Malagasy Big Family
by Harilala Rakotomanana
July 11, 2005

A Malagasy family is very big. It includes 3 or 4 generations: grandmothers; grandfathers; mother; father and their children; uncles, aunts and cousins. Sometimes, a big family is useful. In the countryside, members of a Malagasy family help each other to cultivate the rice field instead of paying laborers. They also help each other to build houses. For big fiestas like wedding or exhumation, a Malagasy family organizes themselves in order to prepare all things in advance and during the party. Nevertheless as everything has a good and a bad side, sometimes a big family is harmful. For example if one family has a lot of land, generation after generation, when some members of family get married, they want to have their own land portions. This is a beginning of family struggle. It can continue until each member of the family wants to be buried in their own grave, instead of together in a family tomb, as is the tradition.