The Monster in Patriarchy-A Thematic Review of Novels of Three Female African Writers (Published)
For the most of history the female has been largely disadvantaged in terms of social standing or status as well as fundamental legal rights, compared to their male counterparts. The continuity of this trend of the female being a second class human, is fuelled by traditional, cultural, and religious beliefs of mostly patriarchal societies. The theory under application in this write-up is the radical feminist approach. The paper seeks to explore how patriarchy, being an aspect of culture, helps to paint or make the woman inferior in the light of their male counterparts. This theoretical approach has been sufficiently explored in the work of Nawal El Sadaawi entitled, “A woman at point Zero” (1983), Buchi Emecheta’s “The joys of motherhood” (1979) and Amma Darko’s “Beyond the Horizon” (1995), among other literary works. The efforts made by the female towards becoming independent from men, have also been closely looked into. Sexual abuse, polygamy, female genital mutilation, widowhood rites and the “trokosi” tradition (Ghana) are among several other socio-cultural factors that set the tone for the oppression, under-rating, malhandling and general discrimination against women in the stories selected in this study. The theories of feminism and literary criticisms have been implied in this study.
Keywords: Culture, Feminist Approach, Patriarchy, oppression.