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The “images of women” school of feminist critics is particularly concerned with how women are represented in fictional texts. Feminists are generally not satisfied with stereotyping of women as done in traditional fictional texts as a way of sustaining patriarchy. In their fight for women emancipation, feminists have taken up an “Amazon image” to construct female characters that resemble the ancient Amazons. The Amazonian characters are constructed for women empowerment as a means of achieving the feminist goal of gender equality. The present study locates itself within the “images of women” school to determine from which perspective female characters are portrayed in selected texts. It employs a corpus of feminist theories that include Amazon feminism, to critically analyse purposively sampled texts by two South African writers, Kopano Matlwa and Zakes Mda. The aim of the study is to determine if female characters in selected texts are constructed from an Amazonian perspective or from a patriarchal view which dominates androcentric texts. The study thus juxtaposes stereotypically constructed female characters with female characters constructed from an Amazonian perspective. Amazonian characters are constructed as subjects, and are empowered while patriarchal constructs are objectified, and are negatively portrayed. A major finding is that Matlwa has constructed female characters from an Amazonian perspective and that Mda has constructed female characters from a patriarchal view. The conclusion is that the Amazonian character is an alternative representation of women than the traditional patriarchal view of women.

The issue of African identity in African literature has been receiving considerable attention in recent times. However, comparatively speaking, the focus has largely been on texts written in English, whereas texts written in (African) indigenous languages have received minimal attention. Moreover, critics who cannot understand the language of indigenous writing ignore such writings in their criticisms, which culminates in the treatment of indigenous writings as palimpsests on which the other records their story. Consequently, perspectives and philosophies shared by indigenous literature are marginalised and only those conveyed in European languages are considered. Against this backdrop, this study aimed to, firstly, attempt to draw Tshivenḓa poetry from the periphery to the ‗centre‘ of conversations on issues of selfhood, identity and culture in the postcolonial context. Secondly, it sought to show that a representative selection of Tshivenḓa poetry can provide indices into the trajectories and nuances of the Vhavenḓa people‘s selfhood, identity and culture. Undergirded by a trifocal theoretical framework, namely Afrocentricity, the hermeneutical approach and postcolonial theory, the study shored up various aspects that were thematised by the selected poets as indices into the Vhavenḓa‘s selfhood, identity and culture. The study employed a qualitative research approach and the descriptive method to analyse sixteen (16) purposively sampled poetry texts. Textual and thematic analyses were relied on in the analysis of the selected texts. The study found that Tshivenḓa poetry demystifies the meta-narratives propounded by colonialists and exponents of apartheid about African people‘s selfhood, identity and culture. Tshivenḓa poetry attains this, firstly, by demonstrating that the indigenes have always had ways through which they expressed their selfhood, identity and culture, and secondly, by agentively challenging hegemonic discourses on selfhood, identity and culture., National Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences (NIHSS) and South African Humanities Deans Association (SAHUDA)

The primary aim of this study is to examine gender stereotypes and their profound impact on the socialisation of females and males. Further, it analyses the extent to which these stereotypes inform the relations and interactions between males and females and their general deportment. Nervous Conditions (1988) by Tsitsi Dangarembga and The Joys of Motherhood (1994) by Buchi Emecheta are the selected primary fictional texts to be textually examined and analysed. The study focuses on women oppression, discrimination, misogyny, sexism, marginalisation and subjugation that flow from gender socialisation. Furthermore, gender socialisation cultivates in the male a macho sense of self-importance, privilege, entitlement, invincibility and substantive power. Lastly, the study seeks to contribute to the body of knowledge about the topical debate on women emancipation and gender equity transforming patriarchal societies.

One of the important duties of performative art is the idea of creating a sense of recognising people’s predicaments, especially those whose voices have been suppressed. This study seeks to employ Applied Theatre techniques to investigate community underdevelopment and youth under-empowerment with a view to discover why there is a prevalence of the human-trafficking plague in Africa, with South Africa and Nigeria as case study. On the assumption that this approach could possibly have a desolating effect through the way in which some community members would feel about their situations, field works in Mabopane (South Africa) and Eleyele (Nigeria) were conducted in order to examine the prevalence of the neglect of the youths of these communities as well as human-trafficking occurrences and possibilities. Through the results from field works, the study seeks to unveil possible relationships community and youth neglect share with the human- trafficking scourge in both regional leading countries, in particular, and the globalised world, in general. KEYWORDS: Applied Theatre; Human-Trafficking; South Africa; Nigeria; Community Development; Youth Empowerment.

The primary aim of this study is to examine the oppression and repression of African women through the collusion of indigenous African patriarchy and colonial, imperialist values. The selected novels are Nervous Conditions (1988) and God’s Bits of Wood (1960) by Tsitsi Dangarembga and Sembene Ousmane, respectively. The study focuses on the roles played by both African and European values in the class, gender and racial oppression of African women. Using the theoretical frameworks of Marxism and Feminism, the study evaluates issues of women’s oppression, repression and marginalisation. The selected literary texts are closely analysed with a view to exploring and establishing the nature and form of African women’s multiple oppressions through the connivance between African patriarchy and European colonial hegemonic norms. Lastly, the study aims to contribute to the existing body of knowledge on the topical issue of African women’s oppression. Keywords: Colonial values; African patriarchy; Hegemonic norms; Oppression; Oppression; Marginalisation; Collaboration; Women and the girl child