Ngugi and the colonization of the mind

In The Language of African Literature, Ngugi brings to light a few interesting points about African Literature as a whole.  One of his most interesting points was that those that are responsible for the literature that is created in Africa, and write in any African language, are completely discredited as legitimate African insight, or literature.  The idea that something that is written in a native tongue would be considered non legitimate is ridiculous.  Even Ngugi thinks the same.  As he stated in this excerpt, he qualified for the conference, while many of the great African writers, who wrote in African languages, were not invited to this conference.  To me, this is a great insult to those writers, and really to the entire continent of Africa.  It is as if they are saying that Africa's history is not important unless it is written in a language that the "elite" can comprehend.  To me, this is like if there was a conference being held on American literature, but they refused to allow anyone who wrote in English to this conference.  The only people that were allowed to attend were those writers that encapsulated the essence of America in Russian. This is absurd.  Plain and simple, this makes no sense.  The language which we use for our ideas is the most powerful one we possess.  Therefore, sharing literature that has no cultural significance to those being told about makes little to no sense.  If the people that the stories are written about cannot even understand what the writer has written, then what good does it really do? Also, how much does it actually show about the culture?  To me, it does little good for the people reading it, and shows how little the author cares about making an accurate portrayal of what these experiences described are like.

"Wedding at the Cross" brings to light the idea of synchretism.  I had never heard a lot about this idea before, and I think that it is fascinating.  I think that this idea must come from a mix of the forced colonization of the minds of the natural citizens, and their contrasting belief systems which existed long before the colonization of their lands.  But rather than keep the two distant from one another, over time, they have melded together in sort of a melting pot of spirituality.  I can venture to say, that is America were colonized today, something very similar would most likely occur.  Today, in class when we were talking about the royal wedding on Friday, and I brought up the point about why anyone in America, who this has no actual significance to, be in any way excited or entertained.  To which you had a rather clever response, the colonization of our minds, as we are originally a British colony.  Although Americans are very aware that we have no royalty in our political system, we continue to hold on to the idea of royalty being something of elegance and beauty.  My own daughter's grandmother is waking up at four in the morning just to watch this silly wedding.  I mean, really?  Why does she care?  But, now I know.  Her mind is colonized!

"Minutes of Glory" is a fantastic story once done with and in the process of discussing it.  After reading this story, I was fairly baffled at what to make of this one.  I can usually come up with some themes that we may discuss in class, however, this one just confused me.  But once we actually started breaking it down, I was interested and fascinated with Ngugi's criticisms of colonization.  I thought that the end of the story sort of sums up everything that Ngugi's relays to the reader in one short finale.  As Nyaguthu wept, Ngugi expresses her resentment for colonization for the effects it has on your mind.  Nyaguthu had resisted the natural urge to change her ways, but she found it so utterly reprehensible that Beatrice had let her mind be colonized.  Wanjiru, had long since been dead.  It was a tragedy  that this was the case, but it was the truth.  When our minds our colonized, and we change our way of thinking, the people that we once were die.  And that is a tragedy unlike any other.  It is as though colonization creates a country full of zombies hardly resembling anything they once were.

Apartheid and Nadine Gordimer

Nadine Gordimer brings the realities of Apartheid to her readers attention with these three short stories we have read.  For me, these stories helped to point out the horrible realities of Apartheid.  I was not aware of all of the difficulties and hardships that come from Apartheid and the long struggle the people of South Africa were subjected to.  I thought that Gordimer's writing was even more fascinating through the eyes of a white person who clearly has major issues with Apartheid and the way it causes her fellow South African's to be treated.  Gordimer uses characters with no name in all of her stories to show us how a group of people would react in everyday situations in South Africa.

To be honest, I was completely disgusted in every sense of the word by all three of these stories.  In "Good Climate, Friendly Inhabitants," we are shown how nothing in Apartheid makes sense not only to those not involved, but to those that are involved.  I found this point to be fascinating.  Before this class, I had certainly heard of Apartheid, but had never studied the true intricacies of this difficult subject.  After learning about it, I am not sure that I understand Apartheid any better than before.  This is an unbelievably complex topic, and seems to be near impossible to fully comprehend, especially for those of us who aren't African, or South African for that matter.  In my opinion, this short story does a great job of attempting to teach an outsider just how hard Apartheid is to get a grasp on.

"Amnesty" brings to light a different side of Apartheid.  Political prisoners like Nelson Mandela spent years upon years sharing radical ideas with each other on Robin's Island.  An unintended consequence of this was the forming of "the movement" by the imprisoned men once released from their island of seclusion.  These men, once released, work for the betterment of his people by joining/starting "the movement."  I had never thought of the politics of Apartheid in this fashion.  I was in awe of the sheer magnitude of everything(i.e. emotions, politics, way of life) to do with Apartheid.  Because this brought to my mind such different ideas about something that I thought I knew a little about, it has really changed the way I view any conflict in general.  It is hard to keep up on global issues for me as it is.  But when you really take the time to examine things that we briefly discussed in high school history classes, it really makes me think just how little America/Americans understands about other cultures; or try to understand for that matter (I say from my corner in the room).  To relate this to something that is current and has been for the past 10 or so years.  I would say that Americans clearly cannot grasp the ideals of the middle east which is why it seems that the two wars in which our country are involved in seem to be endless.  We want to change something that we do not understand.  That seems to be root of a lot of our problems with the middle east.
Anyway, back to "Amnesty," Gordimer made a very interesting point that although the men are the ones that are credited with all of the glory for their fighting for the people, the women are the ones that actually do all of the domestic work, and therefore cannot do anything but that.  The men sort of leave the women high and dry so to speak.  The women of South Africa seem to be speaking through this story and Gordimer, yelling "If you gave us a chance, we could do it better than you!"  It seems that Gordimer asserts that no one deserves more praise or recognition than the women in this so called "movement."

"Six Feet of the Country" was a horribly tragic story, that points out just how faceless the institution of Apartheid is.  There is no way to control the monster that is Apartheid.  It is essentially an untamable beast.  Once created, the evil that Apartheid represents takes over everyone around it, and envelops them in its evil.  This is seen clearly through this short story.  When the baas man tries to get the body back after several failed attempts, even he is not capable of doing so.  I think that this was a very strong statement from Gordimer.  She asserts that not only is the system impossibly hard to deal with for black people as is obvious to those that know anything about Apartheid, but also being white is not an easy thing to do.  Basically, she seems to point out that no one listens to anyone.  I think this is mostly because she is saying that no one cares in any way shape or form.  I mean, to me, if I was burying my brother and when I looked at him one last time before I buried him forever, and it wasn't him, not only would I be devastated, but I would have such an unbelievable amount of anger I would find it difficult not to go on a killing spree.  Especially if prior to all of this, I not only had the body, but then had to pay $20,000 to get it back...  Obviously Gordimer expresses her discontent for the system of Apartheid.  I think it is fair to say that overall Gordimer expressed herself very clearly in her short stories and he points get across very effectively.  As an American reading Gordimer, I feel as I have a much better understanding of what Apartheid actually meant for the people that were apart of it.

Achebe and Colonialism

Chinua Achebe uses a unique writing style in "Girls at War" and "The Madman" to make his views of the colonization of Africa clear to the educated reader.  Personally, I found both of these stories to be some of my favorite short stories purely based on what they say about an entire continent.  From "Girls at War" I very much enjoyed how Achebe uses a contradiction as a character to get his point about his nation across. By using Nwankwo who is a member of the government or an authority figure as a contradiction to what someone in his governmental status should really be doing, Achebe blatantly points out how horribly twisted the entire system really is.  A perfect example of this from the reading was when Nwankwo refuses to help all of the people that are literally starving while he is filling his car with food for his family and his immediate neighbors.  Because Nwankwo is the antithesis of what Achebe actually believes we should do as good people is help everyone in need.  Even if this results in being spread very thin so to speak with our resources, it seems to me that Achebe believes that just a little bit of food for everyone, is much a much better way to live in a society, than to plentifully feed only a few.  I felt a big connection with this idea, and that is why I enjoyed this story so much.  Achebe, in my opinion, makes a valid point not only for Africa as a whole, but for America as well.  I think that a lot of people in America, mainly those of "extreme wealth" (i.e. the top 1% who also not so coincidentally control almost all of the money) have a big problem with "sharing" their money with everyone else.  Although they clearly have more than enough to go around, they are continually fighting for less taxes which go to help those in need.  I have a major problem with this idea in general and that is why this story aroused so much emotion in me.

"The Madman" also made a great personal connection with me.  I think that this short story is brilliant in the way that everything "changes" so quickly when Nwimbe simply is confused while chasing the madman who stole his loin cloth.  It is fascinating that due to the perception of others Nwimbe's life was forever changed from a few minutes of "insanity."  In reality, nothing changed in the least bit in Nwimbe's life.  He was simply momentarily angry about a silly prank so to speak.  However, because he was seen in one of the most populous places in the area in which he lived, acting the way he did, his reputation was forever changed.  Metaphorically, after reading this story a second time, I found an immediate connection to colonialism and the colonization of Africa.  Achebe's words spoke loudly through this short story in my opinion.  When dealing with colonization, we are not only dealing with the colonization of the natural resources of the land, but also the colonization of the human mind, which is the most dangerous thing of all.  Treating a group of people as if nothing in their history mattered or, by their standards, would even be considered wrong is the most dangerous thing of all; because after long, enough of the people whose land is being colonized eventually start to believe what they are being told.  This destroys the uniqueness of Africa, and is detrimental to the future understanding of cultures that are different from our own.  Achebe does a fantastic job of relaying his seemingly radical ideas at the time in a fashion that makes even the biggest skeptic, a believer in his logic.