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The Damsels Marxist Analysis

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This paper talks about the Marxist and Postcolonial analysis of my favourite text, a movie titled The Damsels. The Damsels talks about the birth of a prince called prince Vadin in Achinike kingdom, his return home from his educational adventure after twenty-five years and the actions he undertook in his quest to choose a bride. In this paper, the Marxist and postcolonial lenses have be used to critically analyse my favourite text, The Damsels. Under the postcolonial theory, I have made use of the concepts of culture and national identity to literary critique the movie in relation to how Africa has evolved after colonisation. Also, I have employed the concept of base and superstructure and the concept of alienation under the Marxist theory …show more content…

Robert Eaglestone defines culture as the invented ideas through which we live and that makes up our identity (Eaglestone, 2009). In the movie, the Nigeria’s culture was displayed. This is true based on the components of culture such as language, music, dressing and beliefs of the people in the movie. The characters in the movie spoke the Nigeria local language – Igbo upon the fact that the movie was shot in English. Also, music in the movie was produced using the local drums and local Igbo songs were sung at important occasions. In The Damsels, the music was played to welcome the prince to the land and to usher the damsels to the palace for the contest. Moreover, the characters wore the Nigerian traditional beads as well as the red caps the elders wore, and the traditional crown the prince wore. Furthermore, the people of Achinike Kingdom believed in their gods and consulted them in matters of importance. Their music, language, dressing and beliefs defined and represented their Nigerian culture hence, showing evidence of Nigerians’ quest to reinforce and celebrate their local culture after colonialization. However, the use of the English language in the movie showed their continuous dependence on the Western culture even after …show more content…

According to Robert Eaglestone, national identity refers to a sense of a nation as a unified whole, represented by tradition, language, culture and ideas about the nation (Eaglestone, 2009). National identity as a sense of belonging can be identified by national symbols such as Ghana’s Adinkra symbol, language such as the Igbo language of Nigeria, national colours as represented by flags of our various countries, TV stations such as GTV of Ghana, and our culture in general. The Damsels showed the national identity of the people through their language, culture and national symbols. The Igbo language spoken and sung identified the characters as Nigerians, so did their unique cultural dances performed throughout the movie at ceremonies and gatherings. Likewise, the culture of tapping and drinking white palm wine is associated with Nigerians and scenes in the movie where palm wine was offered and drunk confirms this. Hence, the exhibition of national identity in the movie is an evidence of Nigeria’s quest to reinforce its identity after

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