Read the following extract from Ama Ata Aidoo's short story, 'The Girl Who Can' and answer the questions that follow: 'Like all this business to do with my legs. I have always wanted to tell them not to worry. I mean Nana and my mother. That it did not have to be an issue for my two favourite people to fight over. But I didn't want either to be told not to repeat that or it to be considered so funny that anyone would laugh at me until they cried. After all, they were my legs…'
What ‘issue’ did her two favourite people fight over? Why?
Topic: The quarrel over Adjoa's legs
Answer
They fought over Adjoa’s legs. Nana complained endlessly that they were too thin — spindly, like sticks, without the proper shape a woman’s legs should have.
The reason lies in Nana’s traditional belief that a woman’s worth is measured by her body: strong, thick legs mean wide hips, and wide hips mean the ability to bear children, which is a woman’s purpose. Thin legs, in her view, meant Adjoa would never make a proper woman. Her mother, hurt by this constant criticism of her child, defended Adjoa, and the two women argued about it again and again.
The mark is not merely for naming the legs but for explaining WHY thin legs matter in Nana’s world — the link between legs, hips and childbearing. Say it plainly. This belief is the tradition the story overturns when the same thin legs make Adjoa a champion runner.