Abstract

Being an African woman writer from Zimbabwe and a voice for African women, Tsitsi Dangarembga’s Nervous Conditions (1988) highlights a desire to improve the conditions of African women. The purpose of this paper is to find out how the novel has redefined the roles of women in the society. Therefore, it targets African women. The specific objective is to examine the role of modern African women as envisaged in Tsitsi Dangarembga. The research methodology is qualitative, where it adopts the use of descriptive statements.  Descriptive and analytical research designs are used in conducting this paper and data is collected through intensive reading of the novel while making notes. This paper attempts to analyze the author’s work within the views of third wave of feminism and deconstructive theory. It uses feminism since it is concerned with issues of women in the society, like unfairness, oppression, discrimination, gender equality and freedom which the proposed study looks into. Deconstruction theory is used as this paper involves creating new roles for women. This paper is greatly influenced with views from African feminism which emerge as a variant of the broader feminism movement. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s ideas concerning the space occupied by subaltern, especially women are very helpful too. The findings in this paper are presented thematically. The paper reveals that women in this novel are not controlled by patriarchy. They are modern in thinking and empowered professionally to work away from home. It is hoped that this paper will significantly add value on literary scholars who may want to use these findings to analyze the roles of modern women in the changing Africa. The paper psyches the need to break away from the blanket of generalization of African feminist writings.