Masculinity in Things Fall Apart by Chinua Okonkwo

1830 Words4 Pages

Things Fall Apart: Okonkwo’s Masculinity
The Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe is a straight to the point story, embedded with interesting elements that capture readers’ attention. In my view, when I read the story, I found many interesting things about the theme of the book. But The Masculinity Okonkwo was what captures my attention. The story opens up to a Traditional Igbo lifestyle, a theme which is highly stylized from its ritual to the actions performed for certain ceremonies. Most of the action Igbo tribe has been an attempt to show respect to the gods, for example, when ikemefuna became sick and his stomach swelled up their traditions says that he take them to the evil forest and kill him. The story also seems to focus on gender, family, respect and reputation, and religion. In fact, Gender which in Igbo tradition, sets standards and roles between Igbo women and men. Women in Igbo Culture are the weaker sex, but are endowed with qualities that make them worthy of worship, like the ability to bear children. Men in Igbo Culture are the stronger sex, which gives them the ability to provide for their family and has prowess on the battlefield. In Igbo culture, building a nice and respectable family is important and titles in their culture gives them respect and builds reputation in the ‘‘Umuofia’’ village playing a big role in Igbo tradition. Nothing plays a bigger role in Igbo tradition than religion, the ‘‘Umuofia’’ village worship the goddess of the earth are always careful to avoid committing sins of their goddess with a fear of vengeance that might wipe out an entire generation. In the story, the men of the Umuofia village seem to care a lot about masculinity, when Okonkwo is hosting a party he takes it very seriously and ...

... middle of paper ...

...ton, 2009. Print.

Criswell, Stephen. "Okonkwo As Yeatsian Hero: The Influence of W. B. Yeats on Chinua

Achebe's Things Fall Apart." The Literary Criterion 30.4: 1-14. Rpt. in Contemporary
Literary Criticism. Ed. Jeffrey W. Hunter. Vol. 127. Detroit: Gale Group, 2000.
Literature Resource Center. Web. 9 May 2014.

Bennett, Robert. "An overview of Things Fall Apart." Literature Resource Center. Detroit:
Gale, 2014. Literature Resource Center. Web. 9 May 2014.

Howell, Brian M. "Things Fall Apart." Christianity Today 05 2013: 70. ProQuest.
Web. 3 May 2014.

"Masculinity in Things Fall Apart." StudyMode.com. StudyMode.com, Web. 04 2011

Scanlon, Paul ‘‘Things Fall Apart: On Masculinity’’. Cornell University. Sept. 2005. Print. http://www.docstoc.com/docs/109642868/THINGS-FALL-APART-ON-MASCULINIT http://reading.cornell.edu/reading_project_05/documents/Scanlon.pdf

Open Document