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Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions - Coggle Diagram
Tsitsi Dangarembga's
Nervous Conditions
Religion
"We had no knowledge of nuns except as spiritual, chaste beings who dedicated their pious, prayerful lives to the service of God." (Ch. 9, pg. 287)
Colonialism
“Tell me, my daughter, what will I, your mother say to you when you come home a stranger full of white ways and ideas? It will be English, English all the time. He-e, Mummy this, he-e, Mummy that. Like that cousin of yours.” (299)
Gender
There is a huge cultural difference between the Shona and the British & women are oppressed in different ways in each society.
"I have observed from my own daughter's behavior that it is not a good thing for a young girl to associate too much with these white people, to have too much freedom." (183)
Women will be judged reguardless of what they do.
"I don't know what people mean by a loose woman - sometimes she is someone who walks the streets, sometimes she is an educated woman, sometimes she is a sucessful man's daughter or she is simply beautiful." (184)
“Thus, when the nuns came to the mission and we saw that instead of murmuring soft blessings and gliding seraphically over the grass in diaphanous habits, they wore smart blouses and skirts and walked, laughed and talked in low twanging tones very much like our own American missionaries did, we were very disappointed." (287/8)
“ By the time you have finished your Form Four you will be able to take your course, whatever it is that you choose. In time you will be earning money. You will be in a position to be married by a decent man and set up a decent home.” (293)
Race
“ I was delighted that people, white people for that matter, thought my background was interesting.” (289)
“My father, who was always enthusiastic in Babamukuru’s presence, congratulated Babamukuru on having moulded my mind so skilfully that even white people were impressed by the result, but Babamukuru refused to be drawn.” (295)
Family
“Mauya wekuchirungu,’ they greeted me, and I modestly declined the title, not because I did not want it but because Babamukuru had not granted it to me.” (295)
Class
“So it was not in the least surprising that I performed brilliantly in that entrance examination, thereby earning the privilege of associating with the elite of that time, the privilege of being admitted on an honorary basis into their culture.” (290/1)
“At that convent, which was just outside town but on the other side, to the south, you wore pleated terylene skirts to school every day and on Sundays a tailor-made two-piece linen suit with gloves, yes, even with gloves!” (290)
They recognise that their life is hard and that it could be better, if they conform to the expectations of the colonizers/upper class.
"Going to the convent was a chance to lighten those burdens by entering a world where burdens were light." (182)
"it would be a marvelous opportunity, she said sarcastically, to forget. To forget who you were, what you were, and why you were that. The process... was called assimilation" (182)