While Nervous Conditions depict the effect of colonialism, Heart of Darkness shows the ways Europeans viewed and treated African Americans during colonialism. Using Heart of Darkness as a reference, the postcolonialism effect is shown by the Nervous Conditions as Tambu, Nyasha and Maiguru are faced with the choice of embracing the colonial ways or returning to their Shona roots.
In Heart of Darkness, Conrad illuminates the nature of colonialism: suppression of the Native’s beliefs and traditional way of life. He depicts the true cruelty of colonialism through
Marlow’s journey up the Congo as a steamboat skipper for his company which overtly tells the public that they are going into the Congo to civilize the Natives. The Europeans seek to convert the inhabitants of the Congo region to the European culture. When Marlow’s aunt finds out he will participate in the journey, she states that he is helping in “weaning those ignorant millions from their horrid ways” (Conrad 77). Marlow’s aunt sees the traditional ways of life of the Natives as “horrid”. She believes that the European system is the only system that should be followed. Marlow also unconsciously agrees with his aunt as he suspects the Africans as “inhuman” when he hears the cries of the Natives coming from behind a wall of thick foliage (Conrad 108). Kurtz also believes that the Natives are in need of being humanized, improved, and instructed in the European way of life. The Europeans believe that the Natives are beneath them and in need of being cultured. Despite the high and noble aspiration of civilizing the Natives, the true face of colonialism is revealed after the Natives have abandoned everything to
follow the Europeans in the voyage for better future. The Natives are lulled into a false sense of security and then become slaves of the European colonizers. To the Europeans, the Natives are valuable, if they are productive and supplying ivory and other goods to the Europeans.
Black shapes crouched, lay, sat between the trees, leaning against the trunks, clining to the Earth, half coming out, half effaced within the dim light, in all the attitudes of pain, abandonment, and despair…The work was going on. The work! And this was the place where some of the helpers had withdrawn to die. They were dying slowly- it was very clear…black shadows of disease and starvation, lying confusedly in the greenish gloom. Brough from all the recesses of the coast in all the legality of time contracts, lost in uncongenial surroundings, fed on unfamiliar food, they sickened, became inefficient, and were then allowed to crawl away and rest” (Conrad 83).
The Europeans do not care about the health and working conditions of the Natives as long as they are productive. The vivid observation by Marlow as he enters the grove of death depicts the cruelty of the colonizers when the Natives were no longer able to work. They were left to fend for themselves and slowly died away due to starvation. The populace was beaten and hanged simply to serve as an object lesson to others around them. The Europeans who have traveled to Africa to humanize the Natives treat them severely and inhumanly growing fear against the Europeans. The Europeans uses this fear to their advantage to get what they want.
Through the actions of the Europeans, the Natives are made fearful and in order to protect their lives and the lives of their families they submit to the will of the foreigners.
As depicted in Nervous Conditions, women in Africa must not only liberate themselves from the influences of colonial rule, but also they are also fighting the effects of patriarchal traditions in the history of their culture. They developed psychological colonization based on the social constructs of men. Tambu’s mother is bound by the laws of her culture and the social stratification of colonialism. Her gender restricts her to be seen as more than a possession of the men in her family even though it is through her labor that her son is able to go to missonary school. In addition, she is consumed with the fear of the fatal attraction of Englishness which, in her eyes, is devouring her family one by one because of assimilation. Accepting her reality as a Black woman living in the era of colonialism, she informs her daughter about the juxtaposition of colonialism and the traditional patriarchal system that women face in her community. She tells her daughter, “As if it is every easy. And these days it is worse, with the poverty of blackness on one side and the weight of womanhood on the other.” (Dangarembga 1988:16). The mother indirectly tells her daughter about how the African people were colonized by the white settlers and that this caused the “poverty of blackness”. This relates back to Heart of Darkness where the Europeans came to collect ivory and make profit while using Africans as slaves to work for them. Tambu’s grandmother further tells Tambu about their history when she explains how “wizards” had taken their land and “enticed them into slavery”. She says how these “holy wizards” educated her son, Babamukuru, into their “wizardry”. However, she begged them to take him and “prepare him for their world” (Dangerembga 19). Colonization of the country meant that it was difficult for African men to provide for their family as all the monetary profits were taken by the Europeans. Therefore, African men became dependent on Europeans, “wizards”, for jobs and this led to greater divide between African men and their women. The patriarchal society has caused the oppression of women as much as the black man has been oppressed by the White settlers as shown in the Heart of Darkness.
Instead of telling her daughter to improve herself, Tambu’s mother tells her to carry the “burdens with strength” (Dangarembga 16). She expects her daughter to continue following the culture by being a wife and a mother. This illustrates that the mother’s close identification with her history and her culture is forcing her to inform her daughter to perpetrate customs that will continue to keep them oppressed. However, Tambu disagrees with her mother as she rebels against the system. Tambu believes that education is the only way to provide for her family and move away from poverty. However, she realizes that educating herself at the missionary school can change her identity. Western instutions and the systems of thoughts can alter native Africans who are subjected to them. She may walk in the footsteps of her brother, Nhamu, where …
Tambu’s mother confronts her daugher who she believes is sacrificing her culture for western rewards: “You think your mother is so stupid she won’t see Maiguru had turned you against me with her money and her white ways” (… 143). This illustrates that while these western institutions seem to give opportunities to Africans they are assimilating them.
Conversely, despite Tambu’s perception of her, Maiguru is portrayed as struggling with two different cultures as well as her gender: “As for me, no one even thinks about the things I gave up.” (Dangarembga 1988:103) The text illustrates her dilemma, by educating herself she has embraced the culture of the colonizers and now that she has returned to Africa it is difficult to reconcile her life as just a wife and mother after enjoying that period of self discovery in England. She laments: “What it is […] to have to choose between self and security.” (Dangarembga 1988:103) By staying with Babamukuru and her children she has chosen the patriarchal “security” over what she might have wanted as a woman. However, despite the fact that Maiguru is unsatisfied with her African life, she is trying to force that life on her children. Maiguru believes her children have been too heavily indoctrinated by English customs: “they picked up all these disrespectful ways in England,” […] “and it's taking them time to learn how to behave at home again.” (Dangarembga 1988:74) She believes that her children with “time” will revert to the old ways of their country, despite the fact that like Tambu they are educated at the western missionary school. Similarly to Ma’Shingayi, Maiguru is trying to protect her children’s African heritage by down playing the “English customs.” But her intervention proves too late because Nyasha, Maiguru’s daughter tells Tambu that: “It’s bad enough…when a country gets colonized, but when the people do as well! That’s the end.” (Dangarembga 1988:150) This illustrates that Nyasha is already aware of the conflict that her mother is experiencing and the possible repercussions that it might have on their culture. Nyasha is saying that the country in itself is not that important, rather it is the people that hand down traditions and keep the culture for future generations. So, Maiguru as a colonized woman is suffering for accepting the indoctrination of another culture. This means that she has difficulty in passing down the traditions and so the African culture suffers.
Consequently, Nyasha’s condition, more them any other character in the text, illustrates the powerless situation for the colonized country. Her parents act as a metaphor for colonialism in their oppressive attitude towards her: “They've done it to me,” she accused, whispering still “really, they have." (Dangarembga 1988:200) She is experiencing the condition of someone who is displaced and cannot fit in with the two cultures that her parents have exposed her to and so she rejects both. Nyasha’s parents expect her to give up the western freedom to conform to an African role. Again, like Tambu she is rebelling against what she sees as an unfair system. She continues to discuss her parent's oppression saying: "It's not their fault. They did it to them too. You know they did." (Dangarembga 1988:200) The “it” in the quote refers to Nyasha’s parents, as the natives of the land they had little choice but to give up their independence and live under the control of the settlers. However, when Nyasha says “did it to them too” it implies that she is comparing the control of her parents with that of the settlers. Nyasha recognizes that her parents are continuing the tradition of colonialism by the way they control her life.
In conclusion, Nervous Conditions, Annie John and The Woman Warrior illustrate the mother figure as an informant who passes down important cultural information to their daughters to continue their history. In Nervous Conditions this history concerns the colonist past and the patriarchal system. Ma’Shingayi tells her daughter about the oppression of women by both African men and the white settlers but she tells her daughter to continue this tradition by accepting her “burdens.” The other mother figure Maiguru behaves like a colonial power towards her daughter dictating how she should live her life in order to suppress western influences. Similarly, in Annie John the issues faced are to do with colonialism. The mother acts as the colonial power that protects but also controls her daughter. The mother sends Annie to school to learn the false history of her land and by this process Annie realizes that both her school and mother or trying to indoctrinate her into a system of control. However, Kingston’s Woman Warrior the mother tries to force her culture on her daughter who has been brought up in America by telling her talk stories. She warns her daughter that despite living in a western culture that she has to be aware of her actions in order not to be excluded. However, despite the intentions of the mother figure the three novels show that the daughters are trying to separate from their mothers and culture and this is what causes the tension between them. Tambu wants to be like Maiguru who seemly not weighted down by her “burdens." She does this by educating herself at the missionary school. Nyasha educated enough to see that this colonist system is perpetrated and continued by the colonized people falls sick at having to merge two conflicting cultures. Annie, by seeking separation from her mother shows her independence but by going to England she shows that she might be choosing the western culture over her own. Kingston shows separation from her mother because she cannot understand the deep value of the stories her mother is telling her. She confronts her mother about their culture of silence. But her work in The Woman Warrior suggests that she has reconciled these differences.