Georgiana K Ngeri-Nwagha Oon

Beyond The Kitchen Georgiana K Ngeri-Nwagha Oon

Dr. Georgiana Ngeri-Nwagha's Beyond the Kitchen is a manual of advice, encouragement and exhortation for women to strive toward ascendancy and self-actualization outside the home. The title itself is a loaded phrase, as the kitchen is a woman's domain as is the hearth. The kitchen is the corporal sustaining room and the heart of the household. The author started by bemoaning women's backwardness and quickly adduced reasons for same. These are "gender discrimination, stereotyping, exploitation, government policies and laws, sexual abuse and others" (86). She, however, thinks that the onus of empowerment should emanate from the woman herself who must first believe in herself and show the desire to improve herself. She lists Religion and Culture as pillars of female subjugation.