The Lion and The Jewel main character Sidi sitting in the middle of the picture wearing a striped dress with the outlines of two male faces on other side of her

The Lion and the Jewel

by Wole Soyinka

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Student Question

How is education portrayed in The Lion and the Jewel?

Quick answer:

In The Lion and the Jewel, education is portrayed through the character of Lakunie, who represents formal schooling and modern values in a modernizing society. He believes education is essential for progress and social ascent. However, the play contrasts this with the broader concept of education as life experience, showing how traditional figures like Baroka and Sidi possess valuable worldly knowledge that challenges Lakunie's modernist views.

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Wole Soyinka’s play primarily presents education, in the sense of schooling, through the character of Lakunie. In the independent, modernizing society, schools play a vital role in creating the nation’s new citizens, providing them with the tools they will need to succeed and promoting the progressive values that challenge the traditional ways of life. Lakunie, the schoolteacher, is passionately devoted to these goals of formal education; obtaining the teacher’s position is an important step in his own social ascent.

In contrast, we could look at education more broadly as the experience and knowledge that undergird an adult’s chances of success in life. In that regard, Lakunie gets some schooling from the standard-bearer of traditional society, Baroka, and from the apparently young and impressionable Sidi. Both of them have a broader understanding of the ways of the world. Convinced that his modern ideas are superior, Lakunie conveys that he believes Sidi is ignorant and he must teach her; instead, his condescending attitude backfires and alienates her.

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