Abstract

Somewhere in the core of the sociocultural fabric of many patriarchal African societies is an African traditional view of womanhood. Childbearing and marriage are used by many African societies as determinants of womanhood. Thus, it is often implied that a female attains womanhood when she marries a man and bears children. This article investigates marriage and mothering (childbearing) as indications of womanhood, in the lives of African women, in Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie’s Half of a Yellow Sun and Purple Hibiscus. A survey of the alternatives to marriage and childbearing from the motherist and radical feminist view shows that society conditions some women into choosing marriage and childbearing against their will. Stigma, fear, low self-esteem, and economic dependency are the key catalysts for binding women in marriage. Through the merging of motherism and radical feminism, the study finds that being single and not having biological children does not deny a woman of womanhood. Adoption, community mothering, and cohabiting are identified as viable alternatives to motherhood and marriage, respectively. The article concludes by juxtaposing the suffering of female characters who lived the social construct of womanhood with the emerging new African women who defy the status quo as reasons society must begin to change the qualifications for womanhood in a way that appreciates the rights of a woman.