Resetting Power structures in Rosemary Ekosso’s House of Falling Women

Abstract

The paper, entitled “Resetting Power Structures in Rosemary E. Ekosso’s House of Falling Women” has as objective to analyse the objective presentation of the woman, her experiences and responses in an African and European setting. Life is meant to be enjoyed and celebrated in its wholeness, but this is not often the case because of some barriers and assumed ideologies set aside as fixed rules for the majority to follow. As such, some characters either follow the crowd, succumbing to the prescribed way of life whether they find it comfortable or not, while others categorically carve out their own unique path to follow based on their sense of self and individualism, while shunning all negative criticisms. This paper contends, that Ekosso’s heroine is a pathfinder for many caged women who live unfulfilled lives due to patriarchal norms which for the most part are not in their favour. As concerns representation and resistance, Edward Saïd in The Introduction to the Post-Colonial Studies Reader explains that “Feminism and its intersections with both colonialism and post-colonialism is necessarily about representation and resistance” (85). The theories are chosen because they share a common ground on power relations and resistance to forms of oppression based on historical fact.