EXPOSURE TO ANOTHER CULTURE: SHAPING THE SELF OF THE SUBALTERN IN BUCHI EMECHETA’S KEHINDE

Abstract

The aim of this study is to defamiliarize Gayatri Spivak’s pessimistic approach regarding the condition of the subaltern as a female subject. Spivak’s subaltern, misrepresented by the male-dominated West and the male-dominated East and therefore not belonging to any particular social group, has no history and cannot speak for herself. The position of the subaltern woman is examined based on Buchi Emecheta’s Kehinde (1994), which deals with the circular migration of the eponymous character – Kehinde – from Nigeria to England, back to Nigeria and then back to England. The novel explores the binary between the self and the other of the subaltern woman in relation to the native and host cultures. To this end, the study uses several postcolonial concepts by Homi K. Bhabha, discussed at length in his book The Location of Culture (1994), such as mimicry, liminality, appropriation, and ambivalence, which, in its turn, conceptualises the position of the Nigerian subaltern woman in relation to cultural difference. The study foregrounds the validity of the popular woman theory known as African feminism, which specifically addresses the situation of African women. This approach also makes it possible to redefine the traditional concept of femininity in Nigerian culture. The study shows how cultural difference affects the growing consciousness of the subaltern woman, which ultimately helps her to become an independent person. The study concludes that, unlike Spivak’s subaltern, the Nigerian subaltern creates her own space from which she can speak for herself in the male-dominated society.