Self Irony & Social Constructs

The use of self-irony seemed to be prevalent and very important in Adiele's use of social constructs in social spaces throughtout her memoir The Nigerian-Nordic Girl's Guide to Lady Problems. Adiele uses self-irony to anchor how race and culture intersect with modern and historical medicine through historical laws and societal norms that enforced those laws.

We see this happening when Adiele gives us glimpses of the beliefs and customs of fertililty from her Nigerian side of the family.  For instance, "Igbo tradition, illness is the result of offenses committed against Ala, the land, or against one’s own spirit-double, or against one’s ancestors. Health and well-being can only be achieved when humans, community, and cosmos are in harmony" (p. 283/568 [kindle].) The acknowledgement of this custom heightens the stakes of figuring out the root of the fibroids and whether or not the situation can be mitigated and prevented in the future. We also learn around this time in the memoir that Adiele's mother has/had cancer of the uterus which then gives the readers insight to maybe why Adiele has fibroids. This is all pretty surface level and could be used my medical staff to address Adiele's current condition in the memoir. However, as readers Adiele gives us social constructs in different social places that may also give the answer to why Adiele is dealing with fibroids and the larger picture at hand.

In order to deliver a deeper meaning to Adiele's fibroids she (as the author and character) inserts miscegenation and the historical implications and beliefs that comes with the past law and belief system. That when miscegenation laws were conceived it was believed that if black and white people were to mix or did mix it could leave the children infertile (similar to in the animal kingdom for example if a horse mates with a donkey you get a mule that is infertile because of 63 chromosomes instead of 64.) With this additional information Adiele is able to bring to light social constructs in different social spaces that address her current condition being a mixed Black woman herself. We are not only shown the social constructs that could lead to a "curse" (because of a mass amount of people beliving in this possibly making aspects of it true or taboo) such as race, gender, sexuality, ethnicity and geography but also how science on a large scale has the ability to and power to construct implications of race and gender. In addition, Adiele tells the reader that her mother was having complications with lady problems and the doctor diagnosed her with hysteria instead of cancer of the uterus. All forces of social constructs seem to be at work in the medical field that Adiele speaks about in her memoir. Not only is Adiele black but she is a woman in which people who fall in either category or both have had historical trauma and beliefs imposed upon them by social constructs conceived by science (specifically the medical system.)

This is all the to say that in order for Adiele to open up the different paradigms and reals of social constructs that are present in her life she applied self-irony to deliver the different social constructs in various social spaces. The memoir reflected the importance of self-irony in the midst of discussing, ackownledge and approaching how different social constructs are applied or even thrive.

Jameka Townsend