Award winning author and best selling novelist, Chimamanda Adichie is very outspoken, oftentimes to to the point of controversial concerning her strong views on certain issues.
Only recently, it was reported that she said she did not want people to address her as Mrs. Esegee, despite her subsisting marriage to Dr. Ivan Esegee.
Her reason as reported by SUN News, almost serves as an endorsement of polygamy, that is one man getting married to more than one wives. This is unless Ms. Adichie (as she prefers to be called), prefers to pick and choose the elements of Western culture (for instance homosexuality) and Igbo culture (for instance polygamy) that she chooses to endorse and/or adopt.
Her statement on the issue:
“Before we start, please, I just want to say that my name is Chimamanda Adichie. That’s how I want it; that’s how I’m ad-dressed, and it is not Mrs but Miss. Ms: that’s how I want it. I am saying this, because I just got a mail from my manager this morning.
It seems that there are people who attended the church service, and they wrote about it, addressing me as Mrs. Chimamanda (Esege). I didn’t like that at all. So my name is Chimamanda Adichie, full stop! My name is Chimamada Adichie. If you want to put label for me, put Ms. ”
But people know that you’re married. As an Igbo girl, you know our culture, the interviewer countered…..
“What does our culture do? Let me tell you about our culture. This thing that you are calling our culture –that when you marry somebody, you’ll start call-ing her Mrs. Somebody –is not our culture; it is Western culture. If you want to talk about our culture, you need to go to people in real Igbo land. But it is true. My grandfather’s name is David. His name is also Nwoye. They call him Nwoye Omeni.
Omeni was his mother. You know why? It is to help distinguish him, because there are often many wives. So, it was his mother that they used to identify him. They know that all of these people came from the same compound, but whose child is this one. You may go and ask people who is Nwoye Omeni, and they’ll tell you it is my grandfather. So, conversation about culture is a long one. I don’t even want to have it.”
Our takeaway: In real Igbo land, polygamy is acceptable and practiced and as a form of distinguishing male or female children they use the maternal name.
Also interesting to digest is Ms. Adichie’s view on homosexuality, read it here.