Why is Okonkwo’s attitude towards women such a recurring theme? Cite a few examples, and discuss whether they complicate a sympathetic portrait of the pre-colonial polity.
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To elaborate on what I was saying in class, Okonkwo’s world revolves around his perception of what the traditional, ideal citizen in his community should be. In his case that ideal person is the exact opposite of his father, who was a lazy, unaccomplished, constantly indebted, and soft man who died as an embarrassment to Okonkwo. Okonkwo’s super hard and authoritarian treatment of women stems from his fear and avoidance of anything that would make him appear weak and effeminate, and that could in some way be traced back to the image of his father in people’s minds.
When Okonkwo took part in the slaying of Ikemefuna, he did so as to not appear weak. Then when he and became withdrawn and depressed, he had to scold himself for being so affected by the death of someone he considered a son. “When did you become a shivering old woman…How can a man who has killed five men in battle fall to pieces because he has added a boy to their number?” (p. 65)
In Umuofia women are the subordinate players in society. They live under their fathers and then their husbands. They cook, rear children, and clean their homes as they and try to keep their husbands happy. This isn’t to say that the women are not capable of acting according to their own will and prowess. Okonkwo’s second wife, Ekwefi and her daughter Ezinma, both prove to be strong-willed women, capable of standing up to Okonkwo and his authority.
For Okonkwo, “no matter how prosperous a man was, if he was unable to control his women and children (especially his women) he was not really a man” (p. 53). Expressing his power over his women usually came in the form of violence. Okonkwo beat his third wife because she left without making his dinner, and he tried to shoot Ekwefi after a heated exchange and a muttered comment about his poor aim (Chap 5). Okonkwo also beat his seemingly weak and effeminate son, Nwoye, in an attempt to toughen him up and help him grow into a man.
On the surface, Okonkwo’s perception and treatment of women does tarnish the sympathetic portrait of pre-colonial life and polity for the modern or Western-minded reader. However, if you look at the root of his harsh treatment and the daddy issues that don’t allow him to show emotion or concern, you’re able to look past that and view Okonkwo as a complicated, flawed character who is struggling to deal with the change in the times. Nobody is perfect, and this is what people can relate to, instead of getting hung up on his violent tendencies towards anything feminine.
Okonkwo’s treatment of his wives is harsh and shows his authoritative personality. Okonkwo doesn’t want to be considered an “agbala”; he doesn’t want to be weak as his father was. All his life long he works a lot “to become one of the lords of the clan” (p. 131). He just wants to control his life and this is why he is so upset when his wives act independently. As Alycia said, he is harsh with everybody and not only women.
As has been said in class, his behavior is not shocking if we take into consideration the context in which the scene takes place. Okonkwo is not particularly violent. His acts of violence are sporadic and justified in his eyes. And in regards of what was considered important by women at that time and that place, he is a good husband. His father abandoned his family in a way: he played music when his wife and children were starving. On the contrary, Okonkwo wants to build a prosperous compound. He takes care of his wives and even looks endearing when Ezinma is taken by the priestess. He worries for his daughter and allows his second wife to go after her, showing that he shares her thought. He even waits all night with her. He has feelings sometimes, but he keeps them for himself.
In chapter fourteen, Uchendu has an interesting speech on the reason why “Mother is supreme”. He says that mothers are there to comfort men, so that men are not in the throes of sorrow and can protect their wives and children in return. He says especially to Okonkwo that he has the duty to be comforted, because “if [he allows] sorrow to weigh [him] down and [kills himself], they will all die in exile” (p.134). This may be related to his suicide as an early threat. At the end, he finally decides to free himself and abandons his family, maybe because he put on himself such a hard pressure to reach an ideal. He imagines a perfect world where he would lead strong men, and eventually, he understands that he has no means to make the world as he wants it to be. Facing such a delusion, Okonkwo chooses death over his wives and children, maybe thus expressing the same weakness as his father’s or the same chi. This can lead us to the conclusion that his hard treatment of women is a reflect of the attitude he has towards himself, which turns out to be very destructive at the end.
I think Okonkwo’s attitude towards women occurs so much throughout the story because the author wants us to see how much Okonkwo wants to be opposite from his father. Okonkwo’s father, Unoka, was given the name agbala, which also means woman. He had no titles and was considered lazy which embarrassed Okonkwo. Because Okonkwo’s father was associated with a female, Okonkwo viewed women negatively and wanted to strive to show his superiority and be as different from them as possible.
In Chapter four one of Okonkwo’s wives, Ojiugo, leaves the hut to get her hair braided. It’s the Week of Peace in their village, but Okonkwo still beats her because he is so furious and forgets all about the sacred week. This demonstrated how Onkonkwo cared more about being seen as a strong ruler than obeying the Gods and respecting the traditions of the community. Okonkwo couldn’t be seen as a man who couldn’t control his women, not even during the Week of Peace.
While the women prepared for the Feast of the New Yam, Okonkwo decided to beat his wife Ekwefi out of boredom and anger. It was also revealed that Okonkwo didn’t care much for the feast because he considered it a time of idleness. Okonkwo felt the need to beat his wife at a time when the women were so involved in this feast. He couldn’t make it seem as if he was in support of this event and wanted to degrade his wife so she wouldn’t feel as if she was important or even superior during this occasion. Later on Ekwefi made a comment about Okonkwo’s hunting skills and he shot at her, again showing his disdain for female empowerment. He wasn’t going to let his wife talk to him as if they were equals.
The first time Okonkwo shows some sort of emotion towards one of his wives is when he and Ekwefi are sitting outside of the cave to wait for Ezinma. Okonkwo is very fond of Ezinma so I can understand why he waits for her, but then he remembers how Ekwefi runs away from her last husband to be with him which creates a sort of romance between the two. Before, I saw Okonkwo as a wife beater and sort of a woman hater, but this part of the story reveals that Okonkwo has a heart and beating his wives just may be something he feels he has to do to be seen as a man. He also respects Chielo, the oracle, when she demands that Ezinma see the Gods. This could possibly be because she isn’t his wife or because she is such an important figure in the community. Okonkwo’s attitude toward women is definitely not black and white. He shows little respect to his wives, yet he can hold his daughter Ezinma to high standards and obey Chielo.
It seems as if Okonkwo is negative towards the people who remind him of his father. He can immediately associate his father with women which explains his behavior toward his wives. He also shows disdain toward his son, Nwoye, who is seen as weak and lazy. Okonkwo also beats him in hopes that he will change his behavior. It’s easy for Okonkwo to associate weakness with women because his father was given the name of a woman, but yet he has no respect for his son, Nwoye because he exhibits the same characteristics of his father.
To continue with what my group and I discussed in class, Okonkowo’s attitude towards women is quite chauvinistic. As pointed out, this is quite odd for a main character that we are meant to sympathize with, to have this trait in his personality/culture. In my opinion, Okonkowo feels the way he does about women because he has this urgent fear of being perceived as weak like his father. He is constantly trying to prove to himself, his family, and his father’s people in Umuofia that he is not lazy. Their culture must have some past in which they have associated women with weak, fragile spirits. To be honest, the reader doesn’t see much of those women in this book. Ekwefi and Ezinma are two prime examples of women in the novel who have quite strong-willed spirits. To bring up the theme of women again in the book, Okonkowo on more than one occasion mentions his wish that his daughter Ezinma had the right spirit to be a man and he often wished she had been born one instead of a female. Also, after killing Ikemefuna (though he was technically not supposed to be the one who did it) he became really sullen. He wouldn’t eat, he could barely sleep. He was very affected by this boy’s death; a boy he felt was a son to him. He finally snaps out of this depression and reminds himself that he’s killed other men in battle so he needs to shape up and stop acting like an old woman.
Okonkowo suppresses any urges he has that can be linked with femininity. He comments at one point that a man is not a man if he can’t control his women. Therefore, beating them is an acceptable practice if they are not in line. He often takes this too far, however, with beating his wife during peace week because she didn’t make him dinner, which is completely unacceptable to the village. He also uses his gun against Ekwefi in one scene and almost kills her, missing her just slightly due to poor aiming skills.
He also has this odd relationship with his other son, Nwoye. He sees his father more in him yet automatically sees him as too feminine (though he’s more like his lazy dad than any of his wives or daughters). He beats him regularly to make him into a man. Nwoye eventually gets caught up with the Christian missionaries and is renamed Isaac. Okonkowo basically disowns him from this point on.
Though Okonkwo is sexist, it was part of his people’s culture. In Umuofia, women do not have much social mobility. If they are beautiful, like Okonkwo’s daughters became, they were able to marry well but their lives depended solely on the family life. They were to keep their husbands happy and fed and the compounds clean. They do have some say in parts of their lives as seen when Ekwefi runs after Ezinma when she is abuducted in the night by the goddess Agbala working through the woman, Chielo. Okonkwo not only lets her go after after, he actually comes with his machete because he cares about their safety.
There is also evidence, as seen in the chapter when Okonkwo and his family return to his motherland of Mbanta, that not every culture in that region believed women were far inferior to men. There is that speech that Uchendu, an older and wiser man, gives about the motherland and the phrase “Mother is Supreme.” He primarily is speaking to Okonkwo and asks him two questions: “Can you tell me, Okonkwo, why it is that one of the commonest names we give our children is Nenka, or “Mother is Supreme?” and “Why is it that when a woman dies she is taken home to be buried with her own kinsmen? She is not buried with her husband’s kinsmen. Why is that? Your mother was brought home to me and buried with my people. Why was that?” (133-134) Okonkwo admits he doesn’t know the answer to these questions. Uchendu replies, “It’s true that a child belongs to its father. But when a father beats his child, it seeks sympathy in its mother’s hut. A man belongs to his fatherland when things are good and life is sweet. But when there is sorrow and bitterness he finds refuge in his motherland. Your mother is there to protect you. She is buried here. And that is why we say that mother is supreme.” (134) He also comments on the song that is sung when a women dies which says, “For whom is it well, for whom is it well? There is no one for whom it is well.” (135) This is evidence that there are some parts of the culture that do not view women as entirely negative. There is respect for women there.
As a woman in the 21st century, of course I am shocked to see how Okonkwo treated women and constantly associated them with weakness. However, if I step back from your own notions and beliefs, I still feel sympathy towards him as a character. It is odd, yes, but I don’t think his views damage the portrait Achebe creates of this pre-colonial people. It gives it vitality and realism actually. And like we said in class, were the people in the West at this time that were there to bring the Africans “culture” and “civilization” any better in their treatment towards women at this time? They were different, but not much better in their chauvinistic mindset. Okonkwo was a complicated character and, if he had been perfect, the realism and drama of this book would have been lost somewhat. I am more appalled by the district commissioner at the end of the book and Reverend James Smith than Okonkwo. I don’t condone killing an innocent child but I can say that I don’t understand what it was like to take orders from Oracles and “higher beings” so seriously. Achebe established a respect in me for these people so much, despite their “flaws,” that I do not take Okonkwo’s authoritative attitude towards women as something that lessens my sympathy towards him and the pre-colonial people of Umuofia.
I apologize for adding an extra "o" to Okonkwo's name a bunch of times in the above post. I just realized as I was reading it over. -Lindsey Amato
Okonkwo treats the women in his life as lesser figures. I completely agree with what Alycia said about how she thinks that Okonkwo acts in a way that he views will be the opposite of his father. Okonkwo's father is depicted as being a lazy man who was unable to accomplish anything. Thus, Okonkwo actively tries to escape this legacy by needing to have power. This is also shown in how he is a wrestling champion. I think that he falsely (sometimes) associates power with violence. This carries over to his relationships with females; I believe that he feels the need to assert himself as the dominant force and he mistakenly thinks that if he is violent he will do so. Okonkwo does not understand that to truly be a powerful man you do not prove this by using force, you do it by the strength of your character.
The motif of women in Okonkwo's life becomes an important part of the novel and adds a dynamic to the overall personality of him a character. It also helps paint a better picture of society at the time.
Okonkwo's fierceness with women and his compassion within reveal his complicated nature and the conflict he fights as being perceived as a strong unrelenting warrior and a loving husband/father figure. He loves his wives and certain children very much but as eglantine says " doesn’t want to be considered an “agbala”; he doesn’t want to be weak as his father was. All his life long he works a lot “to become one of the lords of the clan” (p. 131)."
To compensate for his father's reputation Okonkwo embodies every trait he feels his father was not, being a polar opposite he even afraid to show compassion and must be in control at all times. His control freak like mentality makes him very tense and irritable to the point of violence because it is impossible to control everything, especially other individuals.
The beating of one of his wives during peace week is a prime example of the rage he has created inside him. Through his peoples' most sacred time of year he still refused to let anything within his perceived grasp slide, including his wife doing anything that he did not authorize or directly instruct.
Okonkwo does however feel remorse after killing his adopted son. He strikes him down to not appear weak but morns significantly because he loved him so. This is one of the best personifications of Okonkwo's conflicting inner character.
However, back to women.
Although Okonkwo was fierce and violent, he wasn't totally out of line. Although others may not have abused their wives as Okonkwo did, women in Okonkwo's culture held somewhat of a service roll and were stuck in their social status. Although they were allowed some independence they basically were a part of property which the man owned (from my understanding).
Although Okonkwo was fierce at times, (although not right) he was somewhat justified through his culture and desire to appear masculine and strong.
I think part of the reason Achebe chose to make Okonkwo’s low opinion of women such a recurring theme was because it serves to accentuate the loss of the “manly” attitude and behaviors of his tribe when they will not fight the missionaries to preserve their way of life. One of the times when this attitude shows in the book is when he beats his wife during Peace Week even though he knows there will be consequences. It is not just his low opinion of women that makes his frustration clear, but also his low opinion of men without titles, those who do not feel the need to achieve. This attitude becomes clear when he calls the men who will not fight “womanly.”
Even though women are clearly subservient to men in the book, I don’t think it really compromises the sympathetic portrayal of the tribe. It took me a bit to get over my 21st century outrage at the position of women in the society portrayed, but I do realize that everything needs to be examined in the context of the times. When the story takes place, the majority of the world did not see women as equal to men. The fact that Achebe portrays this society as it was, rather than simply trying to appeal to the modern political correctness, is admirable and more edifying and even appealing.
I agree with what has been expressed before regarding the complicated portrayal of Okonkwo - both as an antihero, which he surely was, and to emphasize the contrast he has with his father as a man of actions and deeds rather than a man of sloth. But I think some of the discussion has gone too far and risks losing sight of the particular situation of the novel. It is right to interpret it in the light of our own lives, in one sense; but to extend to that a dominion over the story itself leads to the same sort of Conradesque trap Achebe warned against - that of the uncivilized versus the modern, the enlightened versus the savage.
Some of the terms used to describe Okonkwo here and in class have included "chauvinist," "sexist," terms generally used to describe a sense of disparity between the personhood to which (we believe) every human being is entitled and the extent to which Okonkwo disregards it as a result of gender. But what does it mean to call Okonkwo "sexist"? What does it mean to the Igbo? This term is fundamentally without meaning in the context of his place and time. His behavior is interpreted - and judged, as it will inevitably be - in the context of how it is viewed in his culture.
To speak of Okonkwo as a "sexist" passes just that judgment - it is impossible to call him that as though it is a fault of his nature. The village objects not to his beating his wife but to his doing so in the week of peace. Is what he did wrong? If it is, then it is a wrong committed by the entire village - something is just as wrong whether you do it or condone its being done. Are we thus to call his entire people "sexist"? You can if you like, but the term still MEANS nothing. In the context it is an empty idea, floating in space as an aspersion cast against a people with whom we lack a connection or understanding.
I do not think Achebe wishes to present us an opportunity to pass such judgment. But I do not also think Achebe wishes to present us a character with whom we sympathize. Rather, he says here is this character who lives like this, and here is what he says of his place and time - and here is what occurs when that place and time is disrupted. What may be the true tragedy of Okonkwo's story is not the way women are treated, the way twins are abandoned in the evil forest or any other evil we may find in it. It may be instead that because of the intervention of the British colonialists it becomes MORE likely, not less, that such actions continue - by mandating that it cease the British deprive them of the opportunity and responsibility, as free and conscientious people, to determine for themselves the moral problems associated with what we term sexism and to abandon such behavior. By making the decision for them the British associate "equality" with "oppression" and so devalue what we consider laudable, tainting it by colonial association. I think that this is what Achebe aims to express when the story ends with Okonkwo hanging from a noose - the entrance of the British is the death not just of the culture but of its potential to evolve and grow as ours has.
Like many have posted before me, I believe that Achebe pounds into our heads this attitude of hostility and sometimes even maliciousness by Okonkwo towards women because he wants the reader to understand how passionate Okonkwo is about keeping traditional order to the clan and its surrounding area that he has come to know and love and understand in his own way. Okonkwo, as we see from the many subservient positions he puts his wife and daughters in, is not a perfect man; he is tragic in his flaws, which goes the same for Mr. Smith, the District Commissioner, or anyone else for that matter. As Sasha said, we must take the attitude he displays toward women in the context of the times, and to that effect, there is more to be said for Okonkwo than his shortcomings. He is a passionate soul and will fight for every traditional ideal which gives meaning to the life he lives that the white man, the converted clansmen, and indolent people such as his father are trying to take away from him. This passion is only conveyed further by Achebe giving us a recurring theme of effeminate lowliness in Okonkwo’s mind.
As for the complications Okonkwo’s attitude towards women brings about in our sympathy for the pre-colonial polity, I think that it is exactly what Achebe wanted. In order to make this account more real and telling, sympathetic partialities need be done away with, tragic heroes inserted, and Igbo life of the time accurately described. In the end, we are left feeling a little disheartened, a little relieved, and perhaps unsettled about the customs of modern society and society at large, all at once.
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