Akata Witch<\/em> is one of the few novels I\u2019ve read that breaks this particular mold. While Sunny\u2019s albinism draws the ridicule of her classmates, Okorafor ensures that Sunny\u2019s character is not tarnished by her physical disabilities or the stigma of her peers. In fact, Sunny\u2019s albinism affects her character in a positive way, as dealing with the physical and social aspects of her albinism help build her confidence. She refuses to allow taunts and abuse to compromise her integrity and is never afraid to defend herself from those who see her as inferior.<\/p>\nUnlike many authors, Okorafor pulled no punches in regards to society\u2019s treatment of those with albinism. As a person of color growing up with albinism, Sunny\u2019s character particularly resonated with me. Her interactions with her classmates and countrymen strongly resembled my own. The odd looks and comments that Sunny deals with from her Nigerian counterparts are familiar to any \u201calbino of color\u201d as we see the confusion in the faces around us \u2014 as if we\u2019re pieces in a puzzle that don\u2019t fit correctly. Between the devices we use to protect ourselves from the sun, the blond or white hair, and the pale skin, we\u2019re seen as misfits even among our own societies. Nevertheless, Okorafor does not allow Sunny to succumb to this atmosphere. Unlike most \u00a0characters with albinism who are meek, easily manipulated characters, Sunny is an athletic, adventurous, and confident preteen who is not held back by her albinism and is quick to challenge those who question her looks or sun-shield umbrella. In fact, in the Leopard society her condition is seen as an indication of her power and abilities rather than a reason to ostracize her.<\/p>\n
However, Sunny\u2019s ready acceptance into Leopard society also plays into the \u201cmagical albino\u201d myth that permeates fantasy movies and novels. While Okorafor attempts to distance Sunny\u2019s albinism from the novel\u2019s mysticism, in Leopard society a Leopard person\u2019s abilities are very much influenced by their most striking physical features and\/or maladies; the more striking or severe the disability, the more powerful the associated magic. Thus, while in principle Sunny\u2019s albinism is not meant to contribute to the \u201cmagical albino\u201d myth, Okorafor\u2019s use of Leopard society ideology and mythology invokes an element of the aforementioned trope which mars what otherwise is an unprecedentedly mundane depiction of albinism.<\/p>\n
While Sunny\u2019s character is strongly affected by her albinism, Okorafor ignores or marginalizes some aspects of the condition. Because of our lack of melanin, people with albinism tend to have varying degrees of low vision. But Sunny didn\u2019t suffer from any type of visual impairment; she didn\u2019t even suffer from photophobia, the most common visual impairment associated with albinism. Okorafor\u2019s mysterious \u201ccure\u201d for Sunny\u2019s susceptibility to sunburn was an even more blatant affront to the integrity of her albinism. Soon after Sunny\u2019s magical awakening, she discovers that she is no longer affected by sunlight\u2014that she no longer has to worry about using an umbrella or long clothes to protect herself in the sun. As photophobia (in my opinion) is the most cumbersome physical symptom associated with albinism, Okorafor\u2019s cure does the novel a disservice as she frees Sunny from a burden that every other albino must consciously shoulder or risk the consequences.<\/p>\n
From the perspective of its portrayal of albinism I must confess to being underwhelmed by Akata Witch<\/em>. While I loved Sunny\u2019s character, Okorafor seemed to pick and choose from the physical and social aspects of albinism to craft a character that suited her needs rather than creating a truly realistic character with albinism, and \u2014 perhaps unintentionally \u2014 strayed back into the \u201cmagical albino\u201d trope that mars so many novels with characters with albinism. However, from a literary standpoint Akata Witch<\/em> is a great novel that features the first strong, sympathetic lead with albinism I\u2019ve seen in quite a few years. With a wonderful setting that provides a breath of fresh air to an otherwise tired premise, accurate, life-like characters, and a great message, Akata Witch<\/em> is a book I would recommend to readers of all ages.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Although I was underwhelmed by the portrayal of albinism in Akata Witch<\/em>, it’s a great novel that features the first strong, sympathetic lead with albinism I\u2019ve seen in quite a few years. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":73,"featured_media":1856,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_generate-full-width-content":"","kt_blocks_editor_width":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[217],"genre":[9],"age_category":[8],"disability":[218],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2590"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/73"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2590"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2590\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7277,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2590\/revisions\/7277"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2590"},{"taxonomy":"genre","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/genre?post=2590"},{"taxonomy":"age_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/age_category?post=2590"},{"taxonomy":"disability","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/disabilityinkidlit.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/disability?post=2590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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<\/a><\/center><\/div>Akata Witch<\/em> follows the story of Sunny, a twelve-year-old African-American albino whose family recently moved back to their native Nigeria. Because of her odd looks and African American heritage, Sunny is ostracized by her peers to an extent typical of any book featuring an albino character. Nonetheless, with the help of some friends, Sunny discovers that she is capable of much more than she realized. She is a \u201cleopard person,\u201d a secret race of peoples in Nigerian folklore who walk between the human and spirit worlds and are capable of practicing \u201cjuju.\u201d Soon she is whisked into a world of magic, masquerade, and monsters as she slowly assumes her role as a leopard person. Here Okorafor uses her expertise with Nigerian folklore to paint a truly marvelous world outside anything any Western reader could imagine. Each scene brims with foreign words, ideas, and languages in a way that draws the reader into the page.<\/p>\n