Colonial Education, Identity and Gender in Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o's Weep Not, Child (1964) and Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions (1988) : A Comparative Study
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Date
2025
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Publisher
Université Mouloud Mammeri Tizi Ouzou
Abstract
This dissertation is a comparative analysis of Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o's Weep Not, Child (1964)
and Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions (1988). It focuses on Colonial Education,
Identity and Gender. The analysis is based on postcolonial theoretical frameworks that
consider cultural hybridity, gender experiences, and linguistic imperialism. These frameworks
have helped us analyze identity crises and cultural alienation caused by colonial education in
postcolonial African societies. The research particularly highlights the manner in which
education, although promoted as a path to empowerment and liberation, was used as a means
of control and displacement. Having read both novels in close detail, we come to the
following results: first, Ngũgĩ and Dangarembga uncovered colonial education as a symbolic
domination that alienates individuals from their native identity and values. Second, both
novels stress the gendered character of this alienation, especially in the experience of Tambu,
who has to face both colonial and patriarchal oppression through colonial education. Finally,
the research reveals that the authors are in favor of decolonization and cultural recovery by
illustrating the individual and collective suffering endured by their characters. Weep Not,
Child and Nervous Conditions are thus literary records witnessing the protracted battle for
identity, defiance, and self-definition in the postcolonial context
Description
56p. ; (+CD-Rom)
Keywords
Colonial Education, Gender Experiences, Identity, Patriarchal Oppression, Postcolonial context
Citation
Literature and Civilization