The women's role in the three distinct cultures depicted in Things Fall Apart

          Things Fall Apart is divided into three parts, and in each part women are depicted a bit differently. For my essay, I shall focus on evidence from all three sections to discover what commentary Achebe seems to be making concerning feminism.

          In the first part of the novel, in Okonkwo’s fatherland, males are dominant. This is depicted from the minute it is first stated that Okonkwo “had just married his third wife” (Achebe 7). For instance, only a man can harvest the prized yam, for “yam, the king of crops, was a man’s crop” (Achebe 20). Additionally, it is accepted for a man to beat a wife who has caused him any degree of annoyance or anger; in fact, when Okonkwo beat his wife during the “Week of Peace” because he “was provoked to justifiable anger by his youngest wife, who went to plait her hair at her friend’s house and did not return early enough to cook the afternoon meal” (Achebe 25), he is told, “your wife was at fault, but even if you came into your obi and found her lover on top of her, you would still have committed a great evil to beat her” (Achebe 26). His wife was merely running late, and yet she was still technically deserving of a beating. As can be seen, woman are not treated too kindly in Okonkwo’s village.

            In the second part, Okonkwo is banished to his motherland. There, women are placed in an equilvalently important, but different, role than men. The elder of the village depicts this idea, stating that “A man belongs to his fatherland when things are good and life is sweet. But when there is sorrow and bitterness he finds refuge in his motherland. Your mother is there to protect you” (Achebe 111). Additionally, the elder asks Okonkwo “Have you not heard the song they sing when a woman dies? ‘For whom it is well, for whom is it well? There is no one for whom it is well” (Achebe 112). In his motherland, women are held up to a comparable level as men.

            In the third part of the novel, the white man appears. Therefore, it is important to see how women are revered in the white man’s culture, and perhaps the most compelling evidence is depicted in a conversation between the messenger and Okonkwo, where the messenger states that “They have a queen” (Achebe 147). The white man appears to revere women more than even Okonkwo’s motherland, as they are ruled by a women.

            So, my essay will focus of how females are depicted in the three parts of the novel and in the three different cultures those parts depict, noting the differences and how the woman’s role seems to have increasing important in each part. 


Additionally, I will scan the novel to see if there is any reference to a differing role for women in Ikemefuna's culture or in any other culture for that matter. I will also try to focus on Ezinma, Okonkwo's daughter, as he frequently thinks to himself that "She should have been a boy" (Achebe 54).

Are we a Technopoly?

Technology is a good thing. It makes jobs simpler and more productive. It takes less people to make more things. It gives us luxury and frees us from worry. Technology makes our lives better overall. Right?

Of course, if technology is making jobs easier, shouldn’t there be more free time? Yet all this extra time seems to do is give us more time to work. And if technology is reducing our worry, why does it seem that there is still so much to worry about? In fact, a lot of worries are related to technology, from worry that your computer isn’t up-to-date or worry that a foreign oppressed nation will launch weapons of mass destruction at us. What should make our lives more stress free seems to be making it stressful, and yet we appear to be caught in a cycle from which we can’t escape: we try to fix our old problems and create more free time by using the same old method of technology.

            In Technopoly, Postman discusses the how the United States has become a Technopoly. Now, in today’s era of rapid technological growth, most countries focus on technology. Postman calls most of these countries Technocracies. However, the difference between a Technocracy and a Technopoly is that, in a Technocracy, there still exist things such as religion and traditions. “Technocracy did not completely destroy the traditions of the social and traditional world” (Postman).

            Postman argues that a Technopoly is a bit harsher to old customs. He state’s that Technopolies “eliminates alternatives to itself in precisely the way Aldous Huxley outlined in Brave New World. It does not make them illegal. It does not make them immoral It does not even make them unpopular. It makes them invisible and therefore irrelevant.” Frederick W. Taylor states the underlying focus of a Technopoly: “the belief that the primary, if not the only, goal of human labor and thought is efficiency” (Postman). Therefore, everything inefficient, like religion and intellect, must be done off with.

I can see how this ties in with the novel. Brave New World is a technopoly, as the inefficient have been made obsolete to the people. They still exist, but there is no use for them. People find meaning in efficiency and technology. It is a painful sight to see, for humanity has been sacrificed for efficiency. And isn’t the whole point of efficiency to please the human?
            However, I think it is a bit extreme for Postman to consider America a Technopoly. In fact, he states “The United States is the only culture to have become a Technopoly” (Postman) Sure, Americans do have quite a dependence on technology, but they have not replaced old world customs with it. America still has religion, and people still spend time just enjoying and not being efficient. We are not yet the slave of technology. It still works for us. 

Singularity

Singularity. The merging of man and machine. Absurd, right? After all, how could people continue being people when they have binary codes enhancing their thought process? Sure, people would be smarter and more efficient, but there’s more to life than efficiency. Humanity shouldn’t be abandoned to produce efficiency.

In the article “2045: The Year Man Becomes Immortal”, several convincing points are presented to show that singularity is a very potential future. First off, in 1965 a machine was able to compose music. A machine created art. This began to blur the lines between machines and humans, for “creating a work of art is one of those activities we reserve for humans and humans only” (Grossman).

Of course, at this point and time, machines can be very good at specific things but they fall short at being as adaptable as humans. “The kind of intelligence Kurzweil is talking about, which is called strong AI or artificial general intelligence, doesn’t exist yet” (Grossman). However, chances are that it will at the rate technology increases. According to Kurzweil, “technological progress happens exponentially, not linearly” (Grossman).

I do not believe that singularity is a good thing. Sure, it would make people more intelligent and increase our lifespan. There does not seem to be any fault. It’s like the “utopian” world of Brave New World; there would be less sadness, more efficiency, and everything would be better. Right?

But humanity is imperfection. Singularity seeks to eventually eliminate all of humanity’s imperfection. This is similar to Brave New World, were, as the controller says, the primary goal is “stability. Stability. The primal and the ultimate need. Stability. Hence all this.” (Huxley 41).

So singularity would make everything much more efficient, but at the cost of humanity. People will still be around, of course, but eventually, they won’t even be people any more.

Technology at this point isn’t bad, because we are still detached. It is a large part of our lives, but it is not part of us yet. If we choose to, we can escape from it. Once it is implanted in us, though, there is no escape. Imperfection will eventually be abolished, and with it the very thing that makes us human. Humanity is imperfection. Singularity is not. 

            Alex C. Hawley wrote the short essay, “Revisiting H.G. Wells' Depiction of Science and Religion in War of the Worlds”, in order to examine what the novel War of the Worlds states about both Science and Religion. However, the author does not limit himself to examining only the text in the novel; rather, he also looks at examples in the film that came out half a century later. Not only that, but the first three paragraphs are spent giving background information on the history of the science and religion debate. The essay is a tad on the short side, but the author still makes a compelling examination of what the novel and film of War of the Worlds states about how science and religion hold up in the face of catastrophe.

            The first and foremost thing that caught my attention when examination the style of this piece was that nearly half of it wasn’t about the novel at all; a good portion of the essay looked the background of the science vs. religion controversy and the film War of the Worlds.

            It was not until this year that I seriously considered that outside material would be a good addition to an essay about a novel. I always figured that if the novel was your main subject, than nearly your entire essay should be spent discussing it. However, the background information helps to understand the environment in which the novel was produced, thus helping us understand the context. Additionally, I felt like the analysis of the movie, which was adapted to fit its more modern environment, reflects how people have changed from now to then. All in all, I felt like this focus on things besides the novel bettered the discussion about the novel and helped the essay as a whole

            Another unexpected thing about this essay is the counterpoint that is presented at the end. Prior to the last two paragraphs, the author was stating that the book was advocating technology over religion. However, in the last two paragraphs, it is noted that it could have been religion and God that ultimately defeated the Martians. It seemed strange that the author was bringing up contradictory evidence to the thesis he seemed to be headed towards. In writing an essay, it seems foolish to give support to the side your opposing. It means that you are lacking a “strong thesis”. However, in the end, by tying the two together, I feel that his analysis became all the more powerful.

            It leads me to believe that a weak thesis that does not focus on a central point may be effective as well. In other words, there is no definitive answer. You simply analyze the evidence the book presents for both sides of the argument and then, in turn, give that information back to the readers, in order that they make their own assessment. I feel that many analyses of the deep meanings of books are not what the author intended. Therefore, it is important to present evidence for all sides, as the situation is not as black and white as it seems.

My Philosophy on Life, Contained in a Song.

From Jack Johnson's song, "Breakdown":


"But you can't stop nothing
If you got no control
Of the thoughts in your mind
That you kept and you know.


You don't know nothing
But you don't need to know
The wisdom's in the trees
Not the glass windows


You can't stop wishing
If you don't let go
But the things that you find
That you lose, and you know


You keep on rolling
Put the moment on hold
The frames too bright
So put the blinds down low"


(Little fun fact. My birthday is 4/26. This segment is 26 seconds long and divided into 4 segments of 4 lines each. Funny little coincidence.)