African Culture The novel by Ngugi wa Thiongo and Mariama Ba portrays the picture of African cultures in the colonial days. The novels are written based on the African society and practices, and how the colonial judges were to the black people. Both writers are African who base their story on the attitude of western people to Africans.

The River Between focuses its practices on the African culture, how they did them and how the colonial rule changed them. Ngugi tries to explain the hardships that Africans underwent during the colonial period, and focuses his story on one African tradition, the Kikuyus of Kenya. He clearly brings out their practices in the novel, under the British era.

Mariama Ba in her novel also shows the struggles of Africans under the colonial rule era. She portrays racism and brings out clearly African practices, focusing on one community of the Wolof in Senegal under Francoise rule. She uses the character, Ousmane, to explain the hardships he goes through love trances with Mirelle, who is French.

In my own view, both Waiyaki and Mirelle are naive about marriage. Both character fight for their love, and halts at nothing to make a point they bear what they want, and in the end, they lose it all. Waiyaki faces opposition from the two ridges, even his friends' end up betraying him but still he held on what he wanted. Even though religious practices differ from Waiyaki's, who is a traditionalist, he still goes ahead and wants to have Nyambura, who is a Christian. Their cultural practices differ too, traditionalist and Christians, but all for Waiyaki works out as he wishes. In the end, Waiyaki looses Nyambura because of his carelessness. He even wants to move with Nyambura to Nairobi, but he does not fight for it to escape the opposition from the two ridges. The novel ends when both are set to face the...

Even though their religion differs, he ends up marrying her. They both fly back to Senegal, yet she knows she will face opposition because of their culture. They live in Dakar for quite some time, and later Ousmane lets their religious differences drift them apart. As much as Mirelle switches her religion to Muslim for the sake of Ousmane, in the end she stubs and kills him after marrying a Senegalese woman. She ends up losing what she also fought for in the end.
Tradition

Traditional aspects of the Kikuyus in The River Between and Wolof in Scarlet Song are portrayed in novels. Ngugi brings out the African tradition when he focuses on the practices of the two ridges, Makuyu and Kameno. Women obeyed their husbands no matter the situation, shown when Miriam had no option but had to obey his husband Joshua, although she was bitten severally. Men and women were circumcised, to mark maturity and moving from childhood to adult hood. Small boys would go for herding in the forest, as they played and fight during their childhood stages. Women and girls did household chores and took care of the family such as fetching water and cooking, while men took participation in leadership and no woman had a say when it came to political matters.

Wolof has similar practices to the Kikuyus, in that women had no say to decisions, shown when Mirelle changed her religion for the sake of her husband, and still she was not consulted and considered when Ousmane married a Senegalese woman. Parents are in full control of their children's lives no matter the age, until dead. Ousmane is praised by his parents after his death, since Ousmane sent his father to Mecca to perform Hajji. Children grow to be the pride of their parents, and would…