Identity, Identity And Struggle In Things Fall Apart By Chinua Achebe

Chinua Achebe 's Things Fall Apart is a novel about the social, and physical struggles that occurred when the white man first arrived on the African continent. There are constant struggles between gender, identity, commodification, and class. Among the men and women in many African tribes that still exist today, there are divergences, which will always remain intact because of the culture and the way in which they are taught to treat each other. The novel is based on a conception of humans as self-reflexive beings and a definition of culture as a set of control mechanisms. Things Fall Apart is the story of Okonkwo, an elder, in the Igbo tribe. He is a fairly successful man who earned the respect of the tribal elders. The story of Okonkwo’s …show more content…
At first, the struggle is over Nwoye 's laziness and habit of acting "womanish" in Okonkwo 's eyes. But by the end of the novel, the father/son conflict is religious, as Okonkwo struggles with Nwoye 's conversion to Christianity and rejection of his native religion, and therefore his father. The struggle of father vs. son could also refer to Okonkwo and the memory of his lazy father, Unoka, whom he has despised all his life, and whom he desperately tries to distance himself from. Okonkwo struggles with his own self-worth throughout the entire novel. He tries incredibly hard to build up his own farm, to have strong children, and to take many titles in Umuofia. He is always trying to prove to himself and others that he is worth a lot, and is a strong person worthy of …show more content…
By the end of the novel, Okonkwo is struggling with Christianity, and the fact that it 's encroaching on his own religion and culture. Nwoye also struggles with religion, eventually rejecting his own religion to convert to Christianity because he does not agree with his people 's religious beliefs. The Ibo Culture struggles with the very different culture of the white missionaries. By the end of the novel, many of the Ibo have given up this struggle and opt to stop fighting the missionaries and allow them to introduce their culture. Okonkwo struggles with many men over the course of Things Fall Apart. He struggles with every man he believes is inferior, like the one he called a woman at a meeting of powerful men in Umuofia. He also clashes with the white missionaries, because he is strongly against the actions they are doing, trying to convert the Igbo peoples. He also encounters struggles with the rest of Umuofia, because they refuse to fight the white missionaries, this is when they decide to just let the white man introduce their