Theme Of Culture In Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart

Culture is what keeps people in a certain areas connected and is used to make a sustainable society to live in. Although the main goal of a culture is to unite the people some fall sort and still have separation between the people. In the novel Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, A Nigerian village named the Ibo village is described very well but Achebe does not shy away from showing the reader how the villages culture and traditions divide the people more than unite them. Some of the villages ideas only separates the people rather than unite them which cause the culture to ultimately fall in the end. The need for masculinity in a male in the tribe is huge and any male who is not masculine seems to be looked down upon. The meaning of masculinity …show more content…
Women are beaten in the tribe and is normal for husbands in the tribe to do so. During the peace week Okonkwo beat his wife, “ Your wife was at fault, but even if you came into your obi and found her lover on top of her, you would still have committed a great evening to beat her” (30). Okonkwos wife had killed a plant and beat her during the peace of week where no violence was to be committed. In the quote Ezeani was telling Okonkwo that she deserved a beating but it was not the right time. The wife was beaten for a very small reason and are usually punished for committing these simple mistakes. This tradition to do this sets a boundary between the women and men in the tribe because women are thought as of weak and guilty of punishment for any mistake. The people aren’t being united but rather separated by this thought of women being weak and worth to punish. People of the Ibo culture don’t spend much time with their wives and rather work on their fields. In the short story “The Glasshouse” by Jamaica Kincaid. Kincaid describes men as “men who have sworn to forsake the company of women and have attached themselves to other things”. Kincaid tells us how men don’t want the company of a women like in the Ibo culture because they are looked as weak and useless in the tribe. Most men in the tribe do not spend time with their wives but rather spend it working out in the …show more content…
This pride leads to a lot a disconnections between people, because the men don’t want to be seen as weak but a strong fearless Ibo man. We especially see this in Okonkwo when he kills Ikemfuna, “Okonkwo drew his machete and cut him down. He was afraid of being thought weak” (61). In the quote Okonkwo was told by the oracle to kill his adoptive son, Ikemefuna, because he would later bring destruction to the tribe. Okonkwo killed his own son just because he wanted to keep his pride and not thought of weak. Ikemefuna was from outside the tribe and he had a great bond with Okonkwo. Okonkwo's pride led him to kill someone that he had a bond with and when returned home his family began to question his decisions. His willingness to keep his pride and strength only drew him father away from his family. Pride is what drives the people of the Ibo culture to do what is needed, like be masculine and to be dominant over their wife’s. In the video “Be A Man”, Joe Ehrmann talks about redefining what a man is and he also dives deeper on how young boys become this“man” they are told to become because they don’t want to disappoint other and want to keep their pride. A person's pride should never take over someone dignity because it will only separate people. Okonkwo's pride substituted for his dignity, he values himself by the Ibo cultural standards rather than