VOICES FROM THE MARGINS: A READING OF MIGRANT WOMEN’S AGENCY IN NURUDDIN FARAH’S FROM A CROOKED RIB AND NORTH OF DAWN

Abstract

In African literature of migration and gender studies, the stories of Somali migrant women have remained underreported for a considerable time. Accordingly, the representation of Somali women’s feminism has surfaced quite a little in comparison to other forms of feminisms that have emerged out of other Third-world countries. One can refer to here the name of Nuruddin Farah, who with his stance as an advocate of feminist writers, appears to be among the foremost ones who have brought about an effective articulation on Somali women. Thus accordingly, this research paper is an undertaking to understand the relation between women and migration, and women’s spaces of agency in Nuruddin Farah’s novels like From a Crooked Rib (1970) and North of Dawn (2018). As migrant identities journey from one cultural setting to another, they come to enter into dialogue with different social factors at different cultural settings. Therefore, this study aims to discuss migration as a determinant factor of change (emphasis added) which may pave ways for a series of their self-discoveries. This idea afterwards may lead to findings which establish the phenomenon  of women migration as quintessential that endows women with knowledge of their ‘feminist autonomy’ and with a ‘vision for the future.’