Buchi Emechetas The Joys of Motherhood as an African Feminist Text Ess

Buchi Emechetas The Joys of Motherhood as an African Feminist Text Upon my for the first time reading of Buchi Emechetas The Joys of Motherhood, I immediately rejoiced--in this novel, I had finally encountered an account of a fe anthropoid protagonist in colonial and postcolonial African life. In my workforce rested a work that gave names and voices to the silent, forgotten mothers and co-wives of novels by male African writers such as Chinua Achebe. Emecheta, I felt, provided a much-needed glimpse into the innovation of the African char, a world harsher than that of the African male because woman is twice marginalized. As a female in Africa, the opposite of male, woman suffers sexual oppression as an African, the opposite of white in an ever-colonized nation, the African woman also suffers racial oppression. Nnu Ego, Emechetas protagonist, became at once for me the poster female of Africa, a representative of all subjugated African women, and her story alerted me to all the wr ongs perpetrate against African women, wrongs that could only be righted through feminist discourse.As with legion(predicate) surface readings I have performed as a student of literature, however, my billet on The Joys of Motherhood began to evolve. First, I realized and accepted Nnu Egos failure to fight back against oppressive forces in order to bring about change for herself and the daughters of Africa I consoled myself, reasoning that the novel still deserves the feminist label because it calls attention to the mesh of the African woman and because its author and protagonist are female. Rereading the novel, however, also triggered the silencing of my initial response. I focused on such passages as the dying deal of Ona, Nnu Egos mother, who implored Agbadi, Nnu Egos father, ... ...econd African Writers Conference, Stockholm, 1986. Ed. Kirsten Holst Petersen. Upsala Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, 1998. 173-202.---. The Joys of Motherhood. New York George Brazil ler, 1979.Nnoromele, Salome C. Representing the African womanhood Subjectivity and Self in The Joys of Motherhood. Critique 43.2 (2002) 178-190.Ogundipe-Leslie, Molora. The Female Writer and Her Commitment. Women in African literary productions Today. Ed. Eldred Durosimi Jones. Trenton, N.J. Africa World Press, 1987. 5-14.Okeke, Phil E. Reconfiguring Tradition Womens Rights and Social Status in Contemporary Nigeria. Africa Today 47.1 (2000) 49-63.Schipper, Mineke. Mother Africa on a Pedestal The anthropoid Heritage in African Literature and Criticism. Women in African Literature Today. Ed. Eldred Durosimi Jones. Trenton, N.J. Africa World Press, 1987. 35-53.