COUNTERING MASCULINITY: CHINUA ACHEBE’S THINGS FALL APART AND THE RISE OF FEMINIST ASSERTIVENESS IN THE NOVELS OF NIGERIAN FEMALE WRITERS
COUNTERING MASCULINITY: CHINUA ACHEBE’S THINGS FALL APART AND THE RISE OF FEMINIST ASSERTIVENESS IN THE NOVELS OF NIGERIAN FEMALE WRITERS

Summary/Abstract: It would not be overstating of the fact to say that Chinua Achebe is aforemost African writer, whose influence has been felt in the African cultural affirmation. This is most obvious inThings Fall Apart,a novel crafted to challenge the European conventional assumption that Africa has no culture. However, where Achebe privileges Okonkwo as a paradigm of African communal standard bearer, the third generation Nigerian female writers discredit the masculine violence derived from the Okonkwo’s tempestuous trajectory. The paper examinesthe Nigerian female writers’ countering of masculinity in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart in order to imbue in their female characters a measure of assertiveness needed for a robust African communal development. The paper will further illustrate how Nigerian female writers like Buchi Emecheta, Zaynab Alkali, Lola Shoneyin, Chika Unigwe and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie have depicted various assertive roles accorded their female characters in the plots of their novels. The paper significantly relies on Judith Butler’s theory of performativity which explains the difference between biological disposition and cultural motivation of gender for the development of women in the contemporary world.

• Details
• Contents