The Bride Price
Buchi Emecheta, the author of The Bride Price, illustrates the life of the Odia family and the hardships they go through together, and on their own. The character who stands out the most, however, is Aku-Nna Odia, the protagonist of the story. Because she is an unmarried teenage girl, life is additionally hard for her. Aside from the difficulties she has because of the death of her father, Aku-Nna is faced with the cultural mission as a female in society to get married so the family can receive a bride price. The author of this fictional story weaves in the theme of male dominance and women?s compliance to men. Life in Nigeria is hard at the time, and Aku-Nna is a character who demonstrates the difficulties of life as a female in this culture.
It is clear that men play the dominant gender in Nigerian societies. They are expected to be strong, smart, and powerful. They act as the head of the family as they are the ones who make all the money and decisions. Ezekiel Odia, the father of the Odia family, works a full-time job at the ?Loco Yard.? When he dies, his family is left to fend for themselves. They move back to Ibuza where the mother, Ma Blackie, hopes to find help from her brother-in-law. In this African culture, it is believed that after a husband has died, a woman can no longer take care of herself or her family. ?A fatherless family is a family without a head, a family without shelter, a family without parents, in fact a non-existing family? (28). This statement just further illustrates that men are more important than women in society.
In Nigeria, women are inferior to men. They tend to them and do tedious household chores that need to be done. At four o?clock, women work especially hard. ?Four o?clock was the time when all housewives stopped plaiting their hair, when they finished off their gossiping because their men folk would soon be home, hungry, tired, and irritable, so the women would rush to the kitchen to prepare the evening meal? (20). Whatever task men asked their wives to do, women were expected to complete thoroughly.
Women were demanded to give birth to healthy males and do household work in society. They were also ?supposed to exhibit more emotion? (30) than men were to express.
During this time period women were not respected at all and were belittled by all med in their lives. Even though men don’t appreciate what women they still did as they were told. In particular, “Women have an astoundingly long list of responsibilities and duties – th...
Thesis Statement: Men and women were in different social classes, women were expected to be in charge of running the household, the hardships of motherhood.
Throughout most of recorded history, women generally have endured significantly fewer career opportunities and choices, and even less legal rights, than that of men. The “weaker sex,” women were long considered naturally, both physically and mentally, inferior to men. Delicate and feeble minded, women were unable to perform any task that required muscular or intellectual development. This idea of women being inherently weaker, coupled with their natural biological role of the child bearer, resulted in the stereotype that “a woman’s place is in the home.” Therefore, wife and mother were the major social roles and significant professions assigned to women, and were the ways in which women identified and expressed themselves. However, women’s history has also seen many instances in which these ideas were challenged-where women (and some men) fought for, and to a large degree accomplished, a re-evaluation of traditional views of their role in society.
The 19th Century is an age that is known for the Industrial Revolution. What some people don’t realize is the effect that this revolution had on gender roles in not only the middle and upper classes (Radek.) It started off at its worst, men were considered powerful, active, and brave; where as women were in no comparison said to be weak, passive, and timid (Radek.) Now we know this not to be true, however, back in the day people only went by what would allow ...
Roles for women in society have changed from century to century. There were centuries were women were put on a pedestal and were expected to obey their husband and if not they had to other means to provided for themselves, or more like the present century were women are just as equal as men and are independent as ever. There is a author by the name of Kate Chopin who lived in the times were women were expected to obey their husbands but had the mindset of a time, more like the present, were women could be more independent.
Men are still looked at as the dominant gender and still believed to “own their wives.” According to BBC News, women are still looked at as property and are perceived to be pure and submissive to their parents and husbands. Yes, society has changed in the world to where women are allowed to have “equal right as men,” and women are allowed more freedom. Nonetheless, women in Nigerian society have not had that same change and are now standing up for themselves. Women went from being valued in culture, to being submissive housewives. Men went from being strong warriors who cared for women’s rights, to not caring about women. It was always seen in the Igbo culture that women are supposed to be pure and able to bear multiple children for their husband, but it has taken a bigger turn than expected in their
During post colonial times men and women in the Igbo society had several different roles in the household, the tribe, and in the fields. The male and female roles in the Igbo tribe are determined by many different things throughout the tribe. Genders help determine what that person will be doing. Men and women both have very important roles in the household, tribe, and fields. The women in the Igbo tribe are more in charge of the children, the cooking and the cleaning and the males are in charge of the fields and taking care of the family. The males are the more incharge gender within the tribe and the women must obey everything that the male wants.
In Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe women in Igbo culture seem to have a complicated life. In the story Okonkwo has three wives which in their culture is normal to have. Women are marginalized and silenced by being poorly treated, being possessions of men, and being treated as objects.
Before the arrival of the Europeans, Achebe did a excellent job portraying how the life of Igbo was before they were forced to oppose their own culture. To support this theme, Achebe included detailed descriptions of social rituals within each family, the justice system, religious practices and consequences, preparation and indulgence of food, the marriage process and the distributing of power within the men. Achebe shows how every man has an opportunity to prove himself worthy to achieve a title on the highest level, based merely on his own efforts. One may argue that the novel was written with the main focus on the study of Okonkwo’s character and how he deteriorates, but without the theme that define the Igbo culture itself, we would never know the universe qualities of the society that shaped Okonkwo’s life. The lives of the Igbo people was no different to the actual lives of the Ibos people back in the early days of Africa. Just like in Things Fall Apart, in actual African tribes there was never a ruler. “Very interesting thing about these villages is that there is no single ruler or king that controls the population. Decisions are made by including almost everyone in the village” (AfricaGuide). Using the theme, Achebe educated readers on by mirroring real African life in her
In Umofia, manliness is associated with strength and womanliness with weakness (Okhamafe 127). There is no such thing as a strong woman, and all men should disdain weakness. In Umofia, “all men are males, but not all males are men” (Okhamafe 126). Only the strong men who hold titles deserve to be called “men”. The Igbo word “agbala” is an alternate work for “woman” and for a man who had no title. Women in Igbo society are expected to act a certain way. Okonkwo scolds his daughter, Ezinma, when she does not “sit like a woman” (Achebe 44). He will not let Ezinma bring his chair to the wrestling match because it is a “boy’s job” (Achebe 44). Eve...
In the western world, it is common for a little girl to imagine herself walking down the aisle in a beautiful white gown and her father at her side ready to hand her over into the hands of the man of her dreams. However, in Sub-Saharan African societies like Ghana and Uganda, girls dream of the day when a man, along with his family, will come to her father’s house and propose a bride price to perform the traditional marriage rights. Bride price according to Gita Sen is problematic in that it is defined as a payment made by a prospective husband to the family of a woman he wishes to marry (Sen). From Sen’s definition, it is evident that bride price not only highlights the dominance of patriarchy in African societies but emphasizes the objectification of women as payments are made in exchange of a bride/woman.
Within the Ibo tribe, men have more dominance over the women as they accept titles to display their power and importance, allowing them to participate in the decision making for the village. Compared to the women of the clan, men can marry multiple wives as a sign of wealth, and their wives stay home attending to their husband and caring for their children. For example, Okonkwo has already gained much respect among his tribe as “He was a wealthy farmer and had two barns full of yams, and had just married his third wife. To crown it all he had taken two titles and had shown incredible prowess in two inter-tribal wars. And so although Okonkwo was still young, he was already one of the greatest men of his time. Age was respected among his people, but achievement was revered” (Achebe 8). To prove their masculinity and power, Ibo men rely on their wealth, shown by their farming and the number of wives they have, and their fighting abilities in wars. Even though elderly members of the tribe gained much respect, a man’s contributions to the village and successes increases their importance among the clan. As demonstrated from a village gathering, “It was clear from the way the crowd stood or sat that the ceremony was for men. There were many women, but they looked on from the fringe like outsiders. The titled men and elders sat on their stools waiting for the trials to begin” (Achebe 87). During the ceremony, the way one is positioned illustrates their role in society. While the titled, important men and elders are seated in the front rows, the women are neglected in the outer regions as to show their low social status compared to the men. Achebe compares the women to outsiders because they serve little importance to the ceremony and to the village as they only work from home to care for their family. The ability of men to accept titles and
Adichie portrays the persisting existence of traditional African culture through Odenigbo’s mother – who symbolizes the extreme end of traditional beliefs. When Odenigbo’s mother visits Odenigbo and Olanna at their apartment in Nsukka, she is immediately personified as the traditional Nigerian village woman. Unaccepting of modern attitudes and advancements, she “peered suspiciously at the stove, knocked on the pressure cooker and tapped the pots...
Okeke, Phil E. "Reconfiguring Tradition: Women's Rights and Social Status in Contemporary Nigeria." Africa Today 47.1 (2000): 49-63.
Women are looked at as less than males, and males are to be far superior because society thought male to be the better gender. “A Doll's House,” by Henrik Isben describes the sacrificial role of nineteenth century women , men in society and in the household.