A Womanist Study of Biliqisu Abubakar’s The Woman In Me

Abstract

Northern Nigeria is today rife with spontaneous proliferous writing(s) by women authors, arising from the honed systemic patriarchy that relegates them to obedience, social and cultural subjugation, mental and emotional redundancy as well as denies them the space to productively be at par with their talents, giftings and abilities. This problem allows these teaming writers to question the social and cultural practices of the customs, beliefs, thoughts, and value systems of the society they represent, through their writings. It is on the premise of this background that this paper, deploys Womanism into Bilqisu Abubakar's The Woman in Me, to expose this systemic patriarchal hold on the women and shade light on the Womanist strand of feminism as Africa’s perception to what Feminism is to the West. In light of the foregoing, the paper finds that the phenomenon of culture and religion (in all forms), can negatively reconfigure the livelihood of not just the Northern Nigerian woman, but the African woman at large, as well as denying her femininity the space to thrive. The paper thus, concludes by showing that contemporary female writers in Northern Nigeria are emerging and re-evaluating the nexus between them and the erstwhile systemic patriarchy with subtlety, yet firmness to air out their voices to the balanced and safe spaces Womanism, Motherism, Black feminism, African feminism, and the like offer.