Raising Women’s Consciousness Towards Transformation in Nigeria: The Role of Literature

Abstract

This paper illuminates the marginalization or absenting of the female from transformational processes in Nigeria evident in male-authored works, specifically the novel. This has engendered the woman writer’s creative response to the need for consciousness raising towards female capabilities, by redefining the female as an achiever in multiple transformational spaces—cultural, social, economic, educational, political. The paper argues that literature has played and is still playing a major role in female consciousness raising towards the transformation of Nigerian society. Consciousness denotes awareness. Thus, to be conscious is to attain a state of awareness. Given that “the locus of consciousness [is] the psyche,” consciousness raising should re-educate and re-structure the psyche towards a growing awareness. Transformation connotes change in all spheres of life—the cultural, social, economic, educational, political, etc.