In the novel Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga, the theme of
female rebellion is displayed throughout the book and can be seen
In the novel Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga, the theme of
female rebellion is displayed throughout the book and can be seen by
the characters Nyasha and Maiguru. The main cause of their rebellious
act is their struggle with female oppression. The colonized education
that Nyasha and Maiguru receive initiates the awareness that women are
living in oppressed conditions. This essay will set out to discuss
that even though a woman is educated, she is forced to be inferior to
men.
Nyasha is a young black African girl who spends her formative years in
England receiving an education. Nyasha experiences assimilation into a
new English culture. However, with no education in her Shona language
or identity in her African traditions and customs, Nyasha gets a sense
of alienation from her native African culture when she says, “They do
not like my language, my English because it is authentic, and my Shona
because it is not.”(p196) Her school mates dislike her for her white
mannerisms and she has no Shona mannerisms to fall back on. Nyasha is
stuck in the middle and her struggle to make a place for herself in
society leads to her rebellious ways.
Nyasha has had the benefit of a British education and knows first hand
what kind of lives women in Europe lead. She sees women who are
modern with mini skirts and women who are independent and can lead
their own lives. After living this way
of life and then being placed back into Africa, Nyasha must deal with
a major culture shock. Having such a vast education and knowing a
certain way of life, she can’t help but rebel against r...
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...ght in the modern education and it leads to
her breakdown. Nyasha realizes she is stuck in the middle, “I’m not
one of them but I’m not one of you.”(p201) Nyasha has no memories of
traditions and customs to
silence her voice. This is a major disadvantage for Nyasha because she
is only behaving by what was taught to her.
This novel displays that being modern does not indicate people will be
happy or advance in life. Maiguru was educated but that led to her
outlook on her culture and traditions to evolve. Maiguru received her
English education late in life so she would never be totally free of
her oppressed way of life, but by encouraging Tambu to attend Scared
Heart she is starting a change in the cycle. Tambu is young enough
that she has a firm sense of her identity and to mix that with a
colonial education she will not end up in exile as Nyasha did.
what is for her and how she wants to live. So in the end, she is where she
right to express what she feels, and fights for her right to do what she wants
a passage from the letter she is writing to add a personal feel to the
to him; and that he can give and take as he pleases. Therefore, she's willing to accept the
There are a couple of main points that stood out to me when I was reading the article by Yarhouse about sin and its influence on psychopathology. One of these points was the different terminology used to when discussing pathology. The author talked about various ways people chose to describe pathology and how these terms influence how we perceive pathology. The second point that I found to be important, was the Christian explanation of pathology and how this can influence psychology. I think that this point is crucial because as Christians, we have a unique perspective on psychopathology that can be very beneficial to the field of psychology as a whole.
that he is the one for her, and that he stands out from everyone else.
She is free and seen as a more confident and tenacious woman. She begins to do things she never thought of doing. She begins to have more confidence in herself.
Anxiety disorders are the 2nd most diagnosed mental illness in the United States. Anxiety comes from the “fight or flight” physiological response in ones body. The fear a person experiences is an intense emotional alarm accompanied by a surge of energy in the autonomic nervous system. The surge is what motivates us to flee from danger, cueing the “flight” response. However, some anxiety is good for us in moderate amounts. Most people perform better when we are a little anxious (Yerkes & Dodson, 1908). Anxiety can improve test performance or make you more energetic and charming on a date. It improves, social, physical, and intellectual performance. In fact little would get done if we didn’t have any anxiety. However anxiety can be negative as well. The most common symptoms are looking worried and anxious or fidgeting. That is pretty normal for most people. These symptoms are a physiological response that starts in the brain. It elevates the heart rate and creates muscle tension. Most of the research has been done with animals. Animals seem to experience anxiety in a similar way to ...
The nervous system includes the brain and spinal cord of the central nervous system and the ganglia of the peripheral nervous system. The functional unit of the nervous system is a neuron. It is estimated 100 billion neurons reside in the brain with some neurons making anywhere between 10,000 to 100,000 connections with other cells! A distinctive class of neurons, mirror neurons discharge both when the individual executes a motor action and when he/she observes another individual performing that same or similar action. These mirror neurons were discovered by neurophysiologists in the 1990s at the University of Parma, Italy. Using macaque monkeys, these researchers found that neurons of the rostral part of the inferior premotor cortex were activated both when the monkey made goal-directed hand movements (grasping, holding, & tearing) and when the monkey observed specific hand movements done by the experimenters (Pellegrino, et al., 1992). In a monkey’s inferior frontal and inferior parietal cortex, it is estimated that about 10% of neurons have “mirror” properties.
and identifying as an average woman for a large part of her life, she takes on the persona of a
...e could explore her own intuitions and be her own self, and like most women, it was a dream she had longed for since birth.
Identity-“Ones personal qualities.”Identiy is something only he or she can fully define. My uncle says I am affectionate,cheerful, and calm. My grandmother sees me as slim, pretty and sweet. My dad described me as perky, cheerful and happy, my mom says beautiful, gentle, and self-conscious. These adjectives describe me accurately, yet they are only abstract versions of me. Adjectives cannot begin to describe me and I aknowlege these descriptions for what they are, a condensed translation from my outward self to the world. It is impossible for anyone to understand me completely because nobody has experienced the things I have. My mother has never cherished a raggedy doll named Katie and my father never spent hours upon hours making collages and scrap books for his future children. My uncle never hid in the back of a pick-up-truck and traveled four hours to New York and my grandmother has never walked hours in the rain looking for the Queen of England. My identity is something only I can define.
... it. At the end they bestow the feeling of exposure that in spite of her uncertainty, there is something in her, which keeps her close by.
“There is no such thing as pure pleasure; some anxiety always goes with it”- Ovid
as far as to declare her love as the sole reason for her existence in