THE MUSLIM WOMAN'S BODY AS A SPEAKERLY TEXT: THE GENDERED EMBODIMENT OF RELIGION, TRAUMA AND SHAME IN ABUBAKAR ADAM IBRAHIM'S SEASON OF CRIMSON BLOSSOMS (original) (raw)
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The Woman’s Body as Alternative Canvass of the Nigerian Civil War
Transcultural Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences
This paper examines the inscriptions of the harsh realities of the Nigerian civil war on women using a selected text, Roses and Bullets, written by the prolific author, Akachi Adimora-Ezeigbo. One of the objectives of the study is to explore the various abuses a woman’s body is subjected to, and the role the woman plays in transforming her body from an inordinate object to a site of power, of survival and of hope. In feminist discourses, the issue of the woman’s body is relevant in the explication of texts. The paper will adopt the feminist theory of embodiment to critique the relationship of women’s bodies to Geographies. Since stories are located in time, and since time explains many important historical events like war, we carry out a textual analysis of the exploitation of the female body during the Nigerian civil war, with one of the findings being that women respond readily to healing, as they are willing to forgive, put past abusive experiences behind them, and look forward to a better future. Keywords: Women; Nigerian Civil War; Violence; Bodies; Powe
This article is predicated on the view that African Muslim women do not necessarily perceive Islam or Islamic practice as incompatible with their goals and aspirations of education, independence or leadership. Drawing on the representations of the hijab in three African novels, this paper will simultaneously affirm and challenge certain orientations within African and particularly African feminist theories vis-a´-vis African Muslim women and Islam. In responding to the claims by certain African feminist thinkers that Islam is incompatible with female leadership, that African Muslim women mostly practice Islam against their will and that forms of Islamic practice, in this case the hijab, are of little religious significance to African Muslim women, this paper will demonstrate that not only do African Muslim women choose to practice Islam by consciously and voluntarily situating themselves as agents of Islamic practice, but, in so doing, they, in fact, embody leadership, education, independence and consequently a re-affirmation of their religious identity. Islamic practice among African Muslim women, as will be explored in this analysis of the hijab, therefore, is infused with a deeper religious meaning and it cannot be convincingly concluded that the women have little regard for it.
Traumatic legacies, when unaddressed, continue to haunt the psyches and cultural collectives not only of survivors, but also of subsequent generations. As these legacies are transmitted across multiple generations, they inevitably return and disrupt human bonds. Testimony, in its curative capacity, allows recovery from the traumatic event. In the Algerian context, however, because the historic accounts of war have undermined the trauma that women experienced, by simply excluding them from any public discourse, the possibility of testimony for the victimized women was thwarted, and with it the ability of working through their trauma and recovering. In La Femme sans Sépulture (2002), Assia Djebar, the Algerian female writer, is concerned with this lingering wound of war and how to break history’s great silence over its devastating effects on women’s lives. Through the fictional world it created, her story offers a plethora of testimonies, released from bodily or psychic wounds, all female and trans-generational, concerning the female traumatic experiences of violence and death. The heroine Zoulikha, killed but never found or entombed, parades the story as a ghost that is conjured up by a number of female characters who, in their need to resurrect her, give voice to their missing testimonies that have been for so long muted or muffled. This paper will investigate the extent to which storytelling can ensure working through trauma and promote trans-generational psychic healing. Keywords: trauma, testimony, female storytelling, memory, Algerian war of independence