Women in Things Fall Apart

After reading Things Fall Apart plus what we talked about in classes I wanted to highlight a topic that called my attention. 

Achebe's novel shows the story of the Igbo community in which Okonkwo lives. These people have particularly traditions and customs that differentiate them with other Nigerian groups of people. The topic that I want to talk about is related to the vision of women and their roles in Things Fall Apart.

First of all, for the Igbo culture, women and men have roles that are strikingly different. On the one hand, women are considered to be the "weaker sex" since their roles are pretty simple. First, they have to be pure and honorable for men, then, to be a submissive wife and finally, to bring up children. On the other hand, men were in charge of providing the house and protecting the community. Due to these defined roles, there were certain traditions that were normal for the Igbo community, even though they may seem abuse for us. As far as I know, beating women was common because it was considered as a way to control women. In that sense, for this patriarchal community hitting women was a necessary condition for men to be considered as a strong, brave and powerful man.

These ideas can be seen in Okonkwo's behavior. We have to remember that he was afraid of weakness since this characteristic was related not only with women but also with Unoka, his father. Okonkwo always remembered when a boy called his father agbala (word for women) and how Unoka was characterized as a coward and lazy man who died of a terrible and effeminate way (illness instead of a more "male" way to die). Due to this reminder, he was afraid of what the female role represented. 

There is a moment in the book when Uchendu asks Okonkwo the following question:

"But there is just one question I would like to ask him. Can you tell me, Okonkwo, why it is that one of the commonest names we give our children is Nneka, or "Mother is Supreme?" We all know that a man is the head of the family and his wives do his bidding. A child belongs to its father and his family and not to its mother and her family. A man belongs to his fatherland and not to his motherland. And yet we say Nneka -'Mother is Supreme.' Why is that?"

Within the story, Okonwko shows us how he behave in a chauvinistic way towards women. He was rude, bad temper and acted violently with his wives. Although we can notice that he loved his family, he does not show any kind of feeling related to affection because he considered that it was a way to show weakness.

Okonkwo also shows his preference to his daughter Ezinma instead of Nwoye, because she is a man-like, strong and brave character while Nwoye portrayed female characteristics like kindness, affection and gentleness. When Nwoye gets to know the Christians, Okonwko wondered what happened in his son that he is so effeminate and weak.

In the last chapters of the book, we can see how Okonkwo feels anxious about losing power and respect. He related this situation with his coward father so in that sense, Okonkwo always had this shadow. Finally, despite the fact he hated people who died in a coward way, he committed suicide.

As you can see, Achebe shows us in his book the realistic vision of women treatment that seems to be present somehow in Nigerian communities. Moreover, these examples show us how women were seen and treated at that time. 

Nowadays, it seems that violence against Nigerian women is still present. Indeed, domestic violence (sexually, physical, mentally, emotional) is an issue in Nigeria, as the following video shows. "Steeming Violence Against Nigerian Women" is a section of a talk show in which a group of activists discuss about how Nigerian women need more opportunities to accuse their husbands and leave aside their submissive nature.

All in all, I reckon Achebe shows us through Things Fall Apart how the women are considered in Nigeria and it seems to me that his book may have created the consciousness of this issue. Unfortunately, despite activists' effort, this problem is still widely present in Nigeria.