akata

Akata is an abbreviated Igbo word, akataka, which means: a tough man like Okonkwo in Chinue Achebe's "Things Fall Apart". With the emergence of westernization and woman's empowerment, the abbreviated form “akata” was used to describe a tough Igbo wife/woman that can drive away all her husband’s relatives and isolate him from his family so as to gain access to all his wealth when he passed away without given his relatives any chance to claim some part of his properties as is the custom of Igbo people. When Igbos (in Nigeria) started migrating to America, they found African American ladies tough to control and wayward unlike the laid-back attitude the Igbos are accustomed to. They christened them akata, but now it is equal used for both male and female African Americans. n. (1) an African American (especially a wayward one). (2) a tough Igbo woman.