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The role played by women in south africa
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Humans have a unique ability to express themselves clearly and profoundly without speaking a word. The way a person sighs, cries, screams, or groans exposes his emotion and state of mind. It is a gift that all humans bear, this power to display emotion through instinctual sound. Novelist Alan Paton has a strong grasp on this aspect of the human condition, exemplifying this in his treatment of women in the novel Cry, the Beloved Country. In Paton’s stark, poetic prose, the mere manner in which a woman laughs or weeps symbolizes an entire volume of depth and feeling, providing the reader with a glimpse into the inner workings of gender roles in South African society. Through the laughter and the wailing in Cry, the Beloved Country, Paton enriches his searing portrayal of life in an apartheid nation by honestly depicting the struggles of South African women.
For the most part, the women of this novel are only secondary characters, bearing little significance or influence over the plot. Almost all of them have no first names: for example, Absalom’s girlfriend, Mrs. Lithebe, Mrs. Mkize, and Mrs. Ndlela. In another instance of female namelessness, Absalom tells his father, the minister Stephen Kumalo, that if his unborn child is a boy, he wishes him to be named Peter. But when asked about a daughter, Absalom says, “No, if it is a daughter, I have not thought of any name” (206). In this subtle but noticeable technique, Paton reveals that the native women of South Africa have no definition in themselves, but for the men in their lives, with one notable exception. This exception is a scarlet woman, a woman with a sullied reputation, a woman notorious for engaging in the forbidden “careless laughter” (119). She is Gertrude, Kumalo’s sis...
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...men in so little dialogue and description provides a powerful testament to his writing ability. When Kumalo thanks Mrs. Lithebe for her hospitality, compassion, and support, she replies, “For what else are we born?” (193) It is a simple response, but one brimming with deeper meaning. The native women are the glue that holds together the crumbling skeleton of South African society. Without the women, the men would be nothing. The careless laughter exposes the weakness and depravity that can destroy a woman, but the customary wailing also reveals a woman’s immense strength in the face of adversity. By refusing to reduce the minor female figures to a one-dimensional stereotype, and although it is a mere footnote to the main storyline, Paton crafts an authentic, well-rounded portrait of the lives of South African women.
Works Cited
Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton
In Alan Paton's novel Cry, the Beloved Country two characters, Absalom's girl and Gertrude, show the how society in Johannesburg is as a whole. Absalom's girl symbolizes how girls her age are mothers and have even become divorced several times before. On the other hand Gertrude, Kumalo's sister, illustrates the qualities of a young woman who becomes corrupt from Johannesburg's filthy system of stealing, lying, and prostitution. Both of them show the ways of Johannesburg as a whole.
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Women in Nigeria, as reflected in the novel, usually do not have an identity outside of their father, husband or children, therefore, they are more like visitors or outsiders. And like pilgrims, instead of tearing each other
The book, a feminist anthem in its own right, presents to the reader, Nnu Ego, a love child from an open affair by a woman who refuses to be bound by the chains of marriage, is the reincarnation of a slave girl who was killed by her father before she was born. Nnu Ego’s mother, Ona is an unconventional Igbo woman. She chooses to have an affair with a wealthy local chief who proposes marriage to her. She refuses the marriage proposal, because “he married a few women in the traditional sense, but as he watched each of them sink into domesticity and motherhood he was soon bored and would go further afield for some other exciting, tall and proud female” (Joys of Motherhood 10). She chooses not to be an addition to his harem, but content to be his mistress as long as he meets with her in her father’s
In 1930’s and 1940’s South Africa, many people suffered through traumatic events, whether it be a robbery, a loss of livelihood, a beating, or the ultimate tragedy, the loss of a loved one. In his novel Cry, the Beloved Country, Alan Paton makes sure that this is not left out of his true-to-life, albeit fictional, account of life in South Africa. James Jarvis is the recipient of this tragedy in the novel. His son, Arthur Jarvis, is murdered in his home by Absalom Kumalo during a botched robbery attempt. This sudden loss breaks Jarvis’ heart and sends him reeling. He goes to Johannesburg for the trial and ends up realizing that he really didn’t know his son at all. Reading his son’s writings causes him to have a moral conversion, and he begins his new life when he returns to Ndotsheni. Even though James Jarvis is a man of few words, he has much to say after his son’s death and he speaks through his actions.
Over many years women have been seen by men as accessories and do not treat them fairly. Even though women do have rights and freedom, they are still not treated as equals by men. Women are usually seen as doing housework things but comparing to the book O-lan shows differently because she contributes to helping Wang Lung work on the fields. Women are seen down upon but throughout time it is seen how women can do as much as men can.
Cry the Beloved Country, by Alan Paton, is the story of the two fictional characters, Stephen Kumalo and James Jarvis, who lose their sons in South Africa in 1948. In his story, Alan Paton used the George Hegel's Dialect of thesis, antithesis, synthesis, in order to expose social injustices in a microcosm of South Africa that correlate to the macrocosm of the issues faced by the entire country and what must be done to fix these injustices. Paton subdivided his story into three books. The first of these books, depicts the Journey of Stephen Kumalo, to try and restore his family, is a cry against injustice. The second book focused mainly on James Jarvis’s plight to understand his deceased son, depicts the yearning for justice. While the final book displays the restoration and repair of the injustices derived from the yearning for justice.
In every society, the difference between genders leads to different roles and lifestyles depending on the culture of each society. While there may be similarities between gender roles among many societies, the explanations tend to be different from culture to culture. The society depicted in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart is reminiscent of an Ancient Greek or Roman society, where the men are considered to be strong warriors and breadwinners, and the women are looked at as objects, whose main duty is to tend to the children and obey the husband without a question. While at first glance, the Shakespearean play Tempest seems different from Achebe’s book, in reality, similar themes lie at its center, including the abuse of women and male power dominating throughout the play. While the only female character is a young girl, who is a puppet of his father’s will, she has courage to be honest and to stand up against her father on more than one occasion, exhibiting an innate female power like Ekwefi in Things Fall Apart. Hence these two works, while written three hundred years apart and showing two societies at the opposite ends of colonization, illustrate that the gap between them is not as big as one would think when it comes to society’s gender roles.
Cry, the Beloved Country is such a controversial novel that people tend to forget the true meaning and message being presented. Paton’s aim in writing the novel was to present and create awareness of the ongoing conflict within South Africa through his unbiased and objective view. The importance of the story lies within the title, which sheds light on South Africa’s slowly crumbling society and land, for it is the citizens and the land itself which are “crying” for their beloved country as it collapses under the pressures of racism, broken tribes and native exploitation.
One of the central themes that Achebe developed in his book “Things Fall Apart” is the contrast between feminine and masculine in the African tribes, more specifically Umofia. In the Ibo culture the gender difference plays an important role in Umofian people’s daily life, and has become one of the centric themes of Achebe’s book. This masculinity vs femininity theme has developed through novels protagonist, Okonkwo, by explaining his different reactions toward folktales, sports, and farming.
Chinua Achebe analyzes a culture he is not accustomed with. The Madwoman in the attic theory comes into play as a westerner writing about “savage Africa”. Things Fall Apart provides an important understanding of Africana identity and history for those in the West who may be unfamiliar with African culture. Achebe tackles female identity within this book with delicacy keeping with the Ibo view of female nature in the background of the story but the forefront of the reader’s mind. A discussion of womanhood must touch upon manhood because they operate as a complementary, opposing, and equal entity.
...luding colonialism, feminism, patriarchal society, autobiographical aspects and elements, the relation between the characters, the feministic essence of protagonists are discussed fully and accordingly, the feminine essence of novel (The Grass Is Singing) is determined.
Racism Exposed in Cry, the Beloved Country. The purpose of Cry, the Beloved Country, is to awaken the population of South Africa to the racism that is slowly disintegrating the society and its people. The. Alan Paton designs his work to express his views on the injustices and racial hatred that plagues South Africa, in an attempt to bring about change and.
Women play a key role in this novel in many ways. In the case of...
Things Fall Apart, a novel by Nigerian author Chinua Achebe is a story about an Igbo village in Nigeria and a man that once was a powerful influence in the tribe, but begins to lose his influence as Nigeria is colonized and Christian missionaries come to evangelize. A deeper look at the novel, with a feminist critics point of view, tells a lot about the Igbo people as well as the author’s thoughts about women in the novel. Feminist critics look at female authors, and female characters and their treatment as well as women’s issues in society. Since Achebe is a male, the main focus of feminist literary criticism for Things Fall Apart is the women in the novel and their issues as well as the Igbo view of gender identity. Many issues that women