AFFUM GLORIA MANKONTIA

GENDER REPRESENTATIONS ACROSS PROVERBS: A STUDY OF

ANGLOPHONE AND FRANCOPHONE NOVELS

INTRODUCTION

This work will investigate gender representations embedded in proverbs across selected

anglophone and francophone novels. Africans are noted to convey sensitive and important

concepts through indirection, especially proverbs. The argument of this study is that one may

understand an African society therefore by knowing and understanding their proverbs.

Incidentally, however, the variable historical orientations of anglophone and francophone

neighbours in the West African sub-region makes one anticipate that they will have variable

cultural orientations, belief systems and ideological conceptualizations. For this reason, I

intend, in the course of the PhD to explore two anglophone novels (Things Fall Apart and

The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born) and two francophone novels (So Long A Letter and

The African Child). As Butler argues, gender roles are constructed by society. This study

therefore explores how anglophones and francophones view males and females using novels

from these regions as my anchor.

PROBLEM STATEMENT

African literature in European languages, otherwise known as “Euro-African literature”

(Bandia 28) is the product of an encounter between two different cultures – European and

African. The four literary texts in the proposed research are of anglophone and francophone

background. These are two contexts that capture different realities. The anglophones

experienced British indirect rule which did not stand between Africans and their culture

whereas the French colonial administration introduced the colonial policy of assimilation and

direct rule where French values were imposed on the affected colonies’ people and cultures.

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Though anglophones and francophones are both Africans, one wonders how they will reflect

their historical antecedents through what they write. For instance, one expects the anglophone

to present their message through cultural narrative models including proverbs. Will the

francophone equally express himself or herself through Afrocentric narrative models? And

when they do what will be their world view on specific issues and how different or similar

will they be from those of the anglophone. According to Hussein (2005), “a gender study

based on proverbs from a single society does not provide a fuller understanding of the

ethnocultural construction of masculinity and femininity in Africa” (63). Hence, a closer look

at how anglophones and francophones construct gender identity would aid the “fuller

understanding” of the ethnocultural constructs Hussein calls for.

THEORETICAL FOCUS

1. Gender Performativity and construction (Butler)

2. Critical Discourse Analysis (Fairclough)

3. Intertextuality

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

1. What roles are males and females assigned in proverbs from the anglophone and

francophone novels of this study?

2. How does the variable worldviews of anglophones and francophones reflect in their

conceptualizations of gender?

3. How do gender representations through proverbs from novels of this study empower

or suppress/frustrate the genders?

LITERATURE REVIEW

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It is important to acknowledge here that there have been numerous studies conducted on most

African novels in general. Most of the studies, however, have focused on the thematic

concerns of the novels as well as the style of the writers. For example, Mwinlaaru (2012)

focused on the stylistics and point of view of Achebe’s Anthills of the Savanna.

Adjei (2009) examines narrative subjectivity in the first three novels of Amma Darko, taking

into consideration “the condescending manner in which Darko treats her male characters”

(48) which reveals the position of the writer in relation to the issues explored in the texts.

From “a feminist (con)text, this tends to subordinate the writing process to the pleasures,

prejudices and the ideological and pedagogic intentions of the writer as a woman” (47). The

study views Darko's portrayal of the male as an opportunity to vent up feelings about the

treatment of the African woman over the years.

In a similar work analysing a novel, Akçesme (2010) examined the gendered discourses in

the novels of three writers to investigate how the writers linguistically construct their

characters as gendered beings as an effect of certain identity politics, ideologies and power

structures. Critical discourse analysis was applied to selected passages chosen from different

parts of the novels to prove that the gendered discourses were ideologically driven.

In relation to proverbs, Hussein (2009) studies how gendered ideology is discursively framed

in some sexist proverbs selected from Ethiopia, Kenya and Sudan. Diabah and Amfo (2015)

also examine the representation of women in Akan proverbs by focusing on only the

linguistic strategies employed in such proverbs. It therefore becomes clear that gender

representations in proverbs in novels are yet to be explored from anglophone and

francophone perspectives. This study will therefore look at both the masculine and feminine

constructs in proverbs in these selected texts so as to elicit the gender-related ideologies of

the anglophones and francophones.

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METHODOLOGY

The study will adopt the close reading textual analytical approach. This is because it will

assist greatly in answering the research questions which guide this study. Proverbs that relate

to men and women will be selected from the various selected literary texts. Using the

thematic analysis, the proverbs will then be put into several themes based on the researcher’s

interpretation of these proverbs within their social context.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Adjei, M. "Male-bashing and narrative subjectivity in Amma Darko's first three novels."

SKASE Journal of Literary Studies (2009): 47-61.

Akçesme, I B. Comparative Discourse Analyses of Gender Constructions in the novels of

Robert Heinlein, Ursula le Guin, Joanna Russ and Samuel Delany. Middle East

Technical University : PhD Thesis , 2010.

Armah, Ayi Kwei. The Beautyful Ones are Not Yet Born. Boston : Houghton Mifflin, 1968.

Bâ, Mariama . So Long a letter . London: Heinemann, 1981.

Bandia , Paul. Translation as Reparation: Writing and Translation in Postcolonial Africa.

Manchester : St. Jerome Publishing, 2009.

Diabah, Grace and Nana Aba Appiah Amfo. "Caring Supporters or Daring Usurpers?

Representation of Women in Akan Proverbs." SAGE Journal. Discourse and Society

26.1 (2015).

Fonchingong, Charles. "Unbending Gender Narratives in African Literature." Journal of

International Women's Studies 8.1 (2006): 135-146.

Hussein, J W. "The Social and Ethno-cultural Construction of Masculinity and Feminity in

African proverbs." African Study Monographs 26.2 (2005): 59-87.

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Hussein, Jeylan Wolyie. "Women in Sample Proverbs from Ethipia, Sudan, and Kenya."

Research in African Literatures 40.3 (2009): 96-108.

Kolawole, Mary E. Modupe. Womanism and African Consciousness. Trenton: Africa World

Press, 1997.