Significance of Female Genital Mutilation in Africa Today

When dealing with circumcision, it is our conviction that all human behaviours within a culture have a value for the people who originate and perpetuate the practices. It is our assumption that,for the African communities from which most of the data for the study in this book has been obtained, female circumcision has a meaning and purpose. It therefore follows that whoever desires to change such behaviour, and thus to remove the cultural value that goes with it, needs to propose some other practice that will be perceived as more meaningful, relevant and more functional than the present practice and its values.The book has described the traditional rite of passage commonly known as female circumcision and the values within the rite that actually made it possible for the African people principally,to survive many dangers, to grow and to develop as a people both in numbers and as cultures. The rite of passage and the "cut" has been placed within the context of the life history of a African woman so that it may be perceived in proper perspective. This will lead the reader to the cut as a complex of set of events by focusing on the life story of a woman. The book is good to us today.