IIARD International Institute of Academic Research and Development

RESEARCH JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES AND CULTURAL STUDIES (RJHCS )

E-ISSN 2579-0528
P-ISSN 2695-2467
VOL. 9 NO. 1 2023
DOI: https://doi.org/10.56201/rjhcs.v9.no1.2023.pg1.7

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The Female Subject: From Objectification to Self-Essence in Nawal El Saadawi’s Woman at Point Zero (2008) and The Hidden Face of Eve (2016)

Moustapha Dome Sene

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Abstract

The gender issue has long been a matter of great interest when it comes to deal with African Literature, the question of sex is a topical issue in the African cultural mainstream, born out of Man’s crooked rib”, Women are generally portrayed as weak, sensitive and dependent beings. That worldwide depiction of women is based on manifold aspects deeply rooted on cultural, traditional, societal and religious conceptions and beliefs which aspire to weaken women’s status and promote men’s authoritarian position. As a result, the growth of Patriarchy which represents a last straw which breaks the camel’s, women suffered physically and psychologically at once in an environment where their being are still wretched due to cruel practices: rape, female genital mutilation, child abuse, forced marriage to name but a few which they were liable to undergo from childhood to adulthood. In The Hidden Face of Eve as well as in Woman at Point Zero El Saadawi comes to unveil women’s burden to the entire audience where she portrays the African Arab World and the patriarchal dynamic as the fence leading out of opulence and subjugation. In her capacity as a Psychiatrist, Nawal, in her works analyses and spotlights women’s lives. However, as a feminist, Nawal undertakes significant canvas, paving the way for the real essence of the African Arab woman through education, dislocation and prostitution which constitutes a double-edged sword. This paper aims at spotlighting the phallocentric blooming process with its norms and how the power of the female body can lead to empowerment in foiling men’s strategies. Through that aesthetic woman can move from dependency to independency from unconsciousness to consciousness, from no one to someone then production creativity and intellection gather around their real being in the one oriented society that impede their essence

keywords:

subject, objectification, essence, consciousness, intellection

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References:

EL SAADAWI, Nawal, The Hidden Face of Eve, London, Zed Books 1977 [2016].
………………………., Woman at Point Zero, London, Zed Books 1975 [2008].

SENE, Abib, “A Gender Sex-System that Afrocentralizes the issue of a Traditional Female
Identity. The case in Nawal El Saadawi?s Woman at Point Zero Nuruddin Farah?s
From a Crooked Rib” International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and
Translation, (vol 3, issue 5 2020)

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