A single story

A friend of mine just sent me a link to a talk given by our very own Chimamanda Adichie, the author of Purple Hibiscus and Half of a yellow sun. The talk revolves around the thoughts of us as people on others, particularly when these thougts are formed when we have incomplete information, basically "a single story".

She speaks about the "single stories" that she has heard mostly about "Africans". These include the surprise a lot of people feel, that Nigerians can speak English, or the fact that we do listen Mariah Carey and not our "tribal music".

From my point of view, I don't think it's got anything to do with racism, as naive as that sounds. Because Chimamanda confesses to the fact that she also held single stories about certain people, such as mexicans who are portrayed by Americans as "abject immigrants" as opposed to the learned, hard working people she saw mexicans to be when she visited their country. That goes to show that no one is beyond formulating single stories. Not necessarily in respect to countries, but also individuals. Forming impressions about someones entire lineage or family background based on one person, as Chimamanda did their house-boy's family whom she was made to understand were poor. She then saw a raffia basket that his brother had woven and realised that the only thing she had attached to his boy and his family was "poverty" and nothing else.

This got me thinking. If she speaks about it this way, it means everyone out there does it in one way or the other. When we form these stories about individuals, then it's probably our faults for narrowly assessing people. Then if it's done to larger groups such as countries or a tribe, is it then our fault for not being thoroughly enlightened or the fault of the informant who most likely make sure to omit important information and constantly reiterate that single story that they want you to be aware of.

How then do we solve the situation? Simple! Others may say. "just look for more information". But is it that easy? I don't think it is. Even with the ease that information technology has brought in providing information, our generation does not seem to have thirst for this knowledge. We want to be spoon fed! Then we complain when Africa is named along with countries when it's a continent housing over 40 countries or when an american thinks Kofi Anaan is a coffee derivative (and probably quite expensive too). All in this 21st century, or more recently this year 2009. Meanwhile the average African knows that Utah is an American state and not a fellow African's surname.

But then it's all well and good to point fingers. The question is, what's the way forward?

I do it, you do it too, we all do, but how do we stop it? Both as the receiving end of a single story and the creators of single stories.

Below is the link to the video



http://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_story.html

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