Autor
Milena Bubenechik
Trauma Novels in Postcolonial Literatures: Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Conditions,
and Tomson Highway, Kiss of the Fur Queen
ISBN: 978-3-8428-4320-2
Herstellung: Diplomica® Verlag GmbH, Hamburg, 2012
Zugl. Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf, Düsseldorf, Deutschland, MA-Thesis /
Master, 2012
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2
Table of Contents
1. Introduction...3
1. 2 Trauma Studies, Identity and Literature...5
1.3 The Approach to Trauma in the Novels...8
2. Nervous Conditions...10
2.1 Colonialism and Patriarchy ...10
2.1.1 The Effects of Gendered Ideology ...12
2.1.3 The Burden of Femininity ...18
2.2 Identity and Hybridity...21
2.2.1 The Distortion of Identity...23
2.2.3 The Ambiguity of White Masks...31
2.3 Trauma and Resistance ...35
2.3.1 The Trauma of Colonisation ...38
2.3.2 Tambu's Resistance ...42
2.3.3 Nyasha's Resistance ...44
2.3.4 The Female Empowerment and Conclusion...47
3. Kiss of the Fur Queen ...51
3.1 The Question of Identity...51
3.1.1 Acculturation...54
3.1.2 Christianisation ...57
3.1.3 Cultural Hybridity ...59
3.1.4 The Problem of Translation ...63
3.1.5 Impersonation and Restoration ...65
3.2 Trauma, Mythology and Communication ...69
3.2.1 The Trauma of Abuse ...70
3.2.2 The Trauma of Civilisation ...73
3.2.3 The Communication of Trauma ...75
3.2.4 The Accommodation of Trauma...77
3.3 Resistance, Healing and Reconstruction...83
3.3.1 The Power of Cree Mythology ...85
3.3.2 The Protagonists' Spiritual Homecoming...89
3.3.3. Towards an Individual and National Reconstruction ...92
4. Conclusion ...96
Works Cited...100
List of Abbreviations ...103
3
1. Introduction
This study will depict the traumatic condition of the formerly colonised indige-
nous peoples of Africa and Canada. The postcolonial trauma novels, Tomson
Highway's Kiss of the Fur Queen (1998) and Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous
Conditions (1988), are first-hand accounts of colonial experience under the gov-
ernance of the British Empire of the second half of the twentieth century. The
semi-autobiographical novels bring up the voices of the formerly silenced na-
tives and are pioneering accounts of the native perception of Western intrusion.
The narratives portray the upsetting experiences of the era of colonisation and
explore the insidious consequences of living in the midst of historical change.
The novels, written in English, speak back to the canon and expose the suffering
of its subjects. They depict the grim atmosphere of the colonial project and show
the effects of the domination, oppression, diaspora and discrimination suffered
by the natives. The novels are life narratives and as such reveal facts not re-
corded in history books. The trauma novels enrich and challenge the discourse
on (post)colonial trauma. The native authors, Dangarembga and Highway, ex-
plore the questions of identity, trauma and resistance in the context of coloniza-
tion. Their approach queries traditional notions of identity formation and the
common understanding of trauma and trauma healing. With their portrayal of
unique means for resistance and survival, the novelists offer a challenge to the
existing beliefs and theories.
In the study of the novels Nervous Conditions and Kiss of the Fur Queen, which
allow silenced, repressed individuals to speak out about the unspeakable events of their
lives, I will explore the formation of colonial and postcolonial identities, the nature and
impact of colonial trauma and the possibility of resistance on the side of the colonised. I
will work towards identifying the discrepancies between indigenous and Western no-
tions of trauma and identity, and study the challenges of postcolonial literatures. I will
explore the concept of cultural hybridity as presented in the novels and study the impact
of trauma on identity construction. In the process of this study, I intend to find out to
what extent trauma influences and shapes identity. Moreover, I will reconsider the
Western notions of trauma and identity and examine their integrity in the colonial dis-
course. With the help of the novels, I will study the differences between the antagonistic
cultures and pursue the development of colonial trauma, which may shed a different
light on the Western study of trauma. Moreover, I will explore the natives' means for
4
dealing with the traumas brought about by the process of colonisation. My focus will be
to explore how traumatised characters cope with living in a continuously distressing en-
vironment, the symptoms of their traumas and how these symptoms are expressed.
Moreover, I will explore the conditions and means for resistance, and the process of the
decolonisation of the mind. Furthermore, I will explore the authors' reasons and inten-
tions for writing these novels.
In addition to it, in my analysis of psychic trauma in Nervous Conditions, I will
draw a link to Franz Fanon's writings on psychoanalytic thought and his theory of de-
colonisation. Similarly to the novel, he analyses "the harm done to marginalised groups
by continuous exposure to `a galaxy of erosive stereotypes'."
1
With the aid of the novels
I intend to study the analogies and differences between Dangarembga's and Highway's
novels and Fanon's writings on gender, identity, violence and resistance to oppression.
1
Buelens, Gert, Steff Craps: "Introduction: Postcolonial Trauma Novels." Studies in the Novel, 40, 1/2
(2008), 3. Hereafter referred to as Studies.
5
1. 2 Trauma Studies, Identity and Literature
This study will explore the fragmentation of identity as it is being transformed
from the native identity to the colonial hybrid identity. The postcolonial novels
demonstrate the process of colonial identity formation riven with cultural hybrid-
ity and ambiguity in a changing world. Among others, Franz Fanon's and Homi
Bhabha's theories of cultural hybridity will be applied to the protagonists of the
novels. The postcolonial novels illustrate cultural differences in identity con-
struction. They depict the intermingling cultures of colonization which compli-
cate the evolvement of an unambiguous stable identity. Moreover, the novelists
explore the sociological component of identity formation. Westerners construct
their identities as autonomous, independent selves, whereas indigenous peoples
incorporate a sense of community into their identities. The Western basic
framework "that sees the individual as distinct and distinguishable in the first
place"
2
is problematic in the indigenous environment. In indigenous societies in-
dividuals are always part of a community and identify themselves with it. They
cannot stand for themselves as solid independent individuals. In Africa, for ex-
ample, "a person depends on other people to be a person."
3
In this context
"community is essential to subjectivity [and] a person is incomplete unless he or
she maintains an active connection with the society or culture of which he or she
is part."
4
This study will explore how these essential connections with native
community are complicated and annihilated due to colonial intervention.
Moreover, the novels contribute to the discourse of trauma studies. Trauma stud-
ies as an area of cultural investigation came to prominence in the early-to-mid-1990s.
5
The relatively new discipline is committed to the ethical issues of trauma investigation.
Cathy Caruth is "one of the leading figures in trauma studies," and argues that "a textu-
alist approach [to trauma] can afford us unique access to history."
6
She purports that
"the analysis of cultural artefacts that bear witness to traumatic histories, [can enable to]
gain access to extreme events and experiences"
7
that constitute trauma. The scholars of
trauma studies query the Western-biased approach to trauma and investigate the culture-
2
Murray, Jessica: A post-colonial and feminist reading of selected testimonies to trauma in post-
liberation South Africa and Zimbabwe. Journal of African Cultural Studies, 21,1 (2009), 4. Here-
after referred to as Zimbabwe.
3
Zimbabwe, 4.
4
Zimbabwe, 4.
5
Cp. Studies, 1.
6
Studies, 1.
7
Studies, 1.
6
bound deficiencies in trauma research. Caruth declares, "in its most general definition,
trauma describes an overwhelming experience of sudden or catastrophic events in which
the response to the event occurs in the often delayed, uncontrolled repetitive appearance
of hallucinations or other intrusive phenomena."
8
The very definition of trauma sets an
emphasis on "sudden, unexpected catastrophic events"
9
and, deriving from "the Greek
word meaning wound,"
10
trauma has still predominantly a corporeal connotation in
Western psychoanalysis. However, the colonial situation itself is inherently traumatising
and has pathological consequences on the psyche of the colonised. Thus, the definition
of trauma has been expanded by the analogy of the corporeal wound to "the wound of
the mind."
11
The "feminist psychotherapist Laura S. Brown has argued" that colonial
trauma is an "insidious trauma," by which "the traumatogenic effects of oppression that
are not necessarily overtly violent or threatening to the bodily well-being at the given
moment
[...]
do violence to the soul and spirit."
12
The novels Nervous Conditions and
Kiss of the Fur Queen predominantly portray the expanded and revised notion of trau-
ma, as trauma to the soul.
The recent developments in trauma studies call for a reconsideration of the appli-
cability of Western trauma theories to colonial subjects by arguing that "current defini-
tions of trauma have been constructed from the experiences of dominant groups in
Western society."
13
The experiences of these dominant groups, however, do not include
the chronic nature of trauma. Therefore, the chronic psychic suffering of the colonised
has been commonly neglected in the Western study of trauma. The European or West-
ern conception of trauma focuses traditionally on a single shocking and personally up-
setting event which causes a psychopathology referred to as posttraumatic stress disor-
der (PTSD) in the victims. The traumatising effects of colonialism, however, have a dif-
ferent dimension. Colonialism encompasses a series of traumas for indigenous popula-
tions
.
Both novels illustrate the chronic nature of colonial trauma and its pathological
effects on the colonised. Therefore, in my investigation of colonial trauma I will not fo-
cus on a single shocking event that causes trauma, but on a continuous accumulation
and enhancement of traumatic stressors. I will analyse colonial trauma in terms of the
8
Caruth, Cathy: Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative, and History. Baltimore: John Hopkins Uni-
versity Press 1996, 11. Hereafter referred to as Unclaimed.
9
Studies, 3.
10
Luckhurst, Roger: The Trauma Question. London: Routledge 2008, 4. Hereafter referred to as Ques-
tion.
11
Unclaimed, 4.
12
Studies, 3.
13
Studies, 3.
7
symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder and revise its applicability in the context of
colonialism.
Another problem of the traditional study of trauma lies in its tendency to focus on
individual psychology.
14
"Whereas earlier [trauma] research had focused on only single
types of situations and victims," a more recent research of "the literature on traumatic
stress" challenges this by mapping trauma as "a generalized and socialized phenom-
ena."
15
Since colonisation constitutes a collective or cultural trauma, it is necessary to
consider the wide scope of trauma. Following Sam Durrant, collective or cultural trau-
ma disrupts "the `consciousness' of the entire community [by] destroying the possibility
of a common frame of reference and calling into question our sense of being-in-
common."
16
Jessica Murray compares individual trauma to Durrant's notion of collec-
tive trauma. She writes, "as individual trauma overflows the individual victim's frame
of reference, the trauma of colonialism `disrupts the colonised culture's frame of refer-
ence'."
17
The indigenous societies' departure from the Western individual framework
calls for a societal approach to colonial trauma. Thus the specificity of colonial trauma
cannot be disclosed "unless the object of trauma research shifts from the individual to
larger social entities, such as communities or nations."
18
Furthermore, this study will explore the issues of healing, reconstruction and re-
sistance. The Western approaches to trauma therapy are insufficient for dealing with the
traumatic experiences of subaltern groups. Due to the limited scope of knowledge about
non-Western groups, trauma therapists often neglect the fact that other cultures have
different ways of coping with trauma at their command. In the novels, I will explore al-
ternative solutions for coming to terms with colonial trauma. Furthermore, I will inves-
tigate the protagonists' resistance to oppressive systems in terms of individual and na-
tional empowerment and trace their means for the reconstruction of their culture, self-
knowledge and identity.
14
Cp. Studies, 4.
15
Vickroy, Laurie: Trauma and Survival in Contemporary Fiction. Charlottesville: University of Virginia
Press 2002, 18. Hereafter referred to as Survival.
16
Zimbabwe, 13.
17
Zimbabwe, 13.
18
Studies, 4.
8
1.3 The Approach to Trauma in the Novels
Nervous Conditions is an exemplary novel of insidious trauma induced by colo-
nial oppression and discrimination. The novel's traumatic conditions move away
from the corporeal schema of trauma and expose trauma deriving from psycho-
logical damage. Nervous Conditions explores the traumatised condition of "the
native" as a consequence of colonial intervention into the balance of traditional
Shona culture in colonial Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) of the late 1960s and early
1970s. Dangarembga's first-person narrator Tambudzai provides a sophisticated
view into the coming-of-age consciousness of a teenage narrator struggling to
cope and survive in a distorted colonial world. Tambudzai's complex identity
provides the reader with an elaborate analysis of the sources underlying the
nervous conditions of the colonised.
In Nervous Conditions the narrative focuses not only on colonial oppression but
especially on sexual discrimination. The author subdivides the nervousness of the char-
acters into gendered categories and provides an account of the extent of Westernization
that pollutes and distorts the traditional gender roles. Tambu's anglicized cousin, Nya-
sha, is an influential character in the novel. She supports and guides Tambu's evolving
identity. I will analyse the connections between Tambu's coming-of-age consciousness
and Nyasha's appraisal of the colonial situation. The analysis of Nyasha's predicament
in the novel, will concentrate on her deep cultural hybridity due to her early uprooted-
ness. The patriarchal system will play a crucial role for my study of the main character's
developing identity and her traumatic experiences. Belonging to the genre of Bildungs-
roman, the novel is a bright composition of the process of self-realization in relation to
colonial analysis. I will query the nervous conditions in Dangarembga's novel with re-
spect to its male and female characters and try to detect the triggers which enhance
traumatic situations. I will study the psychopathological effects of the oppressed and
analyse their means of coping with the situation. In terms of the indigenous and sexual
empowerment, I will investigate the characters' ability to generate a resistance to op-
pression and colonisation.
Highway's partly autobiographical novel Kiss of the Fur Queen is an extreme ex-
position of trauma due to its incorporation of a twofold trauma--psychic and physic.
The novel is set Manitoba, Canada, between 1951 and 1990, and tells a story of two
young Cree brothers who are taken from their home and family and sent to a distant
Catholic Residential School. In the boarding school the brothers are subjected to the
9
whims of a sexually abusive principal of the school. It is a life narrative about diaspora,
oppression, abuse, racism, violence and loss. The novel addresses the insidious conse-
quences of colonial trauma, the author's way of coping with the unbearable situation,
his identity problems and the issue of uprootedness on a very large scale. It is a life nar-
rative about the different paths of two Indian brothers with a different outcome. Indige-
nous mythology and symbolism play an important role in the narrative. The author un-
veils the Cree world of spiritual mythology and legends, entwined with the Western cul-
tural discourse. The novel is an exemplary narrative about cultural hybridity induced by
Western influence and its consequences, and is a means for accommodating the novel-
ist's personal trauma. I am interested in the study of the nature and effects of the trauma
of the main characters. I will analyse the formation of the main characters'
(post)colonial hybrid identities and explore their paths of self-realisation and reforma-
tion. Moreover, I will study the novel's political significance with respect to indigenous
liberation and explore the significance of Indian mythology in Highway's novel.
Thereby I will look at its meaning for his coping with trauma and the significance of the
native set of symbols for approaching the brothers' traumatic experiences.
Since trauma studies need to "acknowledge traumatic experiences in non-Western
settings,"
19
many scholars (have lately suggested theorizing colonization in terms of the
infliction of a collective trauma and reconceptualising postcolonialism as a post-
traumatic cultural formation). In order to (realize the self-declared ethical potential) of
trauma studies, an examination of (postcolonial literary trauma representation) is neces-
sary. This can achieve (a break with Eurocentrism). The analysis of postcolonial trauma
(in relation to the dominant trauma discourse) can enable a modification of Western
trauma theories (with a view to wider applicability). My intention is to detect alternative
conceptions of trauma by analysing indigenous ways of coping, accommodating, com-
municating and combating the trauma of the past. The study will query the challenges
the novels pose to the dominant discourse on trauma, identity and healing, and look for
alternative solutions offered by the authors.
19
Studies, 1-3. All further references in the text are to this edition.
10
2. Nervous Conditions
2.1 Colonialism and Patriarchy
Tsitsi Dangarembga's (born 1959) first novel, Nervous Conditions, is the first
novel published in English by a black Zimbabwean woman, and is the "winner of
the African regional prize in the 1989 Commonwealth Writer's Prize competi-
tion."
20
The semi-autobiographical novel centres around two main female charac-
ters, Tambudzai (Tambu) and her anglicised cousin Nyasha, growing up in colo-
nial Rhodesia. It is a first-person narrative told from Tambudzai's point of view.
Dangarembga provides a sophisticated insight into the consciousness of a native
coming-of-age character, Tambu, in her colonial environment, who has to endure
colonialism and patriarchy. Tambu's highly self-reflexive analysis of her pre-
dicament as a young African woman growing up in a colonial world arises to a
great extent from her accurate observation of her same-age cousin Nyasha, who
suffers much more under the colonial situation in Rhodesia. Dangarembga's novel
outlines the consequences of the British colonisation of Rhodesia, renamed Zim-
babwe after its independence in 1980.
21
She illustrates the nuisances of "the colo-
nial rule that extended from 1890 to 1979," during which "the white minority
dominated and oppressed the native population and divested them of their land."
22
The prologue of the novel--"The condition of native is a nervous condition" (v)
--is taken "from Jean-Paul Sartre's preface to Franz Fanon's
The Wretched of the
Earth."
23
Although, following Dangarambga's words, "she had not read Fanon until the
novel was competed,"
24
there are striking similarities between her book and Fanon's
writings. Similarly to Fanon (1925-1961), Dangarembga had medical and psychological
training before she started writing. In The Wretched of the Earth (1961) Fanon describes
"the colonial world as a Manichaean world, in which the world of the native is the nega-
tion of the world of the settler."
25
Dangarembga goes beyond the limits of "Fanons's
20
Thomas, Sue: "Killing the Hysteric in the Colonized's House: Tsitsi Dangarembga's `Nervous Condi-
tions'." The Journal of Commonwealth Literature, 27,1 (1992), 26. Hereafter referred to as Hys-
teric.
21
Cp. Edwards, Justin D.: Postcolonial Literature. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan 2008, 4. Hereafter
referred to as Literature.
22
Literature, 4.
23
Hysteric, 26.
24
Sugnet, Charles: "`Nervous Conditions': Dangarembga's Feminist Reinvention of Fanon." In: Obioma
Nnaemeka (ed.): The Politics of (M)Othering. London: Routledge 1997, 35. Hereafter referred to
as Reinvention.
25
King, Bruce (ed.): New National and Post-Colonial Literatures: An Introduction. Oxford: Clarendon
Press 1998, 122. Hereafter referred to as National.
11
canonical `master narrative' of post-colonial psychiatric thought and literary criticism"
and presents "patriarchal and colonial domination" from a woman's point of view. The
author challenges Fanon by exploring "other psychological realities that [he] leaves un-
examined-- most specifically the role of gender in the colonial context."
26
In Danga-
rembga's critique of patriarchy she underlines how "the sexualities of native men and
women are contained and mortified by colonialism and by Shona and Western patriar-
chy respectively."
27
With her novel, Dangarembga seems to imply that the condition of
`female' native has additional burdens.
28
26
Scahatteman, Renee: Fanon and Beyond: The `Nervous Condition' of the Colonized Woman. In: Kofi
Anyidoho et al. (ed.): Beyond Survival: African Literatures the Search for New Life. Trenton:
Africa World Press 1998, 213. Hereafter referred to as Beyond.
27
Hysteric, 27.
28
Cp. Hawley, John C.: "Tsitsi Dangarembga's Ambiguous Adventure: Nervous Conditions and the
Blandishments of Mission Education." In: Gerhard Stilz (ed.): Missions of Interdependence. A Lit-
erary Directory. Amsterdam: Rodopi 2002, 185. Hereafter referred to as Adventure.
12
2.1.1 The Effects of Gendered Ideology
Nervous Conditions opens with the shocking breaking of a familial taboo in the form of
Tambu's comment, "I was not sorry when my brother died. Nor am I apologising for
my callousness, as you may define it, my lack of feeling" (1). The occasion of Tambu's
brother's premature death is the first event that can be accounted for as traumatising due
to colonialism, and it is the first event in the story that puts Tambu "in a position to
write this account"(1). Her coldness towards her brother's death is a tragic sign of con-
fusion and breakdown in social relations and cultural values under the pressure of colo-
nisation. As Charles Sugnet underlines, Tambu's acknowledgement in the very first sen-
tence of the novel that "I was not sorry when my brother died" is "perhaps the most im-
portant instance of an overt rupture"
29
of traditional familial bonds. In her "critical self-
examination, [Tambu is] quite conscious about rejecting the guilt associated with `un-
natural' sisterhood, inhuman lack of feeling."
30
She says, "As he was our brother, he
ought to be liked, which made disliking him all the more difficult" (11). She explains in
the opening chapters of the novel how she came into the position to write this sentence.
As Sugnet points out, "the whole novel is the story of how Tambudzai came to be capa-
ble of writing this sentence."
31
From Tambu's sophisticated analysis of her feelings to-
wards her elder brother Nhamo, one can see the forces at work behind the colonial sys-
tem. It is the intense clash of two distinct cultures and ideologies that causes dramatic
imbalance and breaches familial bonds in traditional Shona families.
In Tambu's excuse for her lack of feelings for her brother, a crucial element
comes to light, namely that of patriarchy. Colonial patriarchy worsens Tambu's condi-
tion as a colonial subject. Through her narration the reader can see the reasons for her
"unnatural sisterhood" and for her repulsion towards Nhamo. Initially she likes him,
which is normal for a sister. Later, however, her feelings drastically deteriorate as she is
confronted with her brother's sexism. Tambu's first-hand experience of unfair inequal-
ity structures relying solely upon one's biological sex, uttered by her brother Nhamo,
triggers her negative feelings towards him and initiates her nervous condition. His
words, "I go to school. You go nowhere" (21) deeply shock her. Tambu recalls, "Nha-
mo was not interested in being fair. Maybe to other people, but certainly not to his sis-
ters, his younger sisters for that matter"(12). The moment she learns that Nhamo bla-
29
Reinvention, 39.
30
Nair, Supriya: "Melancholic Women The Intellectual Hysteric(s) in Nervous Conditions." Research
in African Literatures, 26.2 (1995), 133.
31
Reinvention, 39.
13
tantly advocates universal gender inequalities that preclude her from going to school,
she states, "My concern for my brother died an unobtrusive death"(20). Nhamo fully
approved the sexist mindset that boys shall have first access to education, and thus ap-
propriated sexism into his repertoire of values.
Tambu depicts how effectively socialisation has worked on Nhamo and contrib-
uted to their alienation. Tambu recalls how he refused to carry his own bags and ex-
pected his sisters to carry them for him, and how he refused to help with housework.
She complains about her "brother's laziness" and says, "I hated fetching my brother's
luggage" (10). Worrying about his development, Tambu notes that "any of the tasks he
used to do willingly before he went to the mission, became a bad joke" (7). Moreover,
Nhamo tried to prevent his sister from going to school and thus oppressed her emanci-
pation by overthrowing Tambu's attempt to grow maize to provide herself with school
fees. This behaviour shows his affiliation with the patriarchal ideology. Disappointed in
her brother, Tambu states that "our home was healthier when he was away" (10).
Since Nhamo's status as a boy and elder brother is a threat and an impediment to
the education Tambu desires, his death is a coincidence which Tambu welcomes be-
cause it gives her the privilege of obtaining education in a "colonial system [which]
makes education scarce."
32
Due to the fact that she has no elder siblings, she becomes
next in line to receive colonial education at the mission school. The patriarchal system
renders Nhamo's death not a tragedy to her but a salvation; she "could not have sur-
vived on the homestead" (59). His death is celebrated as the occasion for her education
at the mission school and an opportunity to become a full-fledged, educated person and
escape the poverty of her native homestead. Tambu vindicates herself, "Thinking about
it, feeling the injustice of it, this is how I came to dislike my brother [...]"(12).
Moreover, Tambu observes her uncle Babamukuru's approval of sexism, apparent
in his maltreatment of his wife and his daughter Nyasha. She comments on "Babamu-
kuru condemning Nyasha to whoredom, making her a victim of her femaleness, just as I
had felt victimised at home" (118). She states her indignation at sexual injustice that is
fundamental to colonialism, "what I didn't like was the way all the conflicts came back
to this question of femaleness. Femaleness as opposed and inferior to maleness" (118).
Tambu identifies the malign nature of patriarchy, "The victimization, I saw, was univer-
sal. It didn't depend on poverty, on lack of education or on tradition" (118). Her realiza-
tion of the scope of female oppression intensifies her traumatic realisation of gender in-
32
Reinvention, 38.
14
equalities. This realization about her uncle's sexism disillusions her image of him. Her
previously immensely admired uncle, "who was as neatly divine as any human being
could hope to be" (167), loses his reputation in her eyes. The disenchanted Tambu
states, "Even heroes like Babamukuru did it" (118).
15
2.1.2 The Question of Masculinity
The novel investigates the relationship between native men and colonial authorities, and
reveals another aspect of colonial patriarchy: the embodiment of Western cultural con-
sensus on the level of political and socio-economic dominance. The colonial relation-
ship between Europeans and natives was executed "in terms of the `natural' ascendancy
of men over women."
33
This notion of sexual dominance was transferred onto colonial
masculinity and engendered an immense break in native masculinity by rendering it ef-
feminate. The "racial effeminacy" of African men was analogous to the Western "dom-
inance of men and masculinity over women and femininity."
34
The colonial congruence
with "the existing Western sexual stereotypes and the philosophy of life which they rep-
resented"
35
deprived native men of their masculinity and created tension in the relation-
ship between African men and women. African men in turn suppressed their women
and thus participated in the double oppression and colonisation of the women nearest
them. The novel suggests that "the existence of the colonized woman is invalidated by
men of color in much the same way that the selfhood of all colonized people is annihi-
lated by the Europeans."
36
Moreover, the novel shows the sharp edges of colonial education offered to native
African men. The patriarchal colonial rule sought to maintain its hegemony by electing
African men who received colonial education. These men were catapulted to the colo-
nial elite. This indirect rule facilitated the colonisation of the rest of the indigenous
population through their `traditional' leaders. Thus the colonial education of the African
elite "served colonial economic and political needs."
37
Africans' "status as agents of co-
lonial hegemony" offered "privilege, material reward, and apparent security."
38
Colonial
education, however, has a double edge. It represents "literary and cultural temptations
of Europe" and is a booster of "cultural transgression."
39
By transmitting Western val-
ues and belief systems, colonial education extinguishes the traditional values of the na-
tives. It is an intricate tool to achieve the goal of colonial authorities, to colonise the
mind of the natives.
33
Theory, 100.
34
Theory, 100.
35
Theory, 100.
36
Beyond, 213.
37
Ania Loomba: Colonialism, Postcolonialism. London: Routledge 2002, 139. Hereafter referred to as
Colonialism.
38
Reinvention, 38.
39
Gandhi, Leela: Postcolonial Theory, a Critical Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press
1998, 13. Hereafter referred to as Theory.
16
The novel illustrates how colonial patriarchy works on African men as representa-
tives of colonial hegemony. In the epigraph to the novel, Dangarembga omits the ensu-
ing clause of Fanon's sentence, "The status of a `native' is a nervous condition intro-
duced and maintained by the settler among colonized people with their consent."
40
The
three most colonially implicated male characters of the novel, Babamukuru (Jeremiah's
elder brother), Nhamo and Chido (Babamukuru's son), "give a sort of coerced consent
to their status as agent[s] of colonial hegemony."
41
The colonial system offers Babamu-
kuru a privileged position. He was able to receive colonial university education in South
Africa and attain his Master's degree in England. In return for his academic career and
prosperity, which enables his position as the provider for his extended family, he has to
fulfil many obligations. He works for the colonial system and is the headmaster of the
mission school which Tambu wishes to attend. He represents the system's indirect ruler
who works as a transformer between the colonial authority and the marginalised natives,
and whose law "becomes the law of the white men."
42
Therefore, Babamukuru imper-
sonates a traditional leader. Sugnet underlines, "with all his advanced degrees and
Christian ways, Babamukuru [is an] impressive kind of `native,' created by the British
colonial system to serve its purposes."
43
Dangarembga reveals Babamukuru's plight in the novel, where he is torn apart by
his desperate attempt to maintain a traditional Shona family and simultaneously apply to
them Western Christian values. When he plays "the part of the `good kaffir' of the colo-
nizer's imagination,"
44
he suffers from `bad nerves' and is only able to alleviate his
nervousness when he is far away from the centre of colonial authority, on the country-
side. In a rare moment in the novel, he remembers his boyhood and starts to hum an old
song and is spontaneously happy: "Unaccountably, unusually, Babamukuru was happy.
Free of tensions and in the best of spirits, he looked younger and more lovable than he
ever did at the mission" (12425).
45
Sugnet emphasises, "the farther he gets from his
English-made job and personality, the farther he gets from his nervous condition."
46
When Babamukuru is in the centre of his colonial responsibility he is ill-tempered. One
evening, when he returns to his house, he is moody and avoids greeting his family; "Ba-
bamukuru grunted briefly by way of reply, in a way that told you at once that he had
40
Reinvention, 38.
41
Reinvention, 38.
42
Colonialism, 145.
43
Reinvention, 36.
44
Hysteric, 26.
45
Cp. Reinvention, 37.
46
Reinvention, 37.
17
weightier matters on his mind than the goodness of the evening" (81). Tambu utters her
disappointment in her uncle's behaviour after she moves to his house. She deplores that
his behaviour has changed and he became more aloof than he used to be before he left
for England: "I had thought it would be like the good old days [...] with Babamukuru
throwing us up in the air and giving us sweets" (104). She continues: "We hardly ever
laughed [...] we did not talk much when he was around either" (104). His wife, Mai-
guru, explains, "His nerves were bad because he was so busy" (104). The deterioration
of Babamukuru's behaviour signals his nervous condition which is a far-reaching con-
sequence of his colonial education.
Tambu's father, Jeremiah, is a `historical artefact' as well, constructed and main-
tained by the colonial system. His traditional patriarchal dependency on his elder broth-
er, Babamukuru, is colonially induced. Colonial authorities deprived him of his ances-
tral lands, thus making him incapable of providing for his family and fully dependent on
his brother's financial support. Sugnet argues that Jeremiah "becomes the stereotype of
the shiftless `native', spending his children's school fees on beer and letting his home-
stead run down."
47
As a result, he "embodies a parodic debasement of `traditional' val-
ues."
48
Jeremiah suffers from the loss of his patriarchal authority as father of his chil-
dren. When Tambu's teacher, Mr Matimba, helps her with selling her mealies and keeps
her money in safety for her school fees, Jeremiah complains, "Does he think he is your
father? [...] He thinks that because he has chewed more letters than I have, he can take
over my children. And you, you think he is better than me" (24). He also mistreats his
wife, Mainini. In the novel, Dangarembga connects male suffering under the colonial
system with the men's impulse to bully the women in their families.
49
47
Reinvention, 36.
48
Reinvention, 36.
49
Cp. Reinvention, 36.
18
2.1.3
The Burden of Femininity
The colonial system renders Tambu and other native women doubly oppressed. In the
Rhodesian colonial context female subordination is maintained by the cultural consen-
sus that regards women as second-class citizens.
The author reveals the system of dou-
ble oppression: the British colonial authority oppresses the male indigenous population
and indigenous men themselves oppress their women.
Tambu elucidates, "the needs and
sensibilities of the women in my family were not considered a priority, or even legiti-
mate" (12). Even Tambu's father, Jeremiah, sides with the oppressive system and oper-
ates as an antagonist to Tambu's educational prospect. His comment, "Can you cook
books and feed them to your husband?" (15), shows his native patriarchy entwined with
solidarity for the oppressive colonial system. Ketu H. Katrak elucidates that "in general,
female education, governed by Victorian ideology and Christian missionary zeal, was
aimed at producing women as good wives and mothers."
50
In this context the burden of
femininity poses a direct threat to Tambu's highly desired education.
Furthermore, Dangarembga illustrates Nyasha's desperate attempt to free herself
from the patriarchal oppression. Her struggle for emancipation within Rhodesia is a pre-
carious matter, because her sexuality is a contested term. Nyasha's uprootedness makes
it (increasingly difficult for her to belong within the constraints of traditional patriarchal
norms embodied in and enforced by her father Babamukuru). Nyasha cannot fulfil the
traditional expectations of female obedience and silence, and her father's (attempts to
have a `traditional' daughter, obedient to his will, backfire in the terrible dramas around
food). Her European influenced view of women is at odds with the African concept of
female subordination, and her struggle to free herself from the traditional expectations
of her father ends tragically in her ailment anorexia nervosa or bulimia when she (at-
tempts to take control over her life). Additionally, the intersection of education provided
by the mission with the patriarchal elements of the Shona culture increases her plight.
Though Nyasha has gained a critical apparatus in England with which help she is able to
analyse critically the whole colonial situation, she is incapable of leading a traditional
Shona life because "she has also picked up English social expectations that disrupt her
acceptance of patriarchal social norms."
51
Her hybrid identity poses her between the an-
tagonistic cultures and renders her an outsider within her native Shona community.
Dangarembga delineates how Babamukuru oppresses his well-educated wife,
50
National, 233. All further references in the text are to this edition.
51
Adventure, 186.
19
Maiguru, who holds a Master's degree in Philosophy from London and has her own job.
Maiguru struggles to cope with the oppressive social situation. She has to give away her
entire salary for the sustenance of Babamukuru's relatives and is unable "to stand up to
her husband or protect her daughter."
52
Tambu remarks, "[...] it was a great shame that
Maiguru had been deprived of the opportunity to make the most of herself, even if she
had accepted that deprivation" (103). Maiguru's inability to act alone under oppressive
circumstances and keep her salary to herself causes her daughter Nyasha to lose respect
of her. Maiguru has to fulfil the traditional expectations of an obedient and good wife is
spite of her European education. She is at pains to comply with the Shona tradition and
fulfil the obligations of a working wife and mother. Caught in her powerless situation,
she desperately laments, "I am not happy. I am not happy any more in this house" (175).
As the only Western-educated woman of her native community she is not accepted
among other married women. Her desperate situation shows how "English education
[...] renders educated women into outsiders in their own communities."
53
The horizontal oppression unleashes the nervous conditions of all the characters in
the novel. As such, the chain reaction of patriarchal oppression imposes a threat to the
mental and physical health of the colonised. Maiguru and Mainini "both give numerous
hints of the repressed rage they harbour over their assigned roles through their attempt
to hide these feelings."
54
The oppressed women of the novel are frequently character-
ised by silence. In many instances in the novel, female characters refrain from uttering
their opinions. They reluctantly comply with the traditional silence of women unless
asked. Especially for the partly Western educated Maiguru, the situation is difficult to
endure. Her excessive submissiveness unnerves her extremely. Mainini's attitude of in-
difference is her reaction to oppression. Tambu also suffers under the oppressive situa-
tion and often has a need to say what she thinks. Justin D. Edwards outlines Pauline
Ada Uwakweh's argumentation that "silence is used as a patriarchal weapon of control"
for the reason that "voicing is self-defining, liberational, and cathartic."
55
When the
powerful Babamukuru "tries to silence all the women in the family,"
56
his daughter,
Nyasha, accurately designates her father "a historical artefact" (162). The concept of a
`historical artefact' stems from Franz Fanon
57
and Dangarembga extends his concept to
52
Reinvention, 39.
53
National, 233.
54
Beyond, 214.
55
Literature, 103.
56
Reinvention, 33.
57
Cp. Reinvention, 38.
20
native women. Her novel demonstrates that not only native men, but also native women
are not natural but `historical artefacts' constructed by the oppressive colonial system.
58
Dangerambga describes "the struggles of the young Tambu against the immediate mani-
festations of patriarchy in her life."
59
Mainini's predicament shows her powerlessness
and hopelessness, and even Maiguru is denied agency, control and even identity. Con-
cerning all these characters, the novel shows how female "self and sexuality are con-
structed and controlled by indigenous patriarchy and British colonial practices,"
60
and
"how patriarchy and colonisation collude to worsen women's predicament."
61
.
58
Cp. Reinvention, 38.
59
Reinvention, 34.
60
National, 232.
61
National, 232.
21
2.2 Identity and Hybridity
Nervous Conditions introduces two main characters with complex identities--
Tambudzai and Nyasha. Dangarembga's coming-of-age novel explores colonial identi-
ties in a society in transition. The main protagonist, Tambu, provides a self-reflective
and lucid analysis of her highly complex identity. Tambu grows up on an impoverished
farm with her family. Nyasha spends five of her formative years with her parents in
England. When Tambu's brother dies, she is thirteen. She moves to her uncle's house,
where she becomes close to his daughter Nyasha. Nyasha's hybridity is the result of the
years she spent in England. The novel explores the formation of colonial identity and
offers sophisticated answers to questions of colonial and post-colonial identity. In the
novel, Tambu takes readers on the journey of "constant reconstruction and reinvention
of the self."
62
Her cousin Nyasha is her companion and sometimes guides her on that
journey.
The novel expands the standard Western identity model which focuses on identity
as being (a stable, self-contained agent). Instead, it focuses on the analysis of identity as
becoming (a process of constructing, negotiating and, not least, maintaining).
63
Danga-
rembga's delineation of the process of colonial identity construction in the novel com-
plies with Stuart Hall's appeal to reconsider the issue of identity and to depart from the
Western concept of stable identity. Hall proposes "to appropriate it to designate identity
as a constructed process rather than a given essence."
64
He points out, "the black subject
and black experience are [also] constructed historically, culturally, politically."
65
The novel shows how the African notion of identity gets fragmented and polluted
by the appropriation of Western modes of individual autonomy. The novel illustrates
"how cultural hybridity causes the individual to be pulled in multiple directions, adopt-
ing identities which may differ from each other."
66
Tambu's and Nyasha's hybrid iden-
tities exemplify the "modes of experiencing and constructing difference."
67
Eslamieh
explains the genesis of a colonial/postcolonial hybrid: "The identity of both the colo-
62
Pristed, Helene: "The Concept of Identity." In: Wojciech H. Kalaga et al. (ed.): Multicultural Dilem-
mas: Identity, Difference, Otherness. Frankfurt am Main: Lang 2008, 35.
63
Cp. Kunow, Rüdiger, Wilfred Raussert (ed.): Cultural Memory and Multiple Identities. Berlin: Lit
2008, 7.Hereafter referred to as Memory.
64
Loomba, Ania: Colonialism, Postcolonialism. London: Routledge 1998, 176. Hereafter referred to as
Postcolonialism.
65
Postcolonialism, 176.
66
Eslamieh, Salumeh: "Tsitsi Dangarembga's `Nervous Conditions': Coming of Age and Adolescence as
Representative of Multinational Hybridity." Moveable Type: Childhood and Adolescence, 1.1
(2005). http://www.ucl.ac.uk/english/graduate/issue/1_1/salumeh.htm (04.11.2011). Hereafter
referred to as Adolescence.
67
Memory, 7.
22
nizer and the colonized within a postcolonial society evolves into a hybrid identity,
since colonisation creates spaces that are corporal positions of multiplicity."
68
With the
aid of Dangarembga's novel, we can observe and explore the steps of colonial identity
formation, a process which involves fragmentation, ambiguity, splitting, mimicry and
re-creation of the colonised self.
68
Adolescence.