Escaping prisons through literary expression : a feminist study of Adichie and Walker's selected novels

Abstract

Gender role expectations are mostly influenced and perpetuated by patriarchy whereby women are marginalised by their surroundings while men are granted the will to do as they wish. The institution of patriarchy thrives on oppressing women in many ways and silencing them is one of those various ways. This study was prompted by the need to explore the experiences that surround African women and that of women in the African diaspora with regard to muted voices of marginalised females. Their inability to express themselves in the name of respecting culture and conforming to the expected behaviour as per their gender is majorly explored. The current study is a literary analysis of Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus (2005) which is narrated by fourteen- year-old Kambili. In it, Adichie explores patriarchy through the family of a strict catholic man by the name of Eugene Achike who stifles his family due to his strict supposed laws of God. Also, The Colour Purple (1982) by Alice Walker is analysed. In this epistolary novel, Walker documents the story of two sisters, Nettie and Celie, who become estranged as a result of their muffled conditions. While the contexts for the novels are distinctly different in many ways, they share oppressive ideologies towards women, which is the colonial experience in Africa. The aims and objectives of this study were met by using the Feminism, African feminism, Womanism theories and the concept of intersectionality as references. The findings indicate that sisterhood relationships and economic independence are huge emancipators for marginalised women.