Effendi, a senior lecturer in anthropology at Andalas University in Padang, the regional capital of West Sumatra, hails from one of Indonesia’s many distinct ethnic groups, the Minangkabau.

The key to Minangkabau matriarchy, according to Dr. Sanday, is found in the ever-present adat idea expressed in the proverb "growth in nature must be a teacher." ...

Anthropologist Peggy Reeves Sanday discovered that the Minang society is founded on the coexistence of matrilineal custom and a nature-based philosophy called adat. She says the key to Minangkabau ...

The Minangkabau are an anthropological wonder. The world’s largest matrilineal society with a population the size of Los Angeles, its people sprawl through West Sumatra province in Indonesia.

In Minangkabau society, I was told, “rape doesn’t exist, because our adat, our local custom, doesn’t allow it.” Men who assault women are shunned and even driven from their villages.

Minang women uphold these pre-Islamic adat customs, which not only trace ancestry through the female line but also involve a complex social system in which women and men share power and control ...

Negri Sembilan is the only state in Malaysia that practises Adat Perpatih, a combination of practices and rules that govern various areas of social life that originated from the Minangkabau ...

The Minangkabau customary principle is reflected in the statement 'Adat Basandi Syarak, Syarak Basandi Kitabullah' meaning that Minangkabau principles and customs are based on Shariah (Islamic law ...