RVS member Dominic Wemochiga Amonzem defended his PhD at the Faculty of Theology, University of Oslo, on 30 November 2018.

We warmly congratulate Dominic with his efforts!

The title of his PhD is "Gendering Marriage: Exploring Kasena Marriage Practices in North-East Ghana"

This thesis outlines the major elements in the academic, African feminist, and popular discourses on marriage in Africa, focusing on two core issues: the conceptual divide between the marriage practices of the Kasena, a Ghanaian ethnic group, and the context-dependent social construction and production of gender in marriage through the marriage practices of the Kasena people of North-East Ghana.

By comparing the functionalist assumptions of the purpose of marriage in the literature on marriage in African societies with ethnographic material from Navrongo, this thesis demonstrates that marriage in Kasena society does more to individuals and the society than it has been seen to do in the functionalist explanations of marriage offered by earlier anthropologists researching on marriage in Africa.

For more about the project and the public defence visit this link

The RVS congratulate RVS member Sivert Skålvoll Urstad on his succsesful defence of his thesis "Ikke religiøse i Norge. Sosiologiske analyser av individer uten religion."!

The thesis was defended at the University of Agder on 4 June. To read more about his thesis and findings see here.