Nationalism, sexual contract, and anti-colonial struggle: A critical reading of Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth and Tsitsi Dangarembga’s Nervous Conditions.

Abstract

Gender-based violence and gender inequalities are among growing global issues. International organizations such as the United Nations have informally labelled gender-based violence a pandemic. In light of the persistence of abuses against women in post-colonial Africa, this qualitative study uses Tsitsi Dangarembga’s Nervous Conditions and Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth and A Dying Colonialism as primary sources to excavate the implicit racial-patriarchal habitus that shaped the anti-colonial movement and the birth of the postcolonial state. This study begins by engaging in a critical discussion of the patriarchy concept, exploring various scholars’ views regarding the concept. Centrally, there is an exploration of the complex interplay of race and gender by Pateman and Mills in Contract and Domination. The study further interrogates the implicit racia-patriarchal contract that is present under colonialism in Nervous Conditions and the anti-colonial movement in The Wretched of the Earth and A Dying Colonialism. The theoretical and conceptual frameworks which guide this study include nationalism, Pateman’s sexual contract, Charles Mills’ implicit contract and the racia-patriarchal habitus. The data is analysed using critical discourse analysis which allows for the interrogation of the implicit contract that legitimises patriarchy in the colonized society and the anti-colonial nationalist movement. Critical discourse analysis also enables one to investigate the tools used in attempts to oppress a group of people in society. This study argues that the pre-existing patriarchal attitudes, norms, and values are not acknowledged and addressed in the nationalist agenda. These then become the patriarchal foundations of both the anti-colonial nationalist movement and the post-colonial state. In addressing gender-based violence and gender inequalities, it is therefore important to address the racia-patriarchal habitus.