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Name
: Dharma J. Gohel
Roll
No : 09
Class
: M.A. Sem-4
Paper
– 14 : The African Literature
Batch
: 2017-19
Enrollment
No : 2069108420180014
Submitted
to : Smt. S. B. Gardi Department of English, MKBU
Topic
:Representation of women in African Literature with reference to the novels 'Things Fall Apart', 'Waiting for the Barbarians' and 'A Grain of Wheat'
➦Introduction:
Women's place in society is thought a lot in contemporary studies.
In literature, women's representation is observed and criticized with feminist
approach. Like most literature around the world, African literature also
portrays women in different shades. In early African works, incomplete and
inaccurate female characters are littered. The fact, like other literature,
African literature was first written by men. Educated African men not only come
from patriarchal society but were educated by colonizers, who also come from
patriarchal society. Some feminist critics say that male francophone African
writers routinely portray their female characters in the stereotype of an
oppressed and subjugated wife who has little if any say in shaping her destiny
or changing the system that deprives and oppresses her. The African novels
present different images of women in the contemporary patriarchal society.
Female character do not have their own identity or story to be called or
celebrated. But they are always portrayed as less heroic than men and in
periphery. The famous African writers like Flora Nwapa, Buchi Emecheta, Ulasi,
Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Cyprian Ekwensi, Amos Tutuola and Ben Okri use
African imagery in portraying and dramatizing the characters and situation, for
effect and authenticity.
African societies are
primarily viewed as masculine. Feminine perspective of Africa and African
society, especially about the role of women in African novels, is richly
illuminating. In African natives religion and African life, it is the image of
the chief deity, the Goddess of earth that dominates. The chief deities of the
Ewe community of Ghana are Mawu and Lisa. Mawu representing the moon is a
female while Lisa symbolizing the sun is masculine. The image of Mawu greatly
influences the life and living of the people. Though men do not duly regard
women, she is universally acknowledged as the mother of mankind.
Gender discrimination, family constraints and social restrictions on women are
the greatest banes of African society. Some female voices scream that the real
place of woman is in her home. However, women are sometimes glorified in their
personal life as family caretakers and teachers. Woman constitutes a force to
nourish and shapes the young minds in her family. In the traditions-bound
society, she is confined to her home discharging her primary duties. The
creation of myth and literary image of Africa meaning one's physical
attachment, formulates the woman's place in the house. But still in some cases,
as a stereotype, the idea of an 'African dilemma' is there with representation
of women. African women have to choose between being true to their traditional
culture and embracing thee colonising western culture and having equal rights
is an interesting one. The study of women characters, portrayed in African
colonized literature is an interesting with that one can know human nature of
colonising, marginalizing or making other race gender religion subaltern.
➥ 'THINGS FALL APART' BY CHINUA ACHEBE :
Umofia, the village in Achebe's Things Fall Apart respects
only one women called Chielo, the priestess of the Oracle of the hills and the
caves. Chielo has a dual role to play as an ordinary woman and as the one to
reprimand the offenders of the community. She, as the spokesperson of the
deity, screams at Okonkwo when he accompanies his wife and daughter to the
shrine of the Oracle of the hills and the caves: beware of exchanging words
with Agbala. Okonkwo, the great warrior and matchless wrestler, rants at
Nwoye's mother.. Do what you are told woman. Okonkwo's wife becomes meek and
dumb before Chielo. Achebe has presented the image of an idealized woman,
thereby opening the space for women to become active and involve themselves
along with men in the nation-building activities. They are the images of
progressive women though they are not fully evolved characters. Achebe's Chielo
is a priestess and a healer whose roles allow her control of spaces that the
fearless Okonkwo is cautious about entering. Confident of these spaces and the
social environment on a moonlit night, she runs through the town with a sick
Ezinma on her back. Throughout Chielo's race that night, her voice calls out
greetings to notable community personages and Agbala. Chielo's voice shows no
hint of oppression or suppressed womanhood. The fact that Ezinma recovers after
the encounter with Chielo also speaks about Chielo's power in Agbala.
There is no male equivalent to this role of priestess in African life. Okonkwo
must follow later and wait in the shadows as woman-as-priestess and Agbala renegotiate
the child's health and continuance. Significant here is the fact that the
process of ritual and negotiation are embedded in narrative tradition and
practice. Like Achebe, Nwapa makes use of this relationship in Efuru in which
the major characters have praise names. Achebe says-
"Names reflect the circumstances of one's birth and
family background."
Many women in the novel are
flat characters who are satisfied with oppressive structures like Polygamy as
Okonkwo's wives. Critics condemn Achebe for being too male-focused, there could
be many reasons for this lack of female representation. One is that, readers
are seeing the culture and events largely from Okonkwo's point of view, who
could be said to have unenlightened gender views by Ibo standards. For example-
when he is sent to his mother's village, be cannot answer to his uncle why a
common name and saying is "mother is supreme", Uchendu, his uncle
replies, "A man belongs to his fatherland when things are good and
life is sweet. But when there is sorrow and bitterness, be finds refuge in his
motherland. Your mother is there to protect you. She is buried there that's why
we say mother is supreme." In these words, women as mother is respected.
The portrayal of Okonkwo's daughter Ezinma, is the only visible rounded female
character in the novel. There is evidence in the novel which suggests that
Achebe was showing ridiculous nature of a strong patriarchal society. Ezinma
was intelligent enough to eventually run the family the way Okonkwo wanted.
Okonkwo says-
"She has the right spirit."
Okonkwo is unable to think outside of his cultural paradigm, when Ezinma offers
to carry Okonkwo's chair to the wrestling match, traditionally a boy's job,
Okonkwo says-
"No, that's a boy's job."
Instead of
finding a way to let Ezinma run the home, be only comments that "She
should have been a boy."
It shows Achebe's poverty in describing woman character in
patriarchal world. Still there was not much female representation in the novel.
It is important to realize that Achebe wrote this novel to justify his native
culture, where women become victims, to European audiences, who were
patriarchal themselves. With the exception of Ezinma, Achebe's female
characters in the novel were not rounded or visible. Okonkwo carries more space
and female characters are marginalized in narrated patriarchal culture.
➥'A GRAIN OF WHEAT' BY NGUGI WA THIONG'O :
A Grain of Wheat is a political narrative talking about Mau
Mau Kenyan movement first placed in forest. The movement included both men and
women against British colonizers. Women played remarkable role directly or
indirectly in that rebellion. Ngugi pays respect to these women and celebrates
their limitless sacrifices, their contribution and struggle for freedom of the
homeland in this novel. The novel describes heroic women as providing the
invisible backbone to the movement. The writer also made use of traditional
African values of womanhood to fight with the enemies. Wambui, the major
character in the novel, is a model of the resistant woman during emergency; she
carried secrets from the villages to towns. Incident of Wambui and policeman is
very significant in portraying her character. For example- Karanja, Kihika and
Gikonyo encounter Mumbi at Gikonyo's workshop, she is addressed respectfully as
Karanja calls her "Mother of Men, we have come, make us some tea."
Kihika, the Mau Mau hero in the novel, refers to the homeland as mother as be
proudly says,
"With us, Kenya is our mother."
Female identities and anatomies become symbolically bound to motherhood and to
the nation. We can find privileging of motherhood in Ngugi's fiction. In the
novel, where Gikonyo has an inferiority, Mumbi is more self-assured and capable
of action. Gikonyo's mother, Wangari, refuses to accept defeat when her husband
beats and rejects her, accusing her of sexual coldness. She displays undaunted
courage when she settles in Thabai with her baby son. Wambui introduces the
active role of women in the movement, while Karanja's mother mirrors Nyokabi's
defiance of the traditional female role, as she questions the action of men.
Ngugi, through the depiction of the ideal patriotic women pays great tribute to
the African women especially in those dark days. The strength and courage of
certain black women is incontestable in relating the fight for freedom. Ngugi
through the persons of Wambui and Mumbi clearly shows us that though the men
were fighting openly, the war led by the women was as much important as theirs.
Example- Wambui's "now-famous drama at the worker's strike in 1950,"
how through her words and the common action of women they had revived the
strength of men. There is also the comic episode of how Wambui "once
carried a pistol tied to her thighs near the groins" where behind the
comic account of the incident, Ngugi portrays the courage and role of women in
freedom fighting. If African women had not been such an inner force, Kenya
would have never been what it is today. This argument is illustrated by Mumbi's
inner force during the emergency period. She is in fact the character who
depicts the ideal African woman according to Ngugi. Strong, beautiful, both and
furthermore mother of a child, be strength during that period if far than
admirable, "In the end, she tied a belt around her waist and took on a
man's work."
Far
from the sensual woman, she has the ability to play a completely different role
which is that of the submissive woman or rather wife. Mumbi, who despite having
survived during harsh times, has to bear the authority of Gikonyo at home,
"I'll make you shut this mouth of a whore", he cried out, slapping
her on the left cheek. Ngugi does not seem to criticize this attitude of Mumbi;
her attitude as a weakness, the author transforms this into a strength by the
characters. Mumbi's mother Wanjiku says-
"The women of to-day surprise me. They cannot take a
slap, soft as feather, or the slightest breath, from a man. In our time, a
woman could take blow and blow from her husband without a though to running
back to her parents."
Ngugi Wa Thiong'o enrich African literature with portraying his woman
characters strong, courageous and patriotic, who equally and sometimes more
than male characters,, participate in struggle for freedom.
➥'WAITING FOR THE BARBARIANS' BY J.M. COETZEE :
"The Magistrate seeks to eliminate his sense of the
girl's otherness and to understand the pain of her torture as her verbally and
physically probes the girl in an effort to read the signs of torture written on
her body."
Actually, Barbarian girl is a
symbol of colonized. Her relationship with Magistrate is of master and slave.
She is tortured by colonizers. She is not colonized by empire but as a woman by
the Magistrate as well. He uses her body as an object. The narration never
gives us the view point of the Barbarian girl, but the magistrate attempts to
understand feminine Viewpoint. He is even at one point dressed as a woman by
his torturers who are servants of the empire. The empire and the Barbarian
culture are symbolically represented by the magistrate and the Barbarian girl
and their relationship the same. The Magistrate sometimes sympathies the
girl but it is also true that he uses as an object, he becomes cause of her
sorrows. Sometimes, the girl plays a role of the catalyst for the change that
takes place in the Magistrate; she fulfills the role as colonized woman.
Coetzee's choice to put a girl as a symbol of colonized, slave and subaltern
indicates woman's position in society and in men's mind.
➥CONCLUSION :
These three famous African novels represent women
differently. One has no significant space for women. One made women courageous,
strong and even greater than men; and one made it slave, colonized and
inferior. These different portrayals shows women's role in different situations
and different cultures, which is moving and not static.
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