Women and Patriarchy in Post-colonial Kenya: A Critical Interrogation of Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye's Coming to Birth and The Present Moment

Abstract

Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye's Coming to Birth and The Present Moment, published just over two decades after Kenya's independence, explore the country's post-colonial inclination towards patriarchy. This paper is hinged on the premise that the post-colonial Kenya is replete with patriarchal tendencies, these tendencies permeate all spheres of its political and economic structures, thus leading to gender inequality. Contextualizing patriarchy within the socio-economic and political structure of the post-colonial Kenya, this paper seeks to highlight the challenges to women’s women's participation in Kenya's public sphere as depicted in Macgoye's novels. Informed by feminist theory, the paper seeks to demonstrate the various ways women seek to claim their agency as active participants in the society despite the challenges. The paper concludes that female characters in Coming to Birth and The Present Moment rise above the limitations brought about by the post-colonial patriarchal constructs.