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Analysis of chinua achebe's things fall apart
Critical analysis of chinua achebe's things fall apart
Analysis of chinua achebe's things fall apart
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In Chinua Achebe’s novel, Things Fall Apart, the traditional Ibo tribe is a very effective and lasting culture. They are the first to introduce many systems and traditions that we still use in society today. One of the major things the Ibo tribe introduces is the judial system, respect during conversation, hospitality, strength and masculinity. In Things Fall Apart, the author wants us to understand the Ibo tribe and feel sympathy for them, including Okonkwo.
In the beginning of the book, the Ibo shows their traditions and harmless ways. This peaceful tribe has many traditions. One of the main traditions is their type of respect. The first type of respect we see is the use of Kola nuts when visiting someone’s Obi(hut). Okoye comes to see Unoka. Unoka is Okonkwo’s father. Okonkwo is very ashamed of his father because Unoka is always borrowing money, doesn’t have a job and is weak. So Okoye comes to see Unoka one day and brings a Kola nut. “‘I have Kola,’ he announced when he sat down, and passed the disc over to his guest.”(1.6) To show respect, one brings a Kola nut to a person’s hut. This shows peace and hospitality. Another example of respect is communication. “Among the Ibos the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the palm-oil with which words are eaten. Okoye was a great talker and he spoke for a long time, skirting round the subject and then hitting it finally.” (1.14) The last example of their peaceful traditions are the stories they tell on rainy days.“At such times, in each of the countless thatched huts of Umuofia, children sat around their mother’s cooking fire telling stories, or with their father in his obi warming themselves from a log fire, roasting and eating maize. It was a brief resting ...
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...fashioned man and his son (Nwoye) reminds him of his father, who he wasn't fond of. Okonkwo is never going to convert because of his traditional beliefs. His son’s converting was a major factor that led to his suicide. Okonkwo would rather die as an Ibo than live to see his culture fall apart.
In Things Fall Apart, Achebe tries to convey sympathy and sorrow for his own tribe that gets destroyed. They are proud of their culture and are a peaceful tribe. The Ibo’s traditional beliefs relate to practices and systems that we still use today. Achebe is asking, why should what we have worked to hard to create and establish be disrespected and destroyed? The Christians had no right to secretly overthrow the Ibos. The main character, Okonkwo, gives up his own life because he did not want to see what means a great deal to him destroyed, but in the end, Things Fall Apart.
Moderata Fonte’s Venetian ladies debated the worth of women while cavorting in their fictional garden in 1605; Tempel Anneke met her unhappy fate in the 1660s. The seemingly enlightened and forward-looking feminist attitudes articulated in Fonte's text were absent from the Brunswick courtroom where the allegations against Tempel Anneke eventually brought about her death. The two accounts illustrate the differences in the attitudes towards women between European states during the 17th century. The differences are technically religiously based, however, they deal with the differences of the specific regional factors of the areas discussed. The differences explain why the attitudes of Fonte’s ladies and the persecutors of Tempel coexisted in roughly the same era. Fonte's ladies are Italian Catholics, and Anna's neighbors are German Protestants, therefore, the ideals of women are varied based on religious experience. Additionally, the theory of reason of state that came about with the consolidation of authority consisted of centralization and secularism that subordinated the social role ...
"Those of us in the first American generations have had to figure out how the invisible world the emigrants built around our childhoods fit in solid America." Maxine Hong Kingston is a native of Stockton, California, born in 1940. The essay, "No Name Woman", was taken from her book ,"The Woman Warrior" (1976). Kingston is , in her everyday life, surrounded by "ghosts" from her past cultural heritage. The role identity concept parallels Ms. Kingston's essay. In the role identity concept, factors surrounding us in our daily life are continuously shaping and reshaping who we are and what we will become. In this concept, taken from the structural school of symbolic interaction, we tend to conform our sense of self to adapt to individual social situations as we are exposed to them. The theory in the concept of role identity is that we all play different "roles" in society, on various levels , which can include our families, our workplaces, our peers, daily experiences, and even within ourselves. Therefore, we are continuously changing and evolving into our "sense of self". Kingston, born a Chinese-American, struggles with her sense of self as she attempts to balance her American lifestyle with that of her Chinese family's rich cultural beliefs; although, even as she begins to accept her "role identity" within her family structure, as an author, she realizes that she will be "haunted", merely by writing about it.
Edgar Allan Poe has been debated to be the author of the most dark and horrific pieces of literature. He was favored by many for his complex pieces of literature that have ultimately impacted the world of literature today. However, Poe’s pieces of work did receive harsh criticism before and after his death. Because Poe was generally known for his thought-provoking short stories, his short stories often received mixed reviews. One of Poe’s most arguable short stories is “The Fall of the House of Usher”. This short story was “regarded as an early and supreme example of the Gothic horror story” (Plot Summary: "The Fall of the House of Usher"). Poe himself described this piece as “arabesque” due to its ornate prose (Plot Summary: "The Fall of the House of Usher"). However, many critics disagreed with each other on their views of “The Fall of the House of Usher”.
It challenged his identity by losing his high title in the clan due to the change in the village as well as new customs. He responded to the clash of cultures by attempting to encourage others to fight in his mission to get rid of the Western influences in the Ibo community. Because he failed to do so, he lost hope and refused to accept the new culture which caused him to hang himself. The conflict between Okonkwo and his clan’s decision to change their way of living was portrayed through characterization and plot development. Achebe gives the people of Africa a voice with Okonkwo’s character who stayed true to his roots. In Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe reveals to us Okonkwo’s response as the cultural collision of the English and Ibo challenged his sense of
William James, a famous American philosopher, once stated, “The greatest revolution of our generation is the discovery that human beings, by changing the inner attitudes of their minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives”. This quotation effectively illustrates how change in one’s attitudes, perceptions, and beliefs can alter the environment in which one lives. This concept is clearly demonstrated throughout the novel Things Fall Apart, authored by Chinua Achebe, by establishing a connection through the development of its characters and the change in traditional African tribal villages seen in the Nineteenth Century. It will be established how various characters demonstrated by the author throughout the novel exemplify how change in one’s attitudes, perceptions, and beliefs can alter the environment in which one lives addressed by William James’s quote above. First, by analyzing Achebe’s development of Okonkwo’s character through his initial character description and the emergence of outsiders, it is evident that he is portrayed as an old fashioned character that is less responsive to change. Secondly, through examining Nwoye’s character, Okonkwo’s son, it becomes apparent that the youth in the novel are more open-minded, easily persuadable and more adaptive to societal changes. Lastly, uncovering the meaning behind the arrival of European missionaries, it becomes apparent that Achebe defines this group as being a “disease”, poisoning the society in which Okonkwo lives. The author look’s at individuals as being critical and influential figures in shaping the environment to which they belong, beginning with Okonkwo.
In Things Fall Apart, Achebe is able to express this embarkation with his division of the novel into two parts. The first part introduces Okonkwo along with his family’s beliefs and their origins, religions, etc. However, in the second part with the arrival of the Christian missionaries, the seeds of colonialism take root within the Ibo tribe and Okonkwo’s family, particularly in his son Nwoye. At the beginning, the missionaries are calm and peaceful. However, as time goes on they start to undergo their mission and start to denounce the Ibo’s gods as “false gods, gods of wood and stone.” At first, many are appalled and find their preaching laughable, but as they continue to thrive, people such as Nwoye begin to reach out. Because Nwoye is unable to forgive Okonkwo for his betrayal in killing his adopted brother, he converts to Christianity in an attempt to get back at his father for his crime. In addition, the missionaries’ hymn about brothers living in “darkness and fear,...
As a person of the Ibo people you are to do whatever you must to make your ancestors and the Gods happy and choosing otherwise is seen as turning your back on your ancestors. Because of this Okonkwo beats Nwoye for ‘turning’ against his ancestors and Gods, “‘Where have you been?... Answer me before i kill you!’ He seized a heavy stick that lay on the dwarf wall and hit him two or three savage blows” (Achebe 151). This was the last straw for Nwoye, he always knew he wasn't a favorite of his fathers so he left after his father beat him and went back to the Christians in hopes of finding
Before the arrival of the Europeans, Achebe did a excellent job portraying how the life of Igbo was before they were forced to oppose their own culture. To support this theme, Achebe included detailed descriptions of social rituals within each family, the justice system, religious practices and consequences, preparation and indulgence of food, the marriage process and the distributing of power within the men. Achebe shows how every man has an opportunity to prove himself worthy to achieve a title on the highest level, based merely on his own efforts. One may argue that the novel was written with the main focus on the study of Okonkwo’s character and how he deteriorates, but without the theme that define the Igbo culture itself, we would never know the universe qualities of the society that shaped Okonkwo’s life. The lives of the Igbo people was no different to the actual lives of the Ibos people back in the early days of Africa. Just like in Things Fall Apart, in actual African tribes there was never a ruler. “Very interesting thing about these villages is that there is no single ruler or king that controls the population. Decisions are made by including almost everyone in the village” (AfricaGuide). Using the theme, Achebe educated readers on by mirroring real African life in her
Iyasẹre, Solomon Ogbede. “Okonkwo's Participation in the Killing of His ‘Son’ in Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart: A Study of Ignoble Decisiveness.” Understanding Things Fall Apart: Selected Essays and Criticism. Troy, NY: Whitson, 1998. 129-40. Print.
Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart is a powerful novel about the social changes that occurred when the white man first arrived on the African continent. The novel is based on a conception of humans as self-reflexive beings and a definition of culture as a set of control mechanisms. Things Fall Apart is the story of Okonkwo, an elder, in the Igbo tribe. He is a fairly successful man who earned the respect of the tribal elders. The story of Okonkwo’s fall from a respected member of the tribe to an outcast who dies in disgrace graphically dramatizes the struggle between the altruistic values of Christianity and the lust for power that motivated European colonialism in Africa and undermined the indigenous culture of a nation.
How does Achebe depict Ibo culture in ‘Things Fall Apart’? Chinua Achebe’s, Things Fall Apart, is a story of a traditional village in Nigeria from inside Umuofia around the late 1800s. This novel depicts late African history and shows how the British administrative structure, in the form of the European Anglican Church, imposed its religion and trappings on the cultures of Africa, which they believed was uncivilized. This missionary zeal subjugated large native populations.
Throughout history, there have been many instances of people struggling to identify and cope with change and tradition, and this is no different in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart. Through most of the novel, Okonkwo, his family, and the villagers all experience this struggle. As the missionaries continue to live in the Evil Forest, they repeatedly gain village converts as a result of the Igbo beliefs constantly being proven inaccurate. Okonkwo’s son, Nwoye, converts because of confusion in what his people believe, and Okonkwo changes drastically as a person because of the missionaries’ arrival and actions.
Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart is an intense, yet beautiful novel on African colonial life in its entirety. Achebe guides his readers through the complexity of living as tribal members paying homage to his very own ancestors. The main character is Okonkwo whom is physically dominant and very ambitious. Okonkwo is in the Umuofia clan of the Igbo tribe. The novel focuses on his life in Umuofia with his three wives and children, his banishment from his village, and his struggle with the colonialism of the British culture and Christian missionaries. Okonkwo’s character is very tough and fears weakness of any kind. His eminent fear in weakness and failure were positive traits to have at most times throughout the novel. However, these traits caused him a many troubles in the end. In this novel, Achebe describes Okonkwo’s resistance towards weakness and the cultural and political issues plaguing the clans due to the religious struggles with the white society.
In Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe, the reader gets a look into how drastically one culture can change the traditions and lifestyle of another. The novel shows their influence mainly through the main character, Okonkwo, and his downfall throughout the story with the collision of the Ibo and Western culture. Achebe uses Okonkwo, a strong warrior and important male leader in his village, to show a person’s perspective of the invasion. He spent his entire life trying to prove that he is the strongest man, and he showed this both physically and emotionally in the beginning. He even killed Ikemefuna, a boy he called his son, and even after he was told not to have any hand in his killing by the Oracle because he did not want to feel weak by not
In many cultures, masculinity is often valued and portrayed in different ways. In Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, masculinity is an essential part of the Ibo culture and is displayed in a variety of ways. Okonkwo, the main character of the novel, is a great example of how masculinity varies in this culture. Okonkwo’s views of masculinity include showing little emotion, and using violence. These views sometimes depart from the views of his male counterparts, as shown through their reactions to his masculinity.