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African Feminism In African Literature

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The colonial period in Africa referred to the period when European countries occupied and applied full control over African countries. During the pre-colonial and colonial period, female writers in Africa have been invisible to the African literature (Da Silva, 129). Their role was oppressed by men who were considered the leaders in African literature. Meyre Ivone da Silva, an African feminist, explained why women were deprived from their role in African literature. She argued that female writers were excluded from African literature because of their own voice against oppression towards themselves, in particular, and towards African women in general. Female writers were very critical about the role of African women that was confined to house chores and …show more content…

These events in history are exposed by the works of Meyre Ivone da Silva, J.A Fisher and Okwiri Oduor. The discrimination against African women and female writers during the colonial and precolonial periods was well described in “African Feminist towards the Politics of Empowerment” by Meyre Iyone da Silva. “Those critics and anthologists have treated the African subject as an exclusively male product” (Da Silva 129). Da Silva noted that throughout African literature, African male writers were the center focus during the colonization period. The article starts off with an explanation as to why this issue persisted. African women writers unfortunately did not have the same educational opportunities as men. To support her argument, Da Silva referred to the work of an African male writer Chinua Achebe and his novel Things Fall Apart which was set during the pre-colonial times. Da Silva explained that despite the urgent need to restore African women and African writers, stories similar to Things Fall

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In the book Ar’n’t I a women the author, Deborah Gray White, explains how the life was for the slave women in the Southern plantations. She reveals to us how the slave women had to deal with difficulties of racism as well as dealing with sexism. Slave women in these plantations assumed roles within the family as well as the community; these roles were completely different to the roles given to a traditional white female. Deborah Gray White shows us how black women had a different experience from the black men and the struggle they had to maintain their sense of womanhood against all odds, resist sexual oppression, and keep their families together. In the book the author describes two different types of women, “Jezebel” and “Mammy” they

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1941 Words | 8 Pages

Black Female African Americans neglected to the point that they and their achievements have been forgotten. There was a study the suggested that the sources for news in the 1940s and 1950s that contributed to the loss of at least

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2029 Words | 9 Pages

In nineteenth century Louisiana, Creole’s lived by strict rules to explain how Creole household’s run: “The man ruled his household and his wife was considered part of his property. He was permitted to take a[nother] mistress if he liked, though his wife was expected to remain faithful” (Kosewick 3). The wives of the household are also “expected to be of good character” and “loyal, passive, innocent lovers”, despite the fact that their husband can take another woman of his liking out and the wife sat back and watched her husband have a plentiful time with the other woman (Kosewick 3). If the wife of the household does anything outside of the norms within their Creole society, she was frowned upon and disgraced. Rarely, women rebelled against

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485 Words | 2 Pages

This chapter addresses the central argument that African history and the lives of Africans are often dismissed. For example, the author underlines that approximately 50,000 African captives were taken to the Dutch Caribbean while 1,600,000 were sent to the French Caribbean. In addition, Painter provides excerpts from the memoirs of ex-slaves, Equiano and Ayuba in which they recount their personal experience as slaves. This is important because the author carefully presents the topic of slaves as not just numbers, but as individual people. In contrast, in my high school’s world history class, I can profoundly recall reading an excerpt from a European man in the early colonialism period which described his experience when he first encountered the African people.

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1204 Words | 5 Pages

In this article “African Dimensions Of The Stono Rebellion”, John Thornton a professor of history and African American studies, who wrote about the African slaves in the Americas, and specifically the servants in South Carolina during the early eighteenth century. In his writing, the author describes the personality of Africans and their desire to escape from slavery, going through obstacles on their path to freedom. John Thornton is primarily an Africanist, with a specialty in the history of West Central Africa before 1800. His work has also carried him into the study of the African Diaspora, and from there to the history of the Atlantic Basin as a whole, also in the period before the early nineteenth century. Thornton also serves as a consultant

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982 Words | 4 Pages

The work is not yet complete, and is evident by looking at the domination of women throughout the centuries, specifically the 19th and 20th century, which was the height of the women’s rights movement. By analyzing two literary works from two different eras, “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in the late 19th century and “Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers” written by Adrienne Rich in the mid-20th century, one can conclude that while there have been improvements to women’s rights, there is still discrimination prevalent. Although set in two different time periods, the main

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1288 Words | 6 Pages

Her tragedy reflects not only the sexism in the African American families in early 20th century, but also the uselessness

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973 Words | 4 Pages

In the book, Hurston showed repeatedly how African Americans were not treated the same way as people who were White. As a challenge to the Harlem Renaissance, Hurston expands her portrayal of inequality to gender. Some examples of views within the book that depart from other people within the Harlem Renaissance is that she had a very strong feminist view in a movement that focused on African Americans. An example in the book of her discussing the role of women is, “Uh women by herself is a pitiful thing … Dey need aid and assistance” (90).

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867 Words | 4 Pages

Many African Americans throughout the Gilded Age did not have the same educational status as white women. For the reason being of this is because many women were being mistreated just because the color of their skin. I believe that this was unfairly comparing to white women, all women should have been treated the same during the Gilded Age. During this time period, many colleges did not accept African American woman just for this purpose. They were known to be slaves, to be able to serve their master’s.

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1024 Words | 5 Pages

The first colony was founded at Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607. Many of the people who settled in the New World came to escape religious persecution and various other reasons. In this paper we will explore the many roles both male and female colonists as well as Native Africans played. In the colonies gender played a large role in everyday life.

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1806 Words | 8 Pages

In the novel, The Book of Negroes, Lawrence Hill writes a fictional account of an African woman’s struggle from enslavement to freedom. Hill researched the subject matter extensively, the book itself taking place during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries which includes historical events such as the American Revolution, the British military’s own Book of Negroes, as well as insights into one of the root causes of the American Civil War. The narrative begins with an elderly Aminata Diallo. She is a free woman in the city of London and sets about recalling her harrowing story. When Aminata was eleven years old, she was abducted from her village and forced to walk in a coffle for miles and miles to a slave ship.

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1950 Words | 8 Pages

The pre-colonial and postcolonial Igbo society has been observed to be male dominated. Men reign supreme in sociocultural affairs while the female figure has specific limited prescribed roles, a confirmation of absence of feministic ideologies. Motherhood, being submissive to the husband and generally domestic dutiesare some of the roles women are associated with. As the title of the novel by Buchi Emecheta Second Class Citizenimplies, the female figure has been treated as a lesser significant sexwithin the Igbo society considering that equalityamong women is limited by their fathers, husbands and the general patriarchy system. This is something Adah finds quite the same when she moves to England whereby with her African descent she continues to suffer womanhood struggles.

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1027 Words | 5 Pages

The tripartite novel “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe, published in 1958 focuses on the changes taking place in Nigeria, as a result of colonization during the 20th century. Chinua Achebe’s pragmatics when writing the novel focused on changing the perspective of Western readers with regard to African society. He mainly wanted to falsify the assertions in books such as “Heart of Darkness” which he claimed gave people of African descent a dull personality. Social status is one of the novels’ main themes. Chinua Achebe successfully incorporates the importance of social status, giving readers the impression that for the Ibo society, social structure consists mainly of a hierarchy of both skill and strength.

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1544 Words | 7 Pages

The domination of men over women is often characterized by physical and psychological victimization of women and enhancement of their misery. This male domination is not limited to any particular region or particular period but it is globalised problem of all the times. Many women writers enter the literary scene to motivate women and fight against male domination. Walker is one among these sort of writers. Alice walker in her novels portrays the world view of women and their worthy roles, as mother, sister, daughter, wife and beloved.

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878 Words | 4 Pages

Feminist Theory In Chinua Achebe’s “Things Fall Apart”, they recognize the life of the Igbos which are a tribe in the village of Umuofia during European colonization. There are many topics brought up in this book like the effects of colonization, culture and tradition, religion, race, etc. It is relatively easy to read “Things Fall Apart” as an anti-feminist text due to the face that the Igbo clan’s customs and traditions seem to side towards masculine features, such as power and strength. The novel is told through a male protagonist’s point of view in nineteenth century Nigeria, while women there do not have much rights, they do wield heavy influence over the leaders of the clan.

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