199, 209, 241 power in polygamy, 6–10, 19, 25, 27, 47, 60, 100–1, 138–39, 142–43, 161, 193, 202–3, 234 pragmatic polygamy, 18, 86, 94, 116, 154, 173–74, 244 premarital course (kursus perkahwinan), 98, 103–4, 229, 244 premarital sex. See sex outside marriage prenuptial agreement. See under divorce prestige polygamy, 32–33, 49, 90, 94, 96, 155, 198–99, 202, 253 prominence of polygamy, 2–4, 8, 18, 34, 39, 45, 91, 94, 95, 180, 194, 209, 241, 243, 249, 250, 253 psychological impact of polygamy, 3, 24, 130, 146, 241 Qur’anic classes, 88, 244 Qur’anic conditions for polygamy, 1, 28–30, 49, 51, 62, 87, 89, 103, 152, 160–64, 240, 244–45 race, 37, 202–10

registration of polygamous marriages, 4, 36, 68, 69, 74–75, 94, 219, 226–27 proper procedures for polygamy, 36, 63, 74–77 rejection of polygamy, 1–2, 4, 23, 30, 49, 62–63, 82, 86, 88, 245, 254 as rejection of Islam, 89, 162, 245, 252 rejection of marriage due to polygamy, 194, 254 religious departments / bureaucracy, 1, 38, 52–54, 57, 59, 72, 75, 77, 120, 246, 251 religious leaders, 1, 4, 37, 49, 98, 234, 247–48, 253 reproductive deficiency. See childlessness revenge, 26, 86, 200, 216, 219 rivals. See under co-wives royal and aristocratic families, 11, 14, 19, 33, 35, 36, 38, 80, 95, 109, 128, 140–41, 156, 238 rumours, 10, 20, 122, 126, 135, 215, 221 second wives divorcees, 40–42, 71, 85, 113, 121, 125–28, 158, 197, 217 as husband stalkers / snatchers, 41, 126, 196–99, 236 as loose women / gold-diggers, 41, 43, 48, 146, 154, 238 as marriage wreckers, 79, 86, 200, 216, 219 widows, 28, 42, 51, 61, 85, 87, 110, 113, 126, 132, 142, 167, 192, 197, 217, 235–36 second wife complexes, 25–26 secret polygamy, 11, 62, 63, 64–77, 147, 166, 185–89, 199, 222, 254 confrontations between co-wives, 21, 44–47, 65–67, 145–46, 161 marriage celebrations, 74, 76, 206–7 open secrets, 65, 72, 198

276

secret lives, 117–21, 254 Selangor, 2, 3, 10, 11, 66, 68, 75, 94, 95, 97, 160, 219, 226, 237 senior wife. See co-wives servants. See maids sex outside marriage, 72–73, 112, 118, 120, 126–28, 130, 131, 176 sexuality in polygamy, 79, 121, 126, 128–36, 141, 182, 217 husband / sexual sharing, 102–3, 129–36, 235 lust / strong desires, 2, 29, 36, 79, 82–83, 90, 97–101, 102, 123, 125, 133, 136, 216–18 sexual access, 132, 136 sexual deficiency in wife, 84, 101–4, 131 sexual gratification, 99–100, 102–3, 125, 130 sexual humiliation of wife, 101–2, 133 sexual jealousy, 103, 134, 147 sexual needs, 98, 102, 103, 125, 127, 128, 130, 132–34 sexuality in Islam, 126, 129–33, 172, 243 sharing in polygamy, 1, 35, 139, 141–49, 151–65, 171, 235, 243 sexual sharing (see under sexuality in polygamy) sharing assets, 159–62 sharing love (see under love) sharing space, 155–59 sharing time, 151–55 siblings, 63, 142, 156, 172, 182–85, 221 Singapore, 11, 34, 105, 156, 189, 217, 251 Sister in Islam (SIS), 34, 61, 74, 76, 252 skewed gender ratio, 51–52, 243 social adulthood, 81, 103, 110–11, 116, 168, 212 social media. See under media social mobility, 11, 37, 38 social ostracism, 120, 126, 192

Index

social / socio-economic status, 10, 34–35, 39, 40, 76, 96, 97, 116, 244 spirits. See under magic in polygamy standard of living / level of lifestyle, 42, 70, 99, 151, 159–60, 231, 236, 243 state religious departments. See religious departments stigma childlessness, 174–77 divorce, 235–38 ethnicity, 203–10 first wife, 189–90 second wife, 17, 44, 62, 89–90, 196–99 unmarried status, 111–18 stories / polygamy storytelling. See narrating polygamy strategic polygamy. See under polygamy successful women. See career women sultans, 35, 58, 95, 234 Syariah Criminal Offences (Federal Territories) Act 1997 / SCO (FT), 58, 72 Syariah law, 3, 7, 73, 91, 119, 233, 234, 248 Syariah courts, 54, 57–58, 67, 68, 70, 75–76, 212, 227, 229, 235, 238–39 Syariah courts and male-bias, 77, 98, 228–29, 230, 253 taxi drivers, 34, 144 Terengganu, 35, 178, 237 Thailand, 30, 41, 67–68, 93, 192, 195, 215, 217, 219 third wife, 32, 93, 135, 137, 145, 159, 166, 173, 182, 184–85, 192, 207, 219, 237 third wife syndrome, 182, 199–202 threat of polygamy, 9–10, 18, 21, 26, 28, 82, 87–88, 91, 112, 166, 170, 175, 179, 182, 186, 193, 198, 232, 234–35, 254

Index277

titles, 11, 14, 22, 33, 35, 37, 45–46, 95, 138, 231 toy boys, 134 traumatic experience in polygamy, 2, 64, 65, 83, 86, 138, 148, 166, 181, 184, 186–88, 226 travel and polygamy, 20, 104–7, 159, 184 tricking women into polygamy, 24, 84, 92, 104–7, 146, 221 trophy husband, 40, 43, 244 trophy wife, 43, 207, 208, 244 ummah (Muslim community), 54, 90, 248 urban polygamy legends, 8, 10, 22–26, 63, 65, 92, 128, 140, 142–43, 146–47, 158, 200 violence between co-wives. See under co-wives virility. See under sexuality

Vision 2020 (Wawasan 2020), 55, 204 wali (guardian), 67, 69, 74, 93, 124, 192, 195 wealth, 11, 20, 32–47, 108, 123, 144, 156, 159, 215, 229, 235 as basis for polygamy, 19, 49, 72, 75, 84, 90, 94–97, 98–99, 149, 197, 198–99, 243, 253 wife deficiency, 80, 84, 101–4, 107, 130–31, 180, 189 wives. See under marriage. See also families in polygamy women’s rights, 61, 71, 74, 77, 252 women’s rights activists / Muslim feminists, 34, 62, 71, 74, 130, 131, 247, 251–52 working with elites. See under polygamy, study of zina (adultery), 60, 70–71, 77, 87, 90, 98, 149, 241

Fertility, Reproduction and Sexuality General Editors: Soraya Tremayne, Founding Director, Fertility and Reproduction

Studies Group and Research Associate, Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Oxford. Marcia C. Inhorn, William K. Lanman, Jr Professor of Anthropology and International Affairs, Yale University. Philip Kreager, Director, Fertility and Reproduction Studies Group, and Research Associate, Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology and Institute of Human Sciences, University of Oxford. Volume 1

Volume 8

Managing Reproductive Life: Cross-Cultural Themes in Fertility and Sexuality Edited by Soraya Tremayne

Population, Reproduction and Fertility in Melanesia Edited by Stanley J. Ulijaszek

Volume 2 Modern Babylon? Prostituting Children in Thailand Heather Montgomery

Conceiving Kinship: Assisted Conception, Procreation and Family in Southern Europe Monica M.E. Bonaccorso

Volume 3

Volume 10

Reproductive Agency, Medicine and the State: Cultural Transformations in Childbearing Edited by Maya Unnithan-Kumar

Where There Is No Midwife: Birth and Loss in Rural India Sarah Pinto

Volume 4

Reproductive Disruptions: Gender, Technology, and Biopolitics in the New Millennium Edited by Marcia C. Inhorn

A New Look at Thai AIDS: Perspectives from the Margin Graham Fordham

Volume 5 Breast Feeding and Sexuality: Behaviour, Beliefs and Taboos among the Gogo Mothers in Tanzania Mara Mabilia

Volume 6 Ageing without Children: European and Asian Perspectives on Elderly Access to Support Networks Edited by Philip Kreager and Elisabeth Schröder-Butterfill

Volume 9

Volume 11

Volume 12 Reconceiving the Second Sex: Men, Masculinity, and Reproduction Edited by Marcia C. Inhorn, Tine Tjørnhøj-Thomsen, Helene Goldberg, and Maruska la Cour Mosegaard

Volume 13 Transgressive Sex: Subversion and Control in Erotic Encounters Edited by Hastings Donnan and Fiona Macgowan

Volume 7

Volume 14

Nameless Relations: Anonymity, Melanesia and Reproductive Gift Exchange between British Ova Donors and Recipients Monica Konrad

European Kinship in the Age of Biotechnology Edited by Jeanette Edwards and Carles Salazar

Volume 15

Volume 24

Kinship and Beyond: The Genealogical Model Reconsidered Edited by Sandra Bamford and James Leach

Militant Lactivism?: Attachment Parenting and Intensive Motherhood in the UK and France Charlotte Faircloth

Volume 16 Islam and New Kinship: Reproductive Technology and the Shariah in Lebanon Morgan Clarke

Volume 17 Childbirth, Midwifery and Concepts of Time Edited by Christine McCourt

Volume 18

Volume 25 Pregnancy in Practice: Expectation and Experience in the Contemporary US Sallie Han

Volume 26 Nighttime Breastfeeding: An American Cultural Dilemma Cecília Tomori

Assisting Reproduction, Testing Genes: Global Encounters with the New Biotechnologies Edited by Daphna BirenbaumCarmeli and Marcia C. Inhorn

Volume 27

Volume 19

Cousin Marriages: Between Tradition, Genetic Risk and Cultural Change Edited by Alison Shaw and Aviad Raz

Kin, Gene, Community: Reproductive Technologies among Jewish Israelis Edited by Daphna BirenbaumCarmeli and Yoram S. Carmeli

Volume 20 Abortion in Asia: Local Dilemmas, Global Politics Edited by Andrea Whittaker

Volume 21 Unsafe Motherhood: Mayan Maternal Mortality and Subjectivity in Post-War Guatemala Edited by Nicole S. Berry

Volume 22 Fatness and the Maternal Body: Women’s Experiences of Corporeality and the Shaping of Social Policy Edited by Maya Unnithan-Kumar and Soraya Tremayne

Volume 23 Islam and Assisted Reproductive Technologies: Sunni and Shia Perspectives Edited by Marcia C. Inhorn and Soraya Tremayne

Globalized Fatherhood Edited by Marcia C. Inhorn, Wendy Chavkin, and José-Alberto Navarro

Volume 28

Volume 29 Achieving Procreation: Childlessness and IVF in Turkey Merve Demirciog˘lu Göknar

Volume 30 Thai in Vitro: Gender, Culture and Assisted Reproduction Andrea Whittaker

Volume 31 Assisted Reproductive Technologies in the Third Phase: Global Encounters and Emerging Moral Worlds Edited by Kate Hampshire and Bob Simpson

Volume 32 Parenthood between Generations: Transforming Reproductive Cultures Edited by Siân Pooley and Kaveri Qureshi

Volume 33

Volume 38

Patient-Centred IVF: Bioethics and Care in a Dutch Clinic Trudie Gerrits

Reconceiving Muslim Men: Love and Marriage, Family and Care in Precarious Times Edited by Marcia C. Inhorn and Nefissa Naguib

Volume 34 Conceptions: Infertilities and Procreative Technologies in India Aditya Bharadwaj

Volume 35 The Online World of Surrogacy Zsuzsa Berend

Volume 36 Fertility, Conjuncture, Difference: Anthropological Approaches to the Heterogeneity of Modern Fertility Declines Edited by Philip Kreager and Astrid Bochow

Volume 37 The Anthropology of the Fetus Edited by Sallie Han, Tracy K. Betsinger, and Amy B. Scott

Volume 39 Global Fluids: The Cultural Politics of Reproductive Waste and Value Charlotte Kroløkke

Volume 40 Being a Sperm Donor: Masculinity, Sexuality, and Biosociality in Denmark Sebastian Mohr

Volume 41 Elite Malay Polygamy: Wives, Wealth and Woes in Malaysia Miriam Koktvedgaard Zeitzen