A contemporary African feminist reading of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Purple hibiscus: unpacking the impact of patriarchy on ‘woman’ in Igbo society

Patriarchy is a global phenomenon that manifests through various forms of abuse, which results in violence against women and children. This is due to the link that patriarchy shares with the notions of male dominance, power, authority and privilege while reinforcing female vulnerability. This paper situates patriarchy and violence within a socio-cultural Igbo-centric framework, which explains the unequal gender relations that place Igbo women and girls in subordinate positions. Recognising that patriarchy infringes the rights of women and girls, the United Nations in 2015 adopted the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Of these goals, Sustainable Development Goal 5 is most relevant to this study because it targets achieving gender equality and female empowerment in member states by 2030. This paper is divided into three sections. The first section contextualises patriarchy, gender-based violence and Sustainable Development Goals within the praxis of Igbo society. The second section analyses how characters like Eugene Achike, Beatrice Achike, Kambili Achike and Aunty Ifeoma perpetuate and challenge patriarchal norms in Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Purple hibiscus (2003). The third section serves as the conclusion. This paper shows how members of the vulnerable class can reclaim their agency as full human beings. These arguments are set against Gayatri Spivak’s postcolonial feminist framework. Spivak’s perspective about subalternity highlights the concepts of positions and power dynamics in postcolonial Igbo settings. This paper calls for the delegitimisation of various patriarchal strategies that reinforce gender inequalities in Igbo society and, by so doing, contributes to nuanced discourses on gender equity and policy inclusivity in postcolonial Igbo contexts.