Voices of matriliny and hidden power: Reimagining female agency through Minangkabau narratives in Kaba and Tambo

Debates on women's agency often reveal a paradox: symbolic recognition coexists with structural marginalisation, particularly in contexts where tradition, religion, and patriarchy intersect. This study positions Minangkabau oral narratives, ten Kaba and one canonical Tambo, as a critical site for exploring that paradox. Through cultural feminism, literary sociology, and critical discourse analysis, the research asks how women are represented, how their roles are legitimised or constrained, and how oral narratives function as ideological arenas. Narrative-thematic coding and hermeneutic reading reveal five patterns: symbolic femininity as a cultural authority, silence as a hidden agency, language as ideology, spirituality as a form of legitimacy, and narratives that resonate with global gender debates. These findings suggest that Minangkabau narratives are not passive relics but dynamic artefacts that contest and reinterpret power. By foregrounding oral narratives as a resource for feminist theorising, this study calls for ethnographic and comparative extensions to test the universality of these patterns.