Nervous Conditions' the author, Tsitsi Dangarembga, offers a unique perspective on the place of women in African society and the effect of colonization. The story is told through a female narrator looking back on her life and her coming of age. Through the narrator, the reader is engaged into the story, with the story having meaning and relevance to all people that can relate to coming of age. The interested reader, through the themes and the events presented then learns something about African culture and the struggle of African people coming to terms with their culture. It is the combination of these qualities that makes 'Nervous Conditions' an informative and entertaining story with an important message about the effect of culture, the link between identity and culture and the impact on a person when this identity is questioned.
The Importance of the Narrator
Tambudzia or Tambu is the narrator and the…...
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Bibliography
Dangarembga, Tsitsi. Nervous Conditions. Seattle, WA: The Seal Press, 1989.
Nervous Conditions" Tsitsi Dangarembga): Each critical essay include a Precis critique, separate . All 3, underlying theme gender inequality post colonialism.
Gender Inequality in Post-Colonial Literature
Barker, Clare. "elf-starvation in the Context of Hunger: Health, Normalcy and the "Terror of the Possible" in Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions." Journal of Postcolonial Writing 44.2 (2008): 115-25.
Clare Barker's article examines the ways in which Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions explores the issue of hunger in terms of how it relates both to human starvation and eating disorders within the book. he rejects the common belief among critics of the book that Nyasha's eating disorder is an example of how she is "Western" or set in opposition to other African people. Instead she sees Nyasha's self-starvation as consistent with the normative nature of hunger in her environment (that being the war-torn Rhodesia of the 1960's and 1970's). Thus her disorder is, like all hunger, a disabling…...
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Sources of Interest
"Writing beyond the ending" (78)
-Uwakweh uses the words of Rachel DuPlessis to describe the elements of the narration that act as dissent rather than just storytelling.
Particularly Impressive Sentences
She demonstrates in her narrative strategy that for the fictional female, choice should be fluid, and that defining actions do not cease within the text.
The illnesses and eating disorders also indicate the struggle of Africans to live in two worlds, white and black, modern and traditional, and it shows that the young women of Africa are dominated by their culture, their men, and their desire to fit in and belong to something, even if it is a dysfunctional family.
Therefore, the book is much more than what the author describes in her first paragraph. It is much more complex, more thought-provoking, and more dynamic. Early on, it seems the story will mainly be about the narrator and her life, but it is really about Africa, and her struggle to break free from colonial rule, just like the narrator breaks free from her family and the bonds that tie her to poverty and ignorance. It is also about Tambu's own growing maturity and questioning of what is going on around her. Early in the novel,…...
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References
Dangarembga, Tsitsi. Nervous Conditions. Seattle, WA: The Seal Press, 1988.
This shows that the society is when where women are seen as weak and powerless.
Another impact of linking all conflicts to femaleness is that it means that the other qualities of women are ignored. It does not matter whether a woman is intelligent, capable, determined, or any other qualities. The fact that someone is a female makes her a lesser person and this is something that cannot be changed. This means that no matter how many good qualities or abilities a woman has, she cannot change her place in society. This creates a society where there is no point for a woman to even try and achieve anything, since her basic femaleness is the one thing that cannot be changed and the one thing that defines her.
Finally, the statement shows how women are considered inferior to males. This is shown be the way that Tambu refers to "femaleness as…...
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Works Cited
Dangarembga, T. Nervous Conditions. Seattle, WA: The Seal Press, 1989.
Hemorrhagic Shock
Shock is a condition of inadequate tissue perfusion, which results in decreased amount of oxygen in the vital tissues and organs (Metrng 2010, Klabunde 2010, Sarathy 2010, Spaniel et al. 2007). It reduces the rate of elimination of waste products of metabolism. Causes are heart attack, severe or sudden blood loss from injury or severe illness, blood poisoning from major infections, large decrease of body fluids, and exposure to extreme heat or cold for long duration. The American College of Surgeons classified shock into four, namely distributive, obstructive, cardiogenic, and hemorrhagic (Metrng, Klabunde, Sarathy & Spaniel et al.).
Hemorrhagic shock is a serious and life-threatening condition, which affects all body systems (Sarathy 2010). Cardiac output is reduced and depriving tissue of adequate oxygen. Hemorrhagic shock is further classified into four, according to the amount of blood lost. In Class I hemorrhage, there is a 15% or less blood loss with…...
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Klabunde, R.E. 2010, 'Pathophysiology of hemorrhagic shock,' University of Ohio
As a result, children and adolescents are at risk of delays and impairments in cognitive development" (Levy 2009). Such delays are far from inevitable, but they do underline the need to assure that Sarah 'keeps up' with her studies and that reasonable peer-appropriate learning goals may need to be met with the assistance of additional support in some instances.
Although not directly applicable to Sarah, immunizations with live viruses, including chickenpox, MMR (measles, mumps, rubella), and oral polio vaccines are not advised for children with lupus (Lupus, 2009, Children's Hospital of Boston). Sarah's parents may need to watch for is the possibility of symptoms in her sibling: "a form of lupus may occur at some point in about one out of twenty people whose siblings have lupus" and they may need to take this into consideration when contemplating a vaccination program if they ever have another child (Lehman 2002). Sarah's…...
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Works Cited
Lehman, Thomas J.A. (2002, Fall). Early diagnosis of SLE in childhood. Lupus News.
One instance of this strategy is the self-therapy suggested by the Speech Foundation of America which is focused on the assumption that stuttering is not a symptom, rather a behavior which can be corrected. (Sadock; Kaplan; Sadock, 2007)
Stutterers have been advised that they can learn to control their problems in part by correcting their feelings regarding stuttering and mindset towards it and in part by correcting the abnormal behaviors linked with the blocks that come to the forefront during stuttering. The strategy covers desensitizing i.e. lowering the emotional reaction to and uncertainties revolving stuttering and substituting positive action to control the moment of stuttering. The latest mature strategies concentrate on the aspect of restructuring fluency. The complete speech production pattern is remolded with emphasis on a series of target behaviors, covering reduction of rate, simple or gentle starting of voicing, and even shift between sounds, syllables as also words.…...
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References
Bothe, Anne K; Shenkar, Rosalee C. (2004) "Evidence-based treatment of stuttering"
Postcolonial Ed Lit
Education, Death, and Postcolonial Literature
The peculiarities of the postcolonial struggle for identity and independence are entirely unique to the historical occupation and colonization that ended, at least ostensibly, in the middle of the twentieth century. Peoples that had full histories and rich cultures prior to the arrival of Europeans or European-descended individuals from the New World found themselves largely without the foundations of these cultures to support themselves once these Europeans had departed, yet also unable to achieve the promises of the Western cultures that had arrived on their shores. Former value systems and ways of life had been eradicated, and nothing substantial was put into place to subsidize what was lost. Instead, the indigenous peoples of the world had to find methods of combining the old and the new in attempts to carve out new identities and self-directed histories in a way that had never really been…...
80s and the 90s, an unknown but virulent cattle disease, called "Mad Cow," destroyed 180,000 livestock in the United Kingdom and some other European countries and plunged other major cattle-producing nations - including the United States - into global panic (Freudenrich 2004). Health experts assured the public that humans were not prone to it. Nonetheless, its symptoms resemble those of an already existing and similarly deadly human nervous condition called Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD), believed to afflict only those 50 years old and older. CJD was then linked to Mad Cow, but believed to be limited to the older population. In the mid 90s, however, several ritish young people, died of a new variety of disease with similar symptoms to both Mad Cow's and CJD's, this time plaguing the young (nvCJD). In all those troubled years, contaminated ritish cattle were exported to as many as countries, including the U.S.A., as…...
Traditional Healing
Often in the healing arts them most simple and obvious cures lie right in front of us, exposed and waiting to be utilized. The purpose of this literature review is to examine the specific ailment of anxiety and review the traditional sources of knowledge that can specifically apply to the treatment of this condition. The use of the individual's own psycho-spiritual faculties will be highlighted as the method in which these sources remedy the effects of anxiety and its sometimes debilitating symptoms.
The Yellow Emperor's Inner Canon includes the many esoteric human tools such as mood, idea and spirit as important aspects of health and immunity from disease. This collection is the earliest and most important written work of traditional Chinese healing arts. The narrative of the story reveals the secrets of keeping a clear and sound mind and hence eliminating the anxious behavior that so often rises. Through simple…...
Post-Colonialism in Literature (Presentation Paragraph)
In the novel Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangarembga, a young girl named Tambu wants to attend school. After her brothers' death she is allowed to take his place at the mission school. At the end of the school term she is able to pass an exam which will allow her to further her education even more. This is the basic plot of the novel, but it shows only a fraction of what the story is about. Tambu's story is symbolic of many colonial nations. She is taught by the western world to desire their education and also many other values of the western world including their culture, in clothing, films, and books. By the end of the story she has completely been immersed in the western culture while denying this is so. In many post-colonial societies, the native people try to reestablish their unique identities as…...
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Works Cited:
Dangarembga, Tsitsi. Nervous Conditions: And Related Readings. Evanston, IL: McDougal
Littell, 2009. Print.
McMahon. "Notes on Tsitsi Dangarembga: Nervous Conditions: Post-Colonial Literature II,"
Her physician husband, John, and those like him do "not believe" that she is "sick" or even, in her view, capable of understanding her sickness, so "what," she asks, "can one do?" (Hume).
How can one view this passage without seeing a total lack of communication in a marriage? The narrator even goes so far as to say, "It is so hard to talk to John about my case, because he is so wise, and because he loves me so" (Perkins Gilman). From a purely logical standpoint, John's wisdom and the fact that he loves her so would seem to naturally suggest that he would be the most receptive person to listen to the narrator's discussions, but other things that the narrator says reveal John's patronizing attitude towards her. Instead of caring for her, John absolutely ignores the narrator's suggestions about what she thinks may help heal her. Dismissing her…...
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Works Cited
Golden, Catherine. "The Writing of 'The Yellow Wallpaper': A Double Palimpsest." Studies in American Fiction. 17.2 (Autumn 1989): 193-201. Rpt. In Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Vol. 201. Detroit: Gale, Literature Resource Center.
Deneau, Daniel P. "Chopin's The Story of an Hour." The Explicator. (Vol. 61). .4 (Summer 2003): p210. Literature Resource Center.
Managing madness in Gilman's "The yellow wall-paper"
This is why wars are fought with bloodletting, why torture takes place, and why neither violence nor war is limited to the physical carnage of the battlefield.
Nordstrom 59)
The early death of Clifton's mother, as a result of having to powerlessly rely on a liar and a letch who could not provide for his family, is the ultimate example of self-inflicted violence, as is Gillman's character resorting to an expression of madness to resist her powerlessness. It was only slightly more "appropriate" for a women to realize madness as it was for her to throw herself from a three story window.
orks Cited
Clifton, Lucille "forgiving my father" in Schilb, John & Clifford, John. Making Literature Matter 3rd Edition. New York: Bedford, St. Martin's, 2005, 314.
Gelfant, Blanche H., and Lawrence Graver, eds. The Columbia Companion to the Twentieth-Century American Short Story. New York: Columbia University Press, 2000.
Gillman, Charlotte Perkins "The Yellow allpaper"…...
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Works Cited
Clifton, Lucille "forgiving my father" in Schilb, John & Clifford, John. Making Literature Matter 3rd Edition. New York: Bedford, St. Martin's, 2005, 314.
Gelfant, Blanche H., and Lawrence Graver, eds. The Columbia Companion to the Twentieth-Century American Short Story. New York: Columbia University Press, 2000.
Gillman, Charlotte Perkins "The Yellow Wallpaper" in Schilb, John & Clifford, John. Making Literature Matter 3rd Edition. New York: Bedford, St. Martin's, 2005, 917-925.
Herndl, Diane Price. Invalid Women: Figuring Feminine Illness in American Fiction and Culture, 1840-1940. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1993.
Depression or Oppression: The Yellow Wallpaper
\\"The Yellow Wallpaper\\" is an amazing piece about Charlotte’s descent into mental impairment. Presented in diary form, the text recounts the experiences of Charlotte who is diagnosed with a nervous condition (i.e. hysteria) and is advised by her physician husband that she ought to be exposed to minimal mental stimulation in her path to recovery. Towards this end, she is essentially barricaded in her bedroom – a room wrapped in yellow wallpaper. While Charlotte is at first diagnosed with depression and supposedly put on treatment for the same, what informs her descent into further mental impairment is oppression, as opposed to depression.
It is important to note that human beings happen to be social creatures. What this means is that they thrive on constant interactions with each other. Charlotte is isolated and the only persons she has access to are the nurse and her husband. At…...
" Does she have faith that a more clear understanding of those problems among the medical establishment will become evident? "I wonder," she wrote, cryptically.
HAT PARENTS HO HAVE PD SHOULD SAY to THEIR CHILDREN: The Parkinson's Disease Society (www.parkinsons.org.uk) offers pertinent advice and counsel to those parents who have both PD and children. "A key message seems to be open and honest" when talking to your kids, the PDS Information Sheet suggests. "Don't keep it a secret." As soon as you are diagnosed with PD, explain to them what it means to your health and to their lives as part of the family as a whole.
Don't be vague or apologetic, the PDS suggests. Be specific and clear, and fully explain that PD is not contagious. Because of the fatigue associated with PD - and the "on-off fluctuations" that are inevitable - parents with PD may not be able to spend…...
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Works Cited
Ali, Rasheda. "Muhammad Ali's Daughter Writes Children's Book on Parkinson's. ABC
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