EXPLORING THE VULNERABILITY OF WOMEN AND THEIR RESISTANCE TO MALE OPPRESSION IN POST-COLONIAL AFRICA: A CASE STUDY OF AMMA DARKO’S BEYOND THE HORIZON.

Abstract

African women in a contemporary male-dominated society face many challenges due to some social stereotypes shaped to keep them in submission and in the back row. This paper addresses the issue of African women’s vulnerability and their resistance to male oppression as a substantial theme in Amma Darko’s Beyond the Horizon. The African woman, considered as vulnerable or as the weaker sex, has been woefully degraded, dehumanized, abused and oppressed by her male counterpart. The committed Ghanaian authoress catechizes the African woman’s freedom facing a debasing and oppressive patriarchal system. The paper highlights the actions of the heroin reflecting both submissive and rebellious attitudes in a phallocentric African culture she finds herself in. Using post-colonialism and feminism as a bedrock, the vulnerable status of the African woman as well as her resistant attitudes to male oppression in the focus novel are dissected and reviewed in a patriarchal context.