Examining girlhoods in KwaZulu-Natal through “coming of age” conventions in selected Bildungsroman.
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Date
2020
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Abstract
Presented chiefly as an endeavour within the field of post-colonial feminist scholarship in South Africa, this study navigates the emerging terrain of girlhood studies. It explores the changes and inclusions in the novel of development, particularly the narrative arc of girl protagonists in this genre. It examines continuities and discontinuities between girlhood and womanhood through selected texts within feminist studies. This study considers how different post-apartheid home environments shape the gendered experiences of girls in just one province of South Africa. The Story of Maha by Summaya Lee (2007) is set in an affluent Muslim suburb in central Durban where an orphaned, mixed-race girl is raised. ZP Dala’s What about Meera (2015) visits the protagonist’s traumatic childhood on a sugarcane farm on the north coast of KwaZulu-Natal, as the offspring of indentured labourers. The Paper House by Dalena Theron (2015), focuses on girlhood within an Afrikaner family: a protagonist living with her homosexual father and his partner in northern KwaZulu-Natal. The primary texts show how a girlchild’s quest for identity and belonging is inextricably linked to issues arising from her home life. Drawing on the hermeneutical interpretations of the novels, the voices of South African girls are presented. Using a theoretical framework that intersects the aforementioned postcolonial literature with belonging and trauma, this study presents the complexities of belonging — exploring identity, trauma and the social concept of ordentlikheid (respectability) within South African girlhood studies. Key thinkers in the aforementioned theoretical concepts include Cathy Caruth (2016); Mary Celeste Kearney (2009); Claudia Mitchell (2016); and Christi van der Westhuizen (2018, 2019). Each of these concepts is explored independently: chapter one discusses the Bildungsroman genre and then expands on the extent family and culture play in shaping the girl child in The Story of Maha. Chapter two explains how trauma, including physical violence and internalised aggression shapes the protagonist from What about Meera. Chapter three discusses the effects of (breaking) generational prejudice and the trope of “good girlhood”, especially in the Afrikaans community under study in The Paper House. Key expansions explore how the postcolonial female Bildungsroman is an extension of the genre rather than an antithesis. The question of “good girlhood” (Van der Westhuizen 2018) and the “defamiliarisation” of trauma (de Finney et al. 2011) within the postcolonial female Bildungsroman genre contribute to scholarship on South African girlhoods within the Bildungsroman ‘novel-of-development’ genre.
Description
Masters Degree. University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban.