PREDATORS AND THEIR PREY: THE PSYCHO-EMOTIONAL CONSEQUENCES OF VIOLENCE AND HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSE IN SELECTED NIGERIAN NOVELS

Abstract

This research has explored psychoanalytical perspectives of violence as human rights abuse in Chimeka Garricks’ Tomorrow Died Yesterday (2010), Adaobi Nwaubani’s Buried beneath the Baobab Tree (2019) and Chigozie Obioma’s An Orchestra of Minorities (2019). The study has examined the different portrayals of violence such as rape, sexual assault, forced marriage, domestic abuse, war, terrorism/insurgency, discrimination, tranny, exploitation, betrayal, stereotype and consistent oppression to reveal how they grossly affect the physical and mental wellness of violated victims in the selected novels. This research has employed Sigmund Freud’s Psychoanalytical concepts in the interpretation of characters’ behaviour during violent experiences with diverse overwhelming reactions and psychological consequences. The study has discovered that both conscious and unconscious behaviour or actions of the protagonist during and after violence are caused by Oedipal Guilt—a death factor with psycho-emotional implication leading to nervousness, obsession, psychic split or death. Most of the male characters who employed aggressive superego died in their post-traumatic stress condition due to extreme involvement in war, insurgency or terrorism; while the female characters have embraced repression as a coping strategy for existence after kidnapping and sexual abuse—a phenomenon of inherent self-defence that has resulted to mental breakdown. Notably, the characters in the selected novels have employed the structured models of the mind (Id, Ego and Superego) in their rebellious and independent tendencies against tyrannical powers.