Literary Analysis Essay on Who Fears Death? By Nnedi Okorafor

Introduction

Human beings generally differ in gender, physical appearance, ethnic affiliation, religious beliefs, and cultural practices. Regardless of their numerous differences, human beings of different ethnicity, religion, physical appearance, and even cultures interact in their daily activities since "the world is a small village". In Nnedi Okorafor's Who Fears Death, Onyesonwu finds herself interacting with many different people who treat her differently or react differently to her based on their beliefs and outlooks towards life. Her gender, conception, and shapeshifting powers are among the many factors that greatly affect the nature of her relationship with the people surrounding her.

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Njeeba, an Okeke woman is raped by Daib who is a Nuru man. The Nuru consider themselves as superior to the Okeke and formulate the raping of Okeke women, killing the Okeke men and burning down their villages as a genocide against the Okeke. It is as a result of her rape that Njeeba gets impregnated with her child who is an Ewu- a child of rape and she becomes loathed by her own community as she is viewed as a collaborator of the Nuru since sons born as a result of rape are considered allies of the Nuru rather than foes ( Okorafor, p.21) . Due to her rejection, Njeeba then flees to the desert where she then bears her daughter. The society judges and sentences Njeeba for an inevitable incident; one that wasn't her fault but she does end up taking the fall anyway and becoming an outcast.

Onyesonwu suffers stigmatization. All through her childhood Onyesonwu is despised by her own people and expected to live a life full of violence and shame (Okorafor, p.31). She has considered a shame to her parents being a child conceived out of rape. Onyesonwu is shunned by other children and ends up having no friends during her childhood life. The society victimizes and patronizes Onyesonwu based on the fact that she is a child of rape; an unwanted child and the fact that her mother is considered as a collaborator with the Nuru who were hell-bent on eradicating the Okeke community.

Aro declines to take Onyesonwu as a student because of her gender (Okorafor, p.63). Onyesonwu becomes unschooled simply because she is of the female gender. According to the Okeke tradition, sorcery is a function reserved for the male gender. Aro only agrees to take Onyesonwu as after she attacks his spirit in frustration and does so only because he considers her as a danger to the society whether or not he takes her as a student. The society looks down upon the female gender and considers then weak and less empowered or less superior. The society sees no reason for educating the female gender and feels like putting power in the hands of the female gender is exposing the society or community to great risks and thinks that it will bring dire consequences upon the society.

Onyesonwu goes through with her eleventh year right as per the Okeke's customs. The eleventh year right is female circumcision. Onyesonwu decides to participate in the eleventh year right in order not to bring any more shame to her parents seeing as she is already a source of shame by being conceived of rape ( Okorafor, p.33). In the Okeke community, female genital mutilation is a practice that is wholly supported by the female elders and she who fails to participate is considered a shame to the society. There is a high social pressure together with the rich belief in cultural practices that coupled with the adolescent desire to fit in compels girls to want to participate in the female circumcision practice.

Onyesonwu goes to confront Daib- her father concerning the planned Okeke genocide, joined by Mwita, Luyu, Binta, Diti, and Fanazi after learning from Sola that the man spoken of by the prophecy that a Nuru man will force the rewriting of the great book is her father (Okorafor, p.70). Onyesonwu inspires hope for her Okeke condemned community. She goes ahead and fights her father in the spirit world, winning against him and re-writing the great book. By doing this, she lifts the curse of the Okeke and inspires the society to think differently and to explore other alternatives in order to promote diversity in thoughts.

Binta suffers from sexual abuse from her father. However, when she reports what happens to her, her claims are just ignored and she is not taken seriously since according to the society, she is not yet an adult and therefore the claims she makes can easily not be given any attention. After Binta participates in the eleventh year right, she suddenly gets a voice in the society. In our encounters with the people around us sometimes we do get misunderstood or ignored due to our gender, age or based on some specific cultural beliefs. There exists an unfair or a biased basis of judgment where despite somethings being wrong and unacceptable end up being allowed and go unpunished as is required.

In the end, Onyesonwu ends up sacrificing herself and dies a martyr death. Despite her death being a tragic one, it ends up bringing relief upon women in society. Onyesonwu's death empowers women all over the society, that is, both the Okeke and the Nuru women. The women gain abilities they didn't have before and this leads to the end of a long period of slavery and oppression.

In society, it is the youth who ignite the desire for transformation against unjust traditions, oppressive world views, corruption and all other forms of injustice. The society should learn to accept the actual reality and prevailing conditions instead of pushing hard against it. Mwita finds it very hard to accept that Onyesonwu passed Aro's test whereas he failed. He is in denial that he is endowed with the skill in healing rather than nature-based like Onyesonwu.

Nnedi Okorafor inspires the society to think transformatively as opposed to the oppressive school of thought the society has been confined to for a long period of time. However, the transformation should not be a "blanket effect" as sometimes some traditions are more valuable than they are considered to be hence should be maintained. Okorafor sparks our interest in how we respond to issues and how they should be responded to. Njeeba is rejected and thrown out of her home because she was raped by Daib. This piques our interest in how society treats victims of rape. Rape victims are usually isolated, patronized, victimized and in most cases blamed for finding themselves in the situations they do find themselves in. We should be more accommodating, sympathetic and supportive towards such victims.

Nnedi Okorafor's: "Who Fears Death?" provides great insight into human interactions. Onyesonwu interacts with a wide variety of people all who treat her differently based on their cultural beliefs, religion and even ethnicity. Onyesonwu has different reactions to all these different people which all bring forth different results. In our daily lives, we do interact with different people every day of our lives and it is our reactions to their actions towards us that does determine the end result. Our reactions towards people should be compassionate and open-minded rather than judgmental due to the diversity of the various members of society.

Works Cited

Okorafor, Nnedi. Who fears death? Vol. 1512. Penguin, 2011.