Second-Class Citizen

Our protagonist in this great novel is Adah Ofili, and the story follows her life from childhood into adulthood. Adah was born in Lagos, Nigeria, and due to the "unfortunate" fact that she was a...

Buchi Emeta uses many literary devices in Second-Class Citizen. These include personification, allusion, and simile. One example of personification relates to Adah’s identification of the river...

Chapter 1 is entitled “Childhood,” as it looks back at the very beginning of Adah’s life. She lives in Lagos, Nigeria, and her family is from an upper-class background. Adah grows up just years...

In Second Class Citizen Buchi Emecheta writes about a girl called Adah, who dreams of leaving Nigeria and instead wants to live in the United Kingdom, a country she imagines to be the land of her...

Second-Class Citizen, written by Buchi Emecheta, tells the story of Adah, a Nigerian woman who overcomes setback after setback in her life due to her being classified as a second-class citizen. The...

Chapter 5 of “Second-Class Citizen” is titled “An Expensive Lesson.” The chapter starts with Adah having a difficult morning. She is pregnant and feels tired. As if this is not enough, her baby...

Adah has always dreamed of one day going to England. Indeed, it is the pinnacle of her ambition. But when she sets foot in the country as a teen bride, the dream quickly turns into a nightmare. Far...

The novel Second-Class Citizen by Buchi Emecheta presents several important themes including misogyny, immigration, racial prejudice, and female strength. The novel reveals the deeply engrained...

All too often in literature, the theme of the stubborn woman can be put to misogynistic ends to portray women as shrewish, nagging, and chronically unreasonable. Stubbornness in women was not...

Adah does not marry for love; she marries to pursue her dreams. She has wanted to go to the United Kindgom since she was eight years old, and she stops at nothing to pursue that goal. Still, even...

In Chapter 6, Adah and Francis are evicted from their apartment and must find a new place to live. Landlords either refuse to rent to “coloured” people or lie and say the place is already rented....

In Buchi Emecheta's novel, Second-Class Citizen, Adah dreams of moving to the United Kingdom as a little girl. When she is old enough to work, she finds a job that pays well, and which guarantees...

There are two tensions in Adah's attempts to be a good mother and a good wife, leading to contradictions which are almost certain to emerge whenever a wife and mother is married to an abusive...

Buchi Emecheta's novel Second Class Citizen follows the journey of the protagonist, Adah, from childhood to adulthood. Throughout her life, Adah overcomes many obstacles, and through her...

Adah's first-born child is a daughter, who she and her husband, Francis Obi, name Titi. Titi's birth came as a disappointment to Francis and his family, as it was widely hoped within the family...

In Second-Class Citizen, the character of Francis Obi embodies the theme of irresponsible husbandhood. After they are married, Adah Ofili’s impression of him changes. Adah had been attracted to...

While there is no universal definition of what makes a parent a failure, a compelling case can be made for Francis Obi's failure in this area. It is also easy to argue that he is a failure as a...

The book Second-Class Citizen was published by Buchi Emecheta in 1976. The novel tells the story of Adah, a young Nigerian woman. Since she was a young girl, Adah had dreamed of moving to the...

When Adah moves from Lagos to London to join her husband, Francis, she finds him a changed person. In Nigeria she had believed that the shared the same dream of finding success in England. During...

Our protagonist in this great story is Adah Ofili. As a child, all Adah wanted was the opportunity to get an education. Through sheer determination, she completes her secondary education and then...

Colonialism and its enduring legacy is a central theme in Second-Class Citizen. The protagonist, Adah, is an indigenous African born in Nigeria during World War II and spends her entire childhood...

The novel Second-Class Citizen, by Buchi Emecheta, follows the life of its protagonist, Adah. Adah grew up in Lagos, Nigeria. During her childhood and youth, Adah developed the desire to live in...

Second-Class Citizen is a novel written by Buchi Emecheta. It was first published in 1974 and follows the story of Adah, who eventually leaves her homeland and moves to Great Britain, following her...

Second Class Citizen is a novel written by Buchi Emecheta. It was first published in 1974. It follows the life of Adah, who grew up in Nigeria and then moved to the United Kingdom in order to join...

In an ideal world, Adah's obstinacy would have led to her having a great life, but due to the patriarchal values forced upon her life, it takes a long time for her obstinacy to start paying off for...

Second Class Citizen is a 1974 novel written by Buchi Emecheta. It tells the story of a Nigerian woman who overcomes sexist traditional African (Nigerian) practices to eventually provide an...

It has always been Adah's dream to go to London. Over the years, she's developed a rather romanticized image of the UK's capital city. In her imagination it is the epitome of all that is decent and...

A large portion of Adah’s desire to bring change to her life and improve her circumstances stems from her responsibilities as a mother. While she has always been ambitious, she prioritizes her...

Throughout Second-Class Citizen, our protagonist, Adah Ofili, is expected to fulfill a variety of roles. She is a dutiful daughter, and after tragedy strikes, she becomes a ward and slave. Later,...

In chapter 12 of Second-Class Citizen, Adah experiences something of an epiphany. At this crucial stage in the story, she starts to think of herself as more of an individual rather than a mere...

Pa Noble used to work as a liftman on the London Underground. It wasn't his first choice of career; he came to London to study law but was never able to succeed in his studies. He tried finding...

At the start of this novel, Adah is a young Nigerian girl who has dreams of getting an education and making something of her life. By the end, she is a battered wife determined to leave her...

Male privilege is evident in Nigerian society right from the start of Adah's story, when the fact that she is a girl means she must fight to be sent to school and get an education. For her brother,...

Adah's husband Francis is an old-fashioned Nigerian man who doesn't believe in any kind of birth control except natural family planning. Inevitably, this means that Adah ends up giving birth at...