First Blood: Menstrual Regulation and Murderous Rage in Nervous Conditions

This article analyzes how Tsitsi Dangarembga’s 1988 novel Nervous Conditions confounds femininity and fury in its explorations of racism and patriarchy in 1970s Rhodesia. To the extent that it is a story about Tambu seeking education to become upwardly mobile, Nervous Conditions is a cautionary tale...

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Veröffentlicht in:Research in African literatures Jg. 55; H. 2; S. 130 - 149
1. Verfasser: Sharma, Ishanika
Format: Journal Article
Sprache:Englisch
Veröffentlicht: Bloomington Indiana University Press 22.06.2025
Schlagworte:
Ambiguity
Anger
Bildungsroman
Blood
Bullying
Colonialism
Criticism and interpretation
Dangarembga, Tsitsi
Discourses
Education
Females
Femininity
Feminism and literature
Feminist literature
Gender
Menarche
Menstrual regulation
Menstruation
Murders & murder attempts
Novelists
Novels
Patriarchy
Portrayals
Postcolonialism
Race
Racism
Rage
Self determination
Zimbabwe
Rhodesia-pre-1979
ISSN:0034-5210, 1527-2044, 1527-2044
Online-Zugang:Volltext
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Zusammenfassung:This article analyzes how Tsitsi Dangarembga’s 1988 novel Nervous Conditions confounds femininity and fury in its explorations of racism and patriarchy in 1970s Rhodesia. To the extent that it is a story about Tambu seeking education to become upwardly mobile, Nervous Conditions is a cautionary tale about the blunting of her innate sense of justice concerning regimes of race, class, and gender, testing the capacity of the postcolonial Bildungsroman to engage the negativity of feminine anger in the construction of female subjecthood. I discuss a famous but curiously undertheorized fight scene between the female protagonist and her bullying brother to claim that it papers over the rage that propels her trajectory. I examine how the novel provides us with an ambiguous scene of self-determination—one that passes for menarche and attempted murder alike—to grapple with the corrosive force of feminine fury. I read the novel’s figuration of rage in conjunction with how menstrual blood is conceived across religious, cultural, and philosophical discourses. I theorize feminine fury through the negativity that suffuses menstruation.
Bibliographie:ObjectType-Article-1
SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-2
content type line 14
ISSN:0034-5210
1527-2044
1527-2044
DOI:10.2979/ral.00063