FEMINISTIC ACTIVITIES IN NIGERIA AND THE ROLE OF WOMEN IN THE SOCIETY

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ABSTRACT

This study was carried out to assess the feministic activities in Nigeria and the role of women in the society. It tries to bring out the idea of feminism in two female writers work (Ifeoma Okoye and Buchi Emecheta). The review of various disciplines on feminism has been used by the researcher to emphasis on the female characters who strove to fight for themselves. The right and freedom of African Women are what the researchers seeks to unravel. This will be carried out to portray Ifeoma Okoye and Buchi Emecheta as writers who celebrates feminism with the spirit of commoner’s living with their rights. In recent years, African women writers, among them Ifeoma Okoye, have focused on representing the lives and experiences of women in the African society in their literary works.  This study therefore adopted the feminist approach in analyzing these works with a view to evaluating the impact of feminist consciousness on the lives of both Buchi’s and Okoye’s female characters and how effectively they utilize education, economic independence and sisterhood to strategize, redefine themselves, challenge the status quo and attain their goals. 

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

Feminism is a branch of social theory (autism) which symbolizes the struggle for participation of women in a literary world dominated by men.

In the African society, feminism has been deployed through a hostile barrier as the African culture itself regards it with so much disdain due to its belief that female emancipation and empowerment would jettison the essence of manhood as well as the roles of women in their matrimonial homes.

Femi Ojo-Ade (1983:158) African Literature Today views feminism as an accidental phenomenon that is gradually creeping into the forbidden land of African.

Therefore, most of the African female writers preferred to be referred to as matherists/womanist instead of feminists because of the way feminism is believed to have ruined many homes then.

Today, the feminist theory and in movement advocate a pattern of lifestyle, activities and mode of living.  An ideal woman should involve herself in the traditional African Societies, women were regarded as inferior, they dare not look their husbands or men in the face.  They were treated as housewives (almost servants) who must do all the domestic works and must always follow the dictates of their husbands without asking questions.

This shows that the typical African woman is the obedient servant who must do all her husband’s biddings without as much as asking him to explain.

This backward position of women in Africa contributed immensely to the late involvement of female writers.  Before the arrival of these female writers, their male counterparts have been presenting female characters as housewives, mothers, whore and dependent characters with their succor being men.  Such writers include, Meja Nwangi’s “Going Down the River Road”, Chinua Achebe’s “Things Fall Apart” and so on.

But when the female writers emerged, things started changing.  Although, not all female writers are feminists but each writer shows different feminist trends.  The African female writers have conceived themselves with changing depreciating characters.  They faced their challenge with all courage, bravery and a daring heart.