Gender norms are prominent throughout many cultures and societies because they define a set of guidelines on how a certain gender should act. Gender roles allow people to develop fixed identities and even feelings of superiority or inferiority over others. In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, the main character, Okonkwo is an ideal representation of what it means to be a “man” in Ibo society. Okonkwo’s continuous urge to fit under gender roles in society eventually lead up to internal dispute. In Things Fall Apart, the rigid gender roles that Ibo men are expected to conform to influences the collision between Ibo and Western culture. Expectations for men, such as Okonkwo, to display masculinity, the need to hold a superior reputation and eventually, …show more content…
High achievements, such as holding a title in the clan, is one way to increase one’s reputation. In one scene, Okonkwo disheartens a clansmen who opposes his ideas. “Without looking at the man Okonkwo had said: ‘This meeting is for men.’ The man who had contradicted him had no titles. That was why he had called him a woman. Okonkwo knew how to kill a man’s spirit” (Achebe 26). This quote illustrates how high reputation is of great importance in Ibo culture, especially for men. Since women are supposed to have an inferior reputation as opposed to men, being compared to a woman is considered highly offensive. In addition, Okonkwo displays arrogance because he holds such a well-respected rank in society. Given that, the characteristic of being arrogant and pretentious causes him to reject European religion altogether. Okonkwo takes pride in his Ibo culture which makes it difficult for him to tolerate other religions. Consequently, this also increases the clash between the two cultures.
Lastly, Okonkwo’s resistance to comply under the Europeans paves way for the collision between the two distinct cultures. In chapter eighteen, Okonkwo tries to convince the Mbanta men to step up and take action against the Europeans who were invading their
Throughout Chinua Achebe’s novel, Things Fall Apart, it is made very apparent how much the main character, Okonkwo, values manliness. Despite the fact that Okonkwo lived quite a few centuries ago, his story still shares some similarities with the way men today are pressured to be masculine. Okonkwo’s desire to be masculine affects him by causing him to be violent towards his family, view women as lesser than him, and produce a view that men shouldn’t have emotions. In the end, this desire causes his downfall, eventually causing him to take his own life.
Okonkwo had a very negative response to the cultural collision the white men brought to the village, do you know why? In Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, a great man called Okonkwo goes through difficult times as many obstacles come in his path to lasting greatness. When the white men start preaching about Christianity Okonkwo starts to loss his sense of identity because he’s used to people listening to him as he was once one of the great leaders of Ibo and everyone was now listening to the white men. While the men continue to preach about Christianity Okonkwo response is to refuse it, he doesn’t want to be a part of it. His consequences because he refused to changed ended with him losing his life and his son.
To begin, Okonkwo's response to the Europeans shows how differences in customs and values can lead to conflict. When Okonkwo returns to Umuofia, he is surprised that his clan has been taken over by the Europeans and that people were starting to give up preserving their own religion and customs. When he confronts Obierika, Obierika explains to Okonkwo, “‘How do you think we can fight when our own brothers have turned against us? … Now he has won our brothers, and our clan can no longer act like one. He has put a knife on the things that held us together and we have fallen apart.’” Okonkwo feels betrayed as many of his clan members have left and joined the Europeans, showing the clash between Ibo culture and Western culture. The Ibo people value staying true to their own traditions while the
Okonkwo’s sense of identity was challenged with the introduction of Western ideas into the Ibo culture. Okonkwo started out in the book as a mean and violent man, but the cultural collision of the British colonists and Ibo people affected Okonkwo to the point of him taking his own life.
With the arrival of third-wave feminism, gender roles are an increasingly popular topic for discussion, and literature is an effective catalyst for it. This is shown through Chinua Achebe´s 1958 novel Things Fall Apart, which discusses the effects of European colonization on African society, using a fictional group of Igbo villages as an example. His main character is Okonkwo, an aggressive and powerful male figure in the community. He is a prime example of how male gender expectations can negatively affect people. As Achebe states, “fiction [is] entirely fictitious [but] it could also be true or false, not with the truth or falsehood of a news article but as to its disinterestedness, its intention, its integrity” (Franklin 3). Clearly, he writes with the purpose of conveying truths through the broader untruth of fiction, and so could not have unintentionally created a character with such problems that are glaringly caused by gender roles. The way that Okonkwo embodies stereotypical gender expectations for men makes clear how they can be toxic to everyone.
Through the demonstration of masculinity, Okonkwo represents what every man should be like in Igbo culture. In every household, the man was viewed
In Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, masculinity plays a prominent role in Ibo society as it defines a man’s strength and character. Nwoye struggles with the idea of masculinity as he wants to please Okonkwo by being aggressive and violent but ultimately rejects the role of masculinity by joining the Christian movement. Throughout the novel Okonkwo constantly tries to instill masculine traits into Nwoye. When Okonkwo is telling Nwoye and Ikemefuna “masculine stories of violence and bloodshed” (53). Nwoye states that he, “knew that it was right to be masculine and violent, but somehow he still preferred the stories that his mother used to tell” (53).
Domination and authority over women are reflected by the male characters in Things Fall Apart, specially the protagonist Okonkwo, as he oppresses his wives and overly abuse his power as the male dominator. At the beginning of the novel Okonkwo displayed, this trait as the monarch of the household “He ruled his household with a heavy hand. His wives, especially the youngest, lived in perpetual fear of his fiery temper, and so did his little children” (Acebe, 10). In the Igbo community men were the domineering sex and ruled over their families especially their wives. They treated their wives with disrespect and continuously let women live in fear. As stated above, males being more powerful than women limit woman capabilities and let them fear their husband. Throughout the book the author gives a clear idea that within the Igbo culture they live in a patriarchy society and as proven above the males continuously withhold this dominate role in their household.
Masculinity Displayed by the worst, Okonkwo In Things Fall Apart by, Chinua Achebe masculinity is shown from the beginning, the ideal man supports and provides for his family; and shows off his strengths and expertise on the battlefield. Okonkwo spends the majority of his time expressing his masculinity and often ignoring family values and discrediting feminism. In the Igbo culture, men and women have specifically assigned roles and they balance each other out. Because Okonkwo is extremely concerned with being hyper-masculine his life is unbalanced.
Some of the Ibo people buy into the new religion and convert, while others find it abhorrent and rebel against. No one supports the idea of being against Christianity more than Okonkwo, who thinks that the men are all turning into women, that the people are weak and need to alienate the new beliefs and that they need to stand up for what they believe in just like him. Okonkwo was reflecting that he sees the clan “breaking up and falling apart” (Achebe 183). His strong, gritty nature comes out clearly in this struggle, as he fights to keep his previous way of life even when all his peers are giving into the wild idea of the white man’s
Every culture sets standards on how a male and a female should be. This can be seen in the novel, Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe that the protagonist does all he can to keep up with these gender expectations his cculture sets for him. The protagonist, Okonkwo, lives in a town in Nigeria called Umofia during the 19th century which is a pre-colonial time. In Things Fall Apart, gender expectations build burdens such as men can not show emotions, women have to be submissive, and men must have titles.
Historically, women have been viewed as inferior to men due to a female's lack of physical strength. In the candid novel, Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe clearly defines gender roles; women are the caretakers and cooks- simply existing to satisfy men’s desires. Although “Things Fall Apart portrays the women as weak ,inferior, and being put in their place by men; however, Achebe also notes their importance during several parts of the story. By incorporating powerful dialogues and scenes to develop gender conflicts, Achebe uses the completely divergent character of Okonkwo, who constantly strives to achieve manliness to demonstrate that although women in the Igbo society are important, they are not treated as such. Chinua Achebe, the author suggests that there is a constant conflict which exists between the two genders and the expectations of the roles in which each of them must play.
The only thing he (Okonkwo) fears most is not ending up like his father, Unoka. However, Achebe ‘‘makes an insightful comment on the nature of masculinity through his representation of the tribal leaders. Achebe basically, was conducive in creating four alter egos of Okonkwo: one of which were the masculinity; next of his fatherly abilities; and the last of his family progress and four of his likelihood of success’’ (Achebe.179). My paper will explain how Okonkwo’s Masculinity from Achebe’s Things Fall Apart will be characterized by his fears, beliefs, and emotions for several reasons.
The novel Things Fall Apart took place in the Igbo Society-the part of the world that has very strict views on gender roles, but not just gender roles. It is likely that every individual in the Igbo society viewed or defined masculinity differently. To some, masculinity was expressed through anger and violence; to others, masculinity was expressed through a man’s responsibility. These different views on masculinity can create conflicts and can therefore impact individual's life. In the novel Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo and Obierika different interpretations of masculinity led them to a different life and such intention was successfully introduced through Achebe’s uses of foil characters.
In most cultures an individual’s gender will influence their characterization. For instance, Ibo tribes in Africa classify people according to their gender. Women are thought as submissive individuals who are to some extent weaker than men. Men on the other hand are thought of as strong beings with much expected from them. Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart strongly emphasizes on the categorization of masculinity and femininity in the society of Ibo tribes. Throughout the book, Okonkwo’s idea about masculinity situates him with respect to his community. In his community Okonkwo is greatly praised for his masculine traits. It is Okonkwo integration with masculinity that leads to him becoming an