Reconstructing Feminist Narrative for the 21th Century African Literary Interpretation: The Example of Adimora-Ezeigbo’s Snail-Sense Feminism

Abstract

Modern African literature had emerged as a vista to privilege a patriarchy, male hegemonic treatise in the continent. The need to foreclose feminist mindset has ever remained pertinent in African cosmos hence, modern African literature finds a safe haven in this direction. The reason for this critical posture is not inadvertent: feminist epistemological standpoint has precluded its own adaptability to African critical engagement as a reliable model, particularly with the 21st century yearning for cultural revamping on which continental development can be premised. However, the preponderance of feminist strands which have emerged as counterdiscursive narratives can no longer be ignored despite their precipitous Western leaning. Therefore, against the backdrop of the resolve to reconstruct feminist polemic for African critical enterprise, as evident in Mariama Ba‟s So Long a Letter, this study seeks succour in Adimora-Ezeigbo‟s non-confrontational, non-combative, indigenous variant: Snail-Sense Feminism. This is consequent on the assumption that only a non-dogmatic African-centred theoretical alternative can be conveniently adduced in African critical domain. This would, invariably, produce a revamping of feminist theory from its overt loathsomeness to that which can be accommodated in the continent‟s creative and critical endeavours.