Intersectionality in "Americanah" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Intersectionality in Author: Lina Gildenstern
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3346555178
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 26

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2020 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 2,0, University of Dusseldorf "Heinrich Heine", language: English, abstract: "Americanah" is a novel written by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. The narrative centers in the experience of Ifemelu, a Nigerian woman who migrated to the USA, and her childhood sweetheart Obinze, a Nigerian man who migrated to the UK, during their adolescence and adult life. Each of their identities is altered by the experiences they face in the Western world. In my term paper, I will analyze the processes of migration through the lens of Intersectionality. I want to show that it is not sufficient to analyze the obstacles they face based merely on race or nationality. Each of them faces different obstacles due to the Intersectionality of factors like race, gender, class, and political views. In the paper, I will focus on the Intersectionality of race and gender as Ifemelu and Obinze migrate away from and back to Nigeria. I will start my analysis by explaining the term Intersectionality. Then, I will elaborate on the stereotypical gender roles in Nigeria to overview the expectations regarding their gender Ifemelu and Obinze grew up with and eventually have to change once they move to the western world. In my main part, I will first analyze Ifemelu's migration story in terms of her gender and race. In this analysis, I will focus on the topics perception of beauty, mainly regarding hair, romantic relationships, and her experiences with finding a job in the USA. Secondly, I will analyze Obinze's migration story as a Black man by considering his relationship with women and their roles in society and his experiences with jobs in the UK. Lastly, I will compare their experiences with migration based on their different genders.

Intersectionality in "Americanah" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Intersectionality in Author: Lina Gildenstern
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3346555178
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 26

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2020 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 2,0, University of Dusseldorf "Heinrich Heine", language: English, abstract: "Americanah" is a novel written by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. The narrative centers in the experience of Ifemelu, a Nigerian woman who migrated to the USA, and her childhood sweetheart Obinze, a Nigerian man who migrated to the UK, during their adolescence and adult life. Each of their identities is altered by the experiences they face in the Western world. In my term paper, I will analyze the processes of migration through the lens of Intersectionality. I want to show that it is not sufficient to analyze the obstacles they face based merely on race or nationality. Each of them faces different obstacles due to the Intersectionality of factors like race, gender, class, and political views. In the paper, I will focus on the Intersectionality of race and gender as Ifemelu and Obinze migrate away from and back to Nigeria. I will start my analysis by explaining the term Intersectionality. Then, I will elaborate on the stereotypical gender roles in Nigeria to overview the expectations regarding their gender Ifemelu and Obinze grew up with and eventually have to change once they move to the western world. In my main part, I will first analyze Ifemelu's migration story in terms of her gender and race. In this analysis, I will focus on the topics perception of beauty, mainly regarding hair, romantic relationships, and her experiences with finding a job in the USA. Secondly, I will analyze Obinze's migration story as a Black man by considering his relationship with women and their roles in society and his experiences with jobs in the UK. Lastly, I will compare their experiences with migration based on their different genders.

Liminality, Diasporic Melancholia and "Small" Redemption. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah

Liminality, Diasporic Melancholia and Author: Aglaia Varlami
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3668764816
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 16

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Book Description
Research Paper (postgraduate) from the year 2018 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 8,5, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, course: Ethnic Studies, language: English, abstract: In the present paper I embed Ifemelu’s migration to America in the broader diaspora of Africans to the United States which is undertaken in search of more favourable education and career prospects. I suggest that diasporans could potentially comprise the par excellence hybrid identity that Homi Bhabha has championed in the development of his postcolonial theory of identity formation. I argue that Americanah poses a substantial challenge to hybridity and mimicry-based cultural identities by accentuating the very limitations of these models; namely, that they seriously overlook the psychic trauma caused by the loss of cultural authenticity due to the disconnection from the motherland and by the identity reinvention undertaken in the host country. My thesis posits that Ifemelu is affected by diasporic melancholia. Adapting Sigmund Freud’s concept of melancholia in the context of diaspora theory I seek to demonstrate that the inarticulate loss of the motherland and the position inbetween cultures disorients and traumatises the subject. I argue that the feelings of ceaseless restlessness and vague yet constant dissatisfaction that the subject experiences point to the trauma of identity loss, a psychic wound that only the physical return to the motherland can heal.

Feminist Studies

Feminist Studies PDF Author: Nina Lykke
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136978984
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 258

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Book Description
In this book, feminist scholar Nina Lykke highlights current issues in feminist theory, epistemology and methodology. Combining introductory overviews with cutting-edge reflections, Lykke focuses on analytical approaches to gendered power differentials intersecting with other processes of social in/exclusion based on race, class, and sexuality. Lykke confronts and contrasts classical stances in feminist epistemology with poststructuralist and postconstructionist feminisms, and also brings bodily materiality into dialogue with theories of the performativity of gender and sex. This thorough and needed analysis of the state of Feminist Studies will be a welcome addition to scholars and students in Gender and Women’s Studies and Sociology.

Racial Identification and Diasporic consciousness in "Americanah" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Racial Identification and Diasporic consciousness in Author: Elisabeth Janzen
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
ISBN: 3346654621
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 28

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Book Description
Seminar paper from the year 2021 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 1,3, University of Cologne, language: English, abstract: “Americanah” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is a representative Afropolitan migration novel that depicts the still prevalent institutional and everyday racism underlying and deeply embedded in American society. In the following, I will therefore assess to what extent racism and discrimination affect the character Ifemelu and the process of her Afropolitan identity formation after migrating to the US and back to Nigeria again. The crucial underlying question is whether the US could live up to its own ideals as they always preached equality and freedom for every American citizen or whether they fail to set an international example for equality for all.

So the Path Does Not Die

So the Path Does Not Die PDF Author: Pede Hollist
Publisher: African Books Collective
ISBN: 9956727377
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 296

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Book Description
Protagonist Fina's search for happiness and belonging begins on the night of her aborted circumcision and continues through her teenage years in Freetown, Sierra Leone's capital; her twenties in the Washington Metropolitan Area; and ends with her return to Sierra Leone to work as an advocate for war-traumatized children. The novel explores the problems she encounters in each setting against the backdrop of the tensions, ambiguities, and fragmentation of the stranger/immigrant condition and the characters' struggles to clarify their ideas about "home" and "abroad." Fina's circumcision gets significant, though not sensational, play in the different attitudes toward the practice between her and her fiance Cammy, a Trinidadian urologist. The differences complicate their relationship at a time when skeletons from their pasts threaten their impending marriage. The stories of Fina's friend, African-American Aman and her fiance, Nigerian Bayo; of Edna (Fina's foster sister) and her husband Kizzy; and of Mawaf, a war-traumatized teen, unfold in subplots that merge with the main plot and overarching theme of belonging as characters straddle "home" and "abroad" places."

Feminism and Intersectionality in Academia

Feminism and Intersectionality in Academia PDF Author: Stephanie Anne Shelton
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319905902
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description
This edited volume explores the diversities and complexities of women’s experiences in higher education. Its emphasis on personal narratives provides a forum for topics not typically found in in print, such as mental illness, marital difficulties, and gender identity. The intersectional narratives afford typically disenfranchised women opportunities to share experiences in ways that de-center standard academic writing, while simultaneously making these stories accessible to a range of readers, both inside and outside higher education.

We Should All Be Feminists

We Should All Be Feminists PDF Author: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 1101872934
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 65

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Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The highly acclaimed, provocative essay on feminism and sexual politics—from the award-winning author of Americanah "A call to action, for all people in the world, to undo the gender hierarchy." —Medium In this personal, eloquently-argued essay—adapted from the much-admired TEDx talk of the same name—Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie offers readers a unique definition of feminism for the twenty-first century. Drawing extensively on her own experiences and her deep understanding of the often masked realities of sexual politics, here is one remarkable author’s exploration of what it means to be a woman now—and an of-the-moment rallying cry for why we should all be feminists.

Demarginalizing the Intersection. Intersectionality of Race and Gender

Demarginalizing the Intersection. Intersectionality of Race and Gender PDF Author: Melina Gerdtz
Publisher:
ISBN: 9783346202901
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 20

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Book Description
Document from the year 2019 in the subject Gender Studies, grade: 1,0, University of Münster (Erziehungswissenschaft), course: Researching Racism - Classical Approaches and Recent Impulses, language: English, abstract: In a time with racism, far-right-parties and the ever so often correlating discriminating mindsets on the rise, fighting for everyone's human rights and equality is again as important as it should ever be. Understanding the concept of intersectionality in this relation is an indispensable necessity for comprehending and ultimately dismantling reigning institutions of oppression such as sexism, racism or heteronormativity and so forth. The precise term "intersectionality" itself was developed and coined by United States (US) civil rights activist, critical race theory scholar and professor of law KIMBERLÉ WILLIAMS CRENSHAW in her influential essay "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics." published in the year of 1989. She used the notion to describe the ways in which social identities overlap, and how that factors into distinct experiences of oppression of individuals since repressive institutions (e.g. racism, sexism, transphobia, xenophobia, classism, etc.) are interconnected as well and hence cannot be examined separately from one another. CRENSHAW specifically introduced the term to describe the peculiar situation of African American women and how they usually uniquely suffer from both sexism and racism in multifaceted and intercorrelated ways. In the footnotes in her following work "Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics, and violence against women of color. "(1991) CRENSHAW states that her analysis of how the concepts of race and gender connect was an attempt to "suggest a methodology that will ultimately disrupt the tendencies to see [them] as exclusive or separable" (CRENSHAW 1991, p. 1244).

Introduction to Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies

Introduction to Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies PDF Author: Associate Professor and Chair of Women's Studies L Ayu Saraswati
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 9780190084875
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 656

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Book Description
Introduction to Women's, Gender & Sexuality Studies: Interdisciplinary and Intersectional Approaches, Second Edition, reflects the exciting changes taking place in this field. Emphasizing both interdisciplinarity and intersectionality, this innovative mix of anthology and textbook includes key primary historical sources, debates on contemporary issues, and recent work in science, technology, and digital cultures. Readings from a range of genres--including poetry, short stories, op-eds, and feminist magazine articles--complement the scholarly selections and acknowledge the roots of creative and personal expression in the field. While the majority of selections are foundational texts, the book also integrates new work from established scholars and emerging voices to expand current debates in the field. The text is enhanced by thorough overviews that begin each section, robust and engaging pedagogy that encourages students to think critically and self-reflexively-and also to take action-as well as supplemental online resources for instructors.

Intersectionality

Intersectionality PDF Author: Anna Carastathis
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 0803296622
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
"Intersectionality intervenes in the field of intersectionality studies: the integrative examination of the effects of racial, gendered, and class power on people's lives. While "intersectionality" circulates as a buzzword, Anna Carastathis joins other critical voices to urge a more careful reading. Challenging the narratives of arrival that surround it, Carastathis argues that intersectionality is a horizon, illuminating ways of thinking that have yet to be realized; consequently, calls to "go beyond" intersectionality are premature. A provisional interpretation of intersectionality can disorient habits of essentialism, categorial purity, and prototypicality and overcome dynamics of segregation and subordination in political movements. Through a close reading of critical race theorist Kimberle Williams Crenshaw's germinal texts, published more than twenty-five years ago, Carastathis urges analytic clarity, contextual rigor, and a politicized, historicized understanding of this widely traveling concept. Intersectionality's roots in social justice movements and critical intellectual projects--specifically Black feminism--must be retraced and synthesized with a decolonial analysis so its radical potential to actualize coalitions can be enacted"--