In Buchi Emecheta's Second Class Citizen, Adah faces discrimination based on gender and race. These two forms of oppression operate simultaneously throughout the novel, shaping Adah's experiences in both Nigeria and England.
Gender discrimination begins in Adah's childhood in Nigeria, where her family prioritises her brother Boy's education over hers simply because she is female. She has to fight for the right to attend school. After her marriage to Francis, she becomes the sole breadwinner while her husband refuses to take responsibility, yet she is expected to be subservient. Francis controls her earnings, dismisses her ambitions, and is abusive.
Racial discrimination intensifies when Adah moves to London in the 1960s. She is treated as a "second-class citizen" because of her race. She struggles to find decent housing because landlords refuse to rent to Black tenants, she faces prejudice at work and in social interactions, and she discovers that being African in England means being consigned to the margins of society.
The novel's title itself captures this dual oppression: Adah is "second class" both as a woman in a patriarchal society and as a Black African in racially prejudiced Britain. Education, social status, age, religion, nationality, and language are not the primary bases of discrimination explored in the novel.