Economic recession, female economic empowerment and emancipation: A study of Osita Ezenwanebe’s <i>Adaugo</i> and Akachi Ezeigbo’s <i>Hands That Crush Stones</i>

Abstract

Women’s economic wellbeing is one area in which the male chauvinists’ antics have been concealed. Maybe it has not yet occurred to many women that  in the face of financial deprivations, they are tied to the apron strings of men. This paper evaluates the need to emancipate the woman from economic  bondage and the denial of the right to eke a living for herself. Unequal pay, poor pay, capitalist exploitation through nonpayment of wages for work  done, and in some cases, outright denial of the opportunity to work by the male folks constitute the area of discourse that this paper looks at.  Furthermore, the need for women to earn money to save the family and make sacrifices in cases where the breadwinners are unable to meet up informs  the analysis of the primary data; Osita Ezenwanebe’s Adaugo and Akachi Ezeigbo’s Hands that Crush Stones. The paper is hinged on a theoretical  framework of socialist feminism and Marxist feminism, which questions the circumstances of the female’s inability to excel in an unequal society. It is  submitted that given the socio-economic circumstances in which the citizenry is constrained, there is urgent need to consider options that make it critical  for womenfolk to assiduously contribute a quota of their productivity for the sustenance of the society