<p>This study focuses on the different strategies that the author uses to subvert the patriarchal and the colonial discourses which are reflected in the novel "Les Honneurs perdus" of Calixthe Beyala. In the introduction a theoretical background is given which includes feminist and postcolonial literary theories and their relation to postmodern theories and deconstruction. The introduction underlines the importance of the constitution of subject in postcolonial and feminist theories in contrast to deconstruction of subject in postmodernism and poststructuralism.</p><p>The analysis demonstrates that the novel can be seen as a female bildungsroman in the protagonist’s intent to create an autonomous identity. A gynocentric writing and the dialogue with another female character, the heroine’s antagonistic double, which includes the possibility of a female genealogy, as well as the final love to a white man, contribute essentially to transculturation and the construction of the heroine’s hybrid identity.</p><p>The second chapter of the analysis shows that the dichotomies Europe–Africa and man–woman in the binary system of the western way of thinking are very marked in the novel. Finally the third chapter points out how the different narrative techniques like the mixing of different language levels, the creation of new words, the use of irony and carnivalation, a special form of parody, as well as the intertextuality of magic realism deconstruct and subvert the heritage of colonial and patriarchal values and demonstrate the post-colonial misery both in the protagonist’s native suburb in Cameroun and in Paris.</p>

This study focuses on the different strategies that the author uses to subvert the patriarchal and the colonial discourses which are reflected in the novel "Les Honneurs perdus" of Calixthe Beyala. In the introduction a theoretical background is given which includes feminist and postcolonial literary theories and their relation to postmodern theories and deconstruction. The introduction underlines the importance of the constitution of subject in postcolonial and feminist theories in contrast to deconstruction of subject in postmodernism and poststructuralism. The analysis demonstrates that the novel can be seen as a female bildungsroman in the protagonist’s intent to create an autonomous identity. A gynocentric writing and the dialogue with another female character, the heroine’s antagonistic double, which includes the possibility of a female genealogy, as well as the final love to a white man, contribute essentially to transculturation and the construction of the heroine’s hybrid identity. The second chapter of the analysis shows that the dichotomies Europe–Africa and man–woman in the binary system of the western way of thinking are very marked in the novel. Finally the third chapter points out how the different narrative techniques like the mixing of different language levels, the creation of new words, the use of irony and carnivalation, a special form of parody, as well as the intertextuality of magic realism deconstruct and subvert the heritage of colonial and patriarchal values and demonstrate the post-colonial misery both in the protagonist’s native suburb in Cameroun and in Paris.

This study examines the feminist ideas in Calixthe Beyala's fictional novel Les Honneurs perdus (1996) and her essay Lettre d'une Africaine à ses sœurs occidentales (1995). The description of women's situation and their possible liberation in these two texts are analyzed, notably based on the feminist theories articulated by Simone de Beauvoir and by Judith Butler. The analysis demonstrates that the women in these texts live in a patriarchal society where they are oppressed and dominated by men. Religion and tradition serve as a way of internalizing this oppression. Early on, the women learn that their sexuality is owned by men, and that the main purpose of their existence is to get married and have children. However, Beyala also demonstrates a possiblity for women to reclaim their subjectivity and to liberate themselves from men's oppression, mainly through gaining awareness of the oppression, getting access to education and finding solidarity between women. In the last chapter of the analysis, Beyala's vision of the woman as the savior of the world is questioned, and the importance of the postcolonial context is considered. The study concludes that Beyala's feminist ideas consist of a fusion of, on one hand, Western feminist theories such as those based on the works of Beauvoir and, on the other hand, ideas of solidarity characteristic for the African continent. This creates a feminism which, just like Beyala herself, straddles two continents.