Female Agency in Religious Disassembly of Culture: Where Do Women Fit In? Megan Elizabeth Kirby Eastern Kentucky University

Eastern Kentucky University Encompass Online Theses and Dissertations Student Scholarship January 2016 Female Agency in Religious Disassembly of Culture: Where Do Women Fit In? Megan Elizabeth Kirby Eastern Kentucky University Follow this and additional works at: https://encompass.eku.edu/etd Part of the Literature in English, North America, Ethnic and Cultural Minority Commons Recommended Citation Kirby, Megan Elizabeth, "Female Agency in Religious Disassembly of Culture: Where Do Women Fit In?" (2016). Online Theses and Dissertations. 388. https://encompass.eku.edu/etd/388 This Open Access Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Scholarship at Encompass. It has been accepted for inclusion in Online Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Encompass. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Female Agency in Religious Disassembly of Culture: Where do Women Fit In? By Megan E. Kirby Bachelors of Arts University of North Carolina at Wilmington Wilmington, North Carolina 2004 Submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Eastern Kentucky University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS May, 2016 Copyright © Megan Kirby, 2016 All rights reserved ii DEDICATION This thesis is dedicated to my husband and children who supported me throughout this journey and to my parents who always believed I could do it iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank Dr. Jill Parrott for her unwavering support throughout this process. She was an inspiration to me in my first semester at EKU and continues to be even now. I would also like to thank Dr. Erin Presley and Dr. Tom Butler for their comments and support throughout this past year. My committee was truly one of a kind in their encouragement and support of my goals. I would also like to thank my husband and kids who endured late nights, lots of pizza, and weekends full of books and writing instead of zoo trips and vacations. Finally, I would like to thank my parents who helped support me and my family through this degree because they believe in the best for all of their daughters. iv Abstract This thesis is a venture into cultural studies through the lens of literature using the texts The Color Purple and Possessing the Secret of Joy by Alice Walker. The study focuses on the impact of Western missionaries on the various African cultures during the time period of the novels, specifically regarding whether or not the missionaries were able to improve the quality of life and agency of women within the existing cultures. Literary criticism and historical accounts focus the thesis on and illuminate both fictional women in the Walker novels and women existing in the real-life cultures at that time. The findings focused on the outcome for women in the Walker novels as well as women existing in the real-life cultures. Particular attention was given to whether or not women as a group benefited from missions work or suffered harm. v TABLE OF CONTENTS PART PAGE I. Introduction .....................................................................................................1 II. Literature Review: Fiction .............................................................................8 III. Literature Review: A Theoretical Framework .............................................15 IV. Literature Review: Female Genital Mutilation ............................................21 V. Literature Review: Historical Significance ..................................................26 VI. Introduction to Argument ............................................................................35 VII. Part I: Christian Missionaries and Female Agency .....................................36 VIII. Part II: Woman as Commodity ...................................................................51 VIIII. Concluding Thoughts...................................................................................55 List of References ..................................................................................................60 vi Introduction Alice Walker’s novel The Color Purple and the second novel continuing the story of Tashi, The Secret of Possessing Joy, are ripe with intersections between post-colonialism and feminism. The goal of this research is to explore the role of Western Protestant missionaries in creating, destroying, or commuting female agency within culture. As Protestant missionaries entered Africa and began replacing traditional practices, such as female genital mutilation, and traditional religion with Western ideas about tradition and religion, women were forced to choose a side. In choosing to remain true to their own culture, it was possible for women to maintain a kind of agency within the loyal faction. In choosing to adopt Western ideals, women could in turn adopt a new agency within a new culture. However, either choice led women into situations where they were still under the power of one societal expectation or another. The question then becomes which choice is better for a woman in this situation, and the answer is oftentimes that there is no good choice. Having discovered this, consider what Western missionaries brought to the table that they felt would empower women. The end of female genital mutilation began with Western missionaries, but as this practice died, women suffered a figurative circumcision of their culture in order to be adopted into Western society. The term “female genital mutilation” is a term ascribed to the practice of female circumcision by opponents of the practice. Those who do not oppose the practice or who view it from a neutral territory view this terminology as unnecessarily offensive and instead refer to the practice as “female circumcision” equating it to the practice of male circumcision. The two are differentiated for opponents of the practice due to the suffering that is often involved. Female circumcision can include excising only a portion of the 1 clitoris or removing all external signs of female genitals and sewing up the entrance. Tashi experienced the latter, we are told, which complicated her life as a young woman and led to the intellectual disability of her child. Other potential outcomes include infection, deformity, increased gynecological problems, and death. For the purposes of this thesis, the terminology “female genital mutilation” will be used as Alice Walker’s work is the primary focus and she is a vocal critic of this practice. 1 Through this disassembly of one group of related cultures—African and the integration into another group of related cultures—Western—women continue to be disregarded as capable of their own agency within existing societies. Western culture, in this case, is a generalized term used to describe the imperialism that began with European nations such as the Netherlands, France, and Britain and then continued with the United States. All of these nations were interested in the resources that Africa could provide, not least of which was its people. While physical resources were mined, both the Europeans and Americans used slave labor to build industry. Likewise, African culture is a generalized term to describe a greatly varying people from one country to another. Both Alice Walker and Chinua Achebe have referenced the Igbo tribe in their work. The Igbo tribe at the time of Walker’s writing was one of the largest and most widespread tribes in Africa. This tribe inhabited many African nations, such as: Nigeria, Liberia, Cameroon, and Equatorial Guinea but maintained similar practices and beliefs. Women who were assimilated into European or American culture from the Igbo 1 Evidence will be presented to suggest that this judgment is made without a full understanding of the cultural implications as is often the case when Western society intervenes in cultures that are not their own. 2 African tradition continued to be dictated to by a culture largely decided by men, traditionally known as patriarchal. However, regardless of the culture these women did continue to be capable of critical thought and of powerful roles. In Walker’s fictional account, Possessing the Secret of Joy, M’lisa, who performed the genital mutilation surgery on both Tashi and Tashi’s sister, is one such example of a powerful woman in a male dominated culture. In order to gain this power she had to unsex all women within her culture through genital mutilation. These women may have maintained the femininity that men of the tribe found pleasing but were disallowed from experiencing their own sexual pleasure. M’lisa’s role essentially made her an ally in this transgression with the men of the tribe thus in at least one sense she had a measure of equality. This adherence to the male ideal gave her agency within her own culture, which is why she chose to remain within that culture even as the West literally surrounded her. M’lisa maintained an awareness that the West would frown on this tradition through her experience with former missionaries. This is true for Tashi as well, who finds her agency in making the choice to kill M’lisa. By killing M’lisa, Tashi is finally able to embrace the Western culture that she so loves through such a powerful rejection of her own culture. Though M’lisa’s death does not un-circumcise Tashi literally, she is able to regain some of the persona taken from her through this act. However, she then loses all agency by becoming imprisoned. Tashi went from a figurative prison to a literal prison but the fact remains that she is one of the sadder

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