Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, The thing around your neck, women, feminism, muslim, social inequality
In this other short story by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, two women help each other to find shelter in an abandoned store, after running with no rest, in a hurry. One is clearly Muslim, the other, Chika, seems to be Christian. In an atmosphere of dictatorship and ethnic tensions, they have escaped a riot sparked by the slaughtering of a man. Since it is too violent outside, they shut themselves in. The two women lost things and relatives on the way. Whereas Chika is panicked and anticipates the next days, the other one makes herself comfortable. They talk about their lives: Chika studies medicine, whereas the Muslim woman is a market seller. She takes the opportunity to ask Chika for a diagnosis of her private parts, but Chika is not at ease with it, like in all real auscultations. She gives her advice but accidentally makes her cry.
[...] "where you go school?", l.14). Chika, instead, seems to be a local, although not exactly from the city. She speaks standard English and does not really believe in god but bears a Christian rosary. The difference is also socio-economic: the Muslim woman has a family of five to feed and works as a market seller, while Chika comes from an affluent, gated family who can support her and her sister's high education. However, this social inequality is reversed by their behaviour. [...]
[...] Maybe it is because the women have spent hours confined in the dark that they have lost their markers). We can say the title perfectly represents the whole story, of course because the medical exam couldn't be more private, but also because the two women, who were strangers, talked about their personal lives, the Muslim one sobbed her heart out, and they helped each other in a closeted environment, maybe finally becoming friends whereas their communities are in conflict. As for the characters, they are both of totally different backgrounds. [...]
[...] She takes the opportunity to ask Chika for a diagnosis of her private parts, but Chika is not at ease with it, like in all real auscultations. She gives her advice but accidentally makes her cry. The Muslim woman starts praying while Chika worries for her sister and decides to leave, although warned about danger. As she walks in the streets, she sees corpses and turns back but is shot in her leg. The Muslim woman looks after her, washing the wound and tying her scarf around it. [...]
[...] Maybe it all changes once the Muslim woman has cried, then she "smiles for the first time", p.51, last line. Chika, on her side, changes her mind about Muslim Hausas and thinks she will be angry when she hears or reads biased news on the radio or in the papers. The narration may trigger emotions in the reader, from thrill in action to compassion when one cries, but also from disgust and angst from the smell, the tense atmosphere and the dead bodies, to some sort of comic astonishment when the Muslim woman unexpectedly shows her breasts. [...]
[...] We know they don't flee the police like burglars but actually something tragic has happened, since they had to drop all their things in panic. At first, the women are distant, since they don't know each other and belong to different communities. In the middle of the story, the situation is still tense, with the Muslim woman retorting "You have ear problem? You don't hear what I am saying", p l. in an exasperated way. But It is during their night together and their interactions that the situation will reverse to amity ("Greet your sister, greet your people", p.56, l. [...]
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