ENTANGLED WEB OF WOMEN’S RESILIENCE: A STUDY OF SECOND CLASS CITIZEN BY BUCHI EMECHETA

Abstract

Women are going through a lot of violence and sexual harassment all over the world. They suffer from low self-esteem as they go through sexual abuse, marital rape, rape, trafficking, modern slavery, female genital mutilation and other forms of wicked acts. The perpetrators of these inhuman acts are mostly the male folk who believe in subduing women and quieting them to show male chauvinism and jingoism which are still common all over the world. Patriarchal society thrives on this wickedness as women are regularly and constantly abused. Is it a sin to be a woman? Though government has set up different organizations to help fight violence against women and feminists have also lend their voices to help recognize girl child all over the world, yet a lot still happen secretly in different families and it seems that much has not been done to showcase this. This paper employed feminist theory in examining different forms of domestic violence against women, effects on victims and women’s ability to recover from the torture and depression. Using Buchi Emecheta’s Second Class Citizen, this work highlights different forms of girl child abuse, right from birth in order to condemn violence in all its ramifications, it shows the effects and of course encourage women to have self-confidence. This paper portrays that men of low esteem are caught in-between the web of fear and frustration which make them uncomfortable and therefore becoming violent to assert their positions in their families as the ‘head’ of the family whose decisions should not be challenged. This paper aims at encouraging women to be educated, strong willed and ready to fight for their right without being pushed. This study concludes that women should have self-confidence, self-assurance, firm trust and boldness to be able to make their own decisions wisely and to intelligently fight back domestic violence.