Animus, “Amadiora” and Adichie: An apologia of psychic nexus

Abstract

Certain masculine traits manifest from the unconscious of female characters in contemporary Nigerian fiction as revealed in the characterization technique of Chimamanda Adichie’s The Thing Around Your Neck. “Animus” instinct – as opposed to “anima” – is what C. G. Jung calls this psychic trait. It is the hidden impulse that makes a woman to behave like a man. It also determines the level of introversion and extraversion displayed by the woman. But this drive is similar with the Igbo religio-mythical character called “Amadiora” who is the male-manifestation of the people’s collective will, expressed in the medium of thunder. The female characters in this text are not expressing the ideology of feminism per se but their peculiar alienating experiences have activated their psychic configuration to reveal their hidden maleness. This essay explores the types of complexity that arise when a female character projects her animus-drive to respond to the challenges of border limitations and the contradictions of hybridizing with foreign values.

Keywords: Amadiora, animus, hybridity, female, Igbo, introversion, extraversion