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Etymologically, the word patriarchy is derived from Greek word, patriarknes”

meaning “Father of race” or Chief of a race” which is a compound of “patria”

meaning linage, descent, and "arche" meaning rule”⁵⁷. Historically, the term

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patriarchy was used to refer to autocratic rule by the male head of the family.

However, in modern times, it is referred to as a social system in which power is held by adult men. Patriarchy is social system in which adult male holds power and predominance in role of political leadership, moral authority, social privilege and control of property in the domain of family over woman and children. Patrilineal society is “a society in which property title is inherited by the male lineage and descent is reckoned exclusively through the male line to the part that the male relatives take prudence over female relatives.’’⁵⁸ Historically, patriarchy manifested itself in social, legal, political economic organization of range of different cultures.

According to Sylvia Walby, patriarchy is “a system of interrelated social structures which allow men to exploit women."⁵⁹ But this definition according to April A.

Gordon, allows for the variability and changes in women’s roles and in the order of their priority under different patriarchal system. It also recognizes that it is the institutionalized subordination and exploitation of women by men that is the crux of patriarchy. It can express itself through the emphasis on motherhood in favour of women as wage earners or some other roles. Domination by men over women is found in ancient, as far back as 3100BCas restrictions on a woman’s reproductive capacity as exclusive from the process representing or the construction of history.

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According to some researchers, with the appearance of the Hebrews, there is also the exclusion of woman from the God humanity covenant.

In platonic dialogue, there is a respective virtue of men and women. He says:

First of all, if you take the virtue of man, It is easily stated that man’s virtue is this, that he has been competent to manage the affairs of his city.

so as to benefit his friends and harm his enemies, and to take care of a woman’s virtue there is no difficulty in describing it as the duty of ordering the house well, looking after the property indoors, and obeying her husband.⁶⁰

The works of Aristotle portrayed women as “morally, intellectually and physically inferior to men. He saw women as the property of men, and claimed that women’s role in the society was to reproduce and serve men in the household while male domination of women is natural and virtuous.”⁶¹ Aristotle viewed male sex to be perfect and superior. He had a hierarchical ruling structure in his theories. Lerner claims that through this patriarchal belief system, it passed down from generation to generation that people have been conditioned to accept that men are superior to women.

According to Gearda Lerner in his work “The Creation of Patriarchy” states that Aristotle viewed that women had colder blood than men which made women not to evolve into men. “Further in the religious sphere, the Roman catholic church and

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orthodox resisted priesthood from marrying, yet viewed the church itself as mother”⁶² this shows that the church and human languages are to some extent matriarchy(mother tongue). Diderot’s encyclopedia, denies inheritance of paternal authority; stating that reason shows us that mothers have right and authority equal to those of fathers for the obligation imposed on children originated equally from mother and the father as both are equally responsible for bringing them into the world. Thus, the positive laws of God that relate to the obedience of children join the father and the mother without any.

The feminist theory maintained that patriarchy is “a social system that enforce gender roles and is oppressive to both men and women.”⁶³ It includes mechanism that evokes male dominance over women; hence this social construction can be overcome by revealing and analyzing its manifestation. Some scholars have called for culture reconstruction, which means that there is need for culture repositioning. There is need for reconstruction of the cultural concept of a society, there is need to change male chauvinism and sexism.

Garda Lerner in her work “the Creation of Patriarchy” argued, that “class society began with the dominance of men over women and developed into dominance of some men over other men and over all women.’’⁶⁴ Thus, the process of class formation incorporated an already pre-exist condition of male dominance over women and marginalized women in the formation of the rule of elite of men

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in power. Again, she argues that before the development, male dominance was not a feature of human society in general. Women were key to the maintenance of human society and community but with a few expectation, social and legal power welded by men and women could gain some status and privilege in patriarchy by limiting child –bearing capacity to just one man, so that he could depend on her children being his children. Further, she upheld that women were not conscious that they were subordinate until this consciousness began slowly to emerge, starting with medieval era. She maintained that other group like peasants slave ,colonials, and ethnic minorities recognized that they are being subordinated and theories were developed for their liberation about their rights as human being, about what kind of struggle to conduct in order to emancipate themselves but women did not and so, that was the question Beauvoir wanted to explore in her work “The Second Sex.” De Beauvoir wanted to understand whether patriarchy system was what most scholars taught, or natural as God-given condition or whether it was a human invention coming out of a specific historic period. Hence, it was on this note that The Second Sex, shows that patriarchy is a human invention. It was created by human being. It was created by man and woman at a certain point in the historical development of a human race. It was institutionalized before civilization and that is why it is difficult to deal with and combat it. Thus, patriarchy can be combated when civilization and reconstruction of culture are

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formed. For love cannot exist in any relationship that is based on domination and coercion. Male cannot love themselves in patriarchal culture, if their very self-definition relies on submission to patriarchal and matriarchal rules but can only love when the value of mutual growth and self-actualization are found in all relationship when male and female are free from bondage to freedom, from lifelessness to loving