Ideology in Four Ethiopian Novels in English
No Thumbnail Available
Date
2019-05
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Addis Ababa University
Abstract
The objective of this study is to explore and analyse general, authorial and aesthetic ideologies as
reflected in four Ethiopian novels in English - Dagnachew’s The Thirteenth Sun, Sahles
Silassie’s Firebrands, Nega Mezlekia’s The God Who Begat a Jackal, and Maaza Mengiste’s
Beneath the Lion’s Gaze. Qualitative literary analysis based on mainly Marxist literary
perspective has been used to analyze the ideologies in the novels. Althusser’s Ideology and
Ideological State apparatus, Gramsci’s hegemony, and Foucault’s idea of power, discourse and
knowledge and van Dijk’s concept of ideology and discourse have been used to approach the
general ideologies and their reproduction as reflected in the novels selected. All the novels
analyzed satirize the contradicting ideologies and their reproductions in different epochs. It was
found out that religious, familial, academic social/power relations and media and cultural
practices played a great role in the reproduction/discourses of the contradicting ideologies in the
novels selected. All the novels under study are Marxist-oriented literary texts; and they reflect
economic conditions, class formation and resistance done for social transformation. They satirize
the base and superstructure; they reflect how the ruling feudal class used the land, exploited the
society, and used both the ideological state apparatuses (ISAs) and repressive state apparatuses
(RSAs) to reproduce its feudal class ideology. Maaza’s novel, Beneath the Lion’s Gaze, reflects
also the reproduction of contradicting ideologies that existed during the reign of the Military
Rule, Dergue, in addition to its reflection of the social realities in the reign of the monarchy. The
novels analyzed also satirize organic intellectuals’ discourses of resistance. It has been found out
that all the novels analyzed are realist literary works though Daniachew’s The Thirteenth Sun and
Nega’s The God who Begat a Jackal share some features of modernist and postmodernist modes
of literary writings respectively in their form. All the novels have also been found committed to
the cause of the organic intellectuals; and this is confirmed in the authorial ideology of each
novel analyzed.
Description
Keywords
Languages