Amy Shanks

A Novel Education

            Repeatedly referenced throughout the semester, Objective 2a addressed the germane question of using fiction as a means of obtaining global and historical perspective and knowledge. The appeal of fiction is that it takes cold facts and details and fleshes them out into riveting dramas. The last class discussion ended with a focus on the importance of balanced selection in fiction to facilitate a well-rounded understanding of history, culture, and gender relations. Just as history books have been criticized for being told from the perspective of the victors, it is just as important to avoid only reading fiction from only one perspective (i.e. the colonizer). Jasmine and Train to Pakistan offer a paired insight to conflicts that arise from different cultures and the complexities of varied experiences of gender, while Things Fall Apart and Heart of Darkness provide a balancing perspective over the tensions from tradition and modernity. The pairing of the selected texts was a model example of how to facilitate education through the fictional lens of varied perspectives.

Simply reading about the cultural tension between the Sikhs and Muslims during the partition of India does not provide the same depth of understanding as the narrative tale in Train to Pakistan. The conflict is fleshed out and much more readily conceptualized when reading about how the Sikh Jugga reacts to Malli’s condescending reference to Nooran, Jugga’s Muslim girlfriend. Jugga “took Malli as a terrier shakes a piece of rag from side to side, forward and backward, smashing his head repeatedly against the bars” (122) screaming “This to rape your mother. This your sister...” (122). Here we see Jugga’s ability even in prison to violently display his contempt for the tension that has built between Sikhs and Muslims.

Not only does fiction provide a scope of culture tension, but it also exposes the limitations imposed upon women by juxtaposing Jugga’s ability to express his feelings about prejudice with Nooran’s inability. As Paula Tyler observed in her final, “A Gendered Power Struggle,” “there is not a strong female presence anywhere in the novel and women are proven utterly defenseless to the atrocities occurring around them.” Even in captivity, Jugga is able to physically and verbally express his feelings. For Nooran, this does not appear to be an option. The novel provides very few scenes of dialogue for Nooran, emphasizing her lack of voice. In her most vocal scene, Nooran is visiting Jugga’s mother who verbally attacks and berates her because she is a Muslim. Nooran accepts the abuse and begs her to relay a message to Jugga instead of standing up for herself.

            Jasmine is a well-paired reading with Train to Pakistan because it provides a contrasting depiction of a more empowered woman dealing with cultural conflict primarily through the perspective of a transnational migrant. Again, a dramatized depiction of the transitional migrant experience better illustrates the diverging loyalties of these bicultural individuals. Through Jasmine, we are able to see a calmer, assimilative approach to differing cultures than in Train to Pakistan. Granted, Jasmine’s circumstances are different since she left her native country; however, as a transnational migrant, she still faces cultural conflicts, but she is able to pacify and ultimately abandon situations she encounters and live the life she chooses. At first, Jasmine desires to be a submissive wife, but her husband’s insistence and enduring tragic events, she evolves into a strong postcolonial woman with characteristics more comparable to Jugga than Nooran. At times it may seem as though she vacillates from a strong woman capable of killing her assaulter to a husband pleaser suppressing her past, but a closer look reveals that though Jasmine is reacting to events in her life, she is ultimately in charge of the choices she makes.

 During her life with Bud, Jasmine suppresses her native culture. The situation may appear to be analogous to Nooran’s powerless life, but Jasmine chooses to hide her past to protect Bud because she believes “there’s so much about me he doesn’t know, that might kill him to find out” (213). Jasmine’s perpetual change of identity is depicted as an empowering decision she makes to face the challenges of life. Nooran does not have the indulgence of such options. A member of a heavily patriarchal culture, her identity is constructed and restrained through her father.  While Jasmine easily shifts from “Jane, Jasmine, Jyoti” (21), Nooran is and always will be a “weaver’s daughter” (138).

Just as fixed as her identity, Nooran’s relationship with Jugga is doomed and she is powerless to even attempt to save it. Jasmine chooses to leave Wylie and Taylor, just as she is empowered to pacify cultural conflicts between her and Bud, ultimately leading to her deciding to leave him for a life where she felt comfortable exposing her native culture. The women in Train to Pakistan do not have such luxury in choice. Coupling the novel with Jasmine provides a balanced look at the challenges of cultural struggles through the perspective of both genders.

Gender and cultural conflicts are closely tied to the tension that develops between “tradition” and “modernity.” Traditional societies often have fixed expectations for gender roles that modernization typically challenges. The pull between tradition and modernity is not simply an archaic concept; current societies still experience this tension. Modernization from colonization is a more specific, complex version of this conflict that not all contemporary societies possess the background to understand. Things Fall Apart and Heart of Darkness provide a balanced paired reading over this specific issue. The first imparts a glimpse into the dangers of complete inflexibility to change despite an acknowledgment of the nefarious imperialistic sources of modernity while the latter intimates the absurdity of imposing modernizing culture upon on another civilization. Both novels provide insight into struggles that exists between these diverging ideas.

To acknowledge that modernity is not always readily accepted by traditional cultures does not suffice in explaining the complex tension that arises from such a change. Things Fall Apart exposes the grey areas that arise from the modernization of a society. While it is not surprising that a novel from the perspective of the colonized (or rather a culture on the precipice of being colonized) would show an adherence to tradition, the novel unexpectedly does not exactly praise this behavior. The protagonist Okonkwo marginalizes his family and tribe and ultimately takes his own life because of his inflexibility toward change. Asserting that the novel supports modernization is a stretch since Okonkwo probably would not have taken his life had the threat of modernity not existed, but the story also shows the dangers of a complete intolerance to societal changes.

The harsh reality of strict devotion to tradition is amplified in Achabe’s narrative form. Hearing that tribal ties and rivalries exist is not nearly as impressionable as seeing the bonds build for three years between Ikemefuna and his surrogate parents and siblings, only to be stabbed by his surrogate father Okonkwo because of a loyalty to the tribe and the desire to uphold a traditional masculine appearance. The reader’s grimace at this event in the narrative is validated through Obierika’s condemnation of Okonkwo’s actions. He states, “If the Oracle said that my son should be killed I would neither dispute it nor be the one to do it” (67). Okonkwo, however, refuses to agree with Obierika. Singularly preoccupied with maintaining his status, Okonkwo’s only regret is the sorrow he feels over Ikemefuna’s death, rebuking himself for being a “shivering old woman“ (65) and excusing the behavior as a result of the season of rest. The novel’s ability to articulate the complexity involved in the battle of modernity provides readers with a glimpse into the human experience of the conflict, which facts alone cannot convey.   

Heart of Darkness, filled with vivid descriptions of colonizers’ efforts to modernize the Africans, provides insightful commentary on the issue of colonialism. Though the novel is from the perspective of the colonizer, it subtly critiques imposing modern ideas onto a traditional culture.  While Things Fall Apart purported the dangers of glorifying tradition, Heart of Darkness emphasizes the abnormality of modernization. The protagonist Marlow observes the absurdity of Africans donning colonial apparel stating, “to look at him was as edifying as seeing a dog in a parody of breeches and a feather hat, walking on his hind-legs. A few months of training had done for that really fine chap”(2.7). Here, Marlow touches on the very source of Okonkwo’s anxiety. Dressing up and giving chores to natives were simply unfruitful attempts in changing their identity. While Okonkwa and Marlow would be unified in belief of the negative effects of colonization, their reasons differ, providing a broader scope of perspective on the topic. As previously observed, Okonkwa is frightened by the threat of change modernization brings, while Marlow felt such efforts were feckless. Despite the novel’s lack of development of the natives’ culture, the narration still exposes how attempts of colonizing are a farce. Marlow may at times expose elitist behavior towards the indigenous African culture, but he is simultaneously critical of the behavior of the colonists.

Things Fall Apart and Heart of Darkness work well together because they provide a fuller representation of culture. Things Fall Apart privies the native, African culture, focusing primarily on one native’s conflict with the modernity of colonization. The novel provides little insight to the European missionaries. What Heart of Darkness lacks in development of African culture, it supplies in critical commentary of European culture. Marlow uses examples of the natives, such as a privy of natives who were “men one could work with” (2.10), primarily to censure the colonizer, without recognizing the experience of the native. Placing the two novels in dialogue fills the cultural representation gaps each possess.

 Fiction provides insightful context for gender and cultural conflicts as well as the struggle between tradition and modernity. Molding anthropology into a relatable narrative that readers are much more receptive towards, fiction promises to engage while simultaneously educating. To be knowledgeable in a subject, the curriculum must provide balanced perspectives for true scope of the subject matter. The course paired readings offered a multicultural and multi-gendered perspective fostering a well-rounded awareness of the course objectives.