...INTRODUCTION In the text, language and Igbo Philosophy, Fr. Dr. Chukwuelobe .M. explored the deep contribution of language to Igbo critical thinking via a tasking presentation on the phenomenology of Igbo language taking Igbo proverbs on “okwu” as his point of reflection. It shows the originality and pure nature of Igbo philosophy thereby, aborting the false view that Igbo philosophy is philosophizing in western concepts or dressing Igbo philosophy with western garb; Since, language as we know is ‘an experience that a thinker undergoes with the view to uncovering nature. This work is going to critically analyze and evaluate the author’s argument in this essay. TEXT EXPOSITION The author began by affirming the validity of Igbo philosophy when he argued that Igbo philosophy like every other philosophy ‘sets its goal to question the tradition from which it arises and to transcend it through an interpretive and critical activity of the Igbo thinker.’ Tracing the origin of language in the Igbo philosophy, he maintains that our experience with language is something historical because it relates to man who is historical in nature. Consequently, to understand the Igbo and discern what has come to language in his thought requires that a philosophy listens attentively to the sayings of the historical language; which is yet to be known and remains to be seen. He asserts that the Igbo traditional thinking derives essentially from oral transmission, which predates the advent of western...
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...contributed to the relevancy of the novels which are tradition vs. progress, gender inequality, and the “white dream”. Traditions vs. progress or change was one of the most poignant themes throughout all three novels. There have been several universal biases against Africa implying that Africa is a resilient country that opposes change and as a result of their stubborn ways suffer, living an expired life struggling in poverty and disease. As a result, the authors of the novels write in a way that demonstrates how Westerners imposing their industrialization, religion, and cultural views upon the African people have in some ways handicapped the actual African society from revolutionizing themselves. For example in Things Fall Apart Okonkwu constantly resisted change and eventually let his resistance become his demise by committing the moral crime of suicide. However the majority of his Igbo society transitioned to Christianity, denying their own culture and joining the oppressors whom mocked their culture. Nonetheless, this proves that Africa is a society that can change because of the lasting legacy of colonization in Africa. What are the postcolonial themes and concerns of the novels we have read? Post-colonialism refers to the legacy of colonialism. It describes a post-modern era after the imposing of Westerners on Africa. Many African authors write descriptive tails about Africa after colonialization in order to withdraw bias views and revive the cultivating...
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... and what morals to follow. Many pre-colonialist African societies, specifically Igbo and Bambara societies, could be defined by the impact of their traditional (meaning any religious belief indigenous to Africa before European arrival) religion on everyday life. Traditional beliefs in these societies were defined by polygyny and male dominance, in addition to sacrificing to divinities, fetish priests, and medicine men. Although Islam had roots in Africa before the beginning of colonialism, the introduction of the transatlantic slave trade and the start of Islam social movements began a new campaign toward religious reform in Africa. The novel Segu by Maryse Conde, shows how these Islamic movements brought both hope and fear into the lives of the men and women in the Bambara society. In particular, this new emphasis on Islam brought fear into the lives of many women; fear of leaving the traditions they had followed their whole lives. Whereas Segu focused on changes, The Concubine, by Elechi Amadi, took a more timeless approach, focusing solely on the traditional religion of the Igbo society and its effects. Although these novels are very different, each author effectively shows the significant social, emotional, and physical effects of religion particularly on the lives of women in both the Igbo and Bambara societies. The Concubine, provides insight to many traditional concepts of the Igbo society such as its village democracy, beliefs in spirits, and, most importantly...
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...In the novel Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe reveals both the tradition and challenge of tradition to the Igbo people. Achebe uses and array of literary devices such as symbolism, proverbs, and dialogue between characters to portray the importance of Igbo tradition. Okonkwo faces the challenge of having to maintain his power in his village while simultaneously keeping his fading tradition alive. First, Achebe uses symbolism to illustrate to the reader parts of the Igbo culture. In the passage, it can be seen that the kola nut holds a lot of respect within it. The kola nut is to be served to the most elderly first, then to the younger people. The kola nut represents almost a holy object in Igbo tradition that brings good vibes, even to their...
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...neighboring tribes. Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart achieves the paradoxical effect of enabling African tribal life to be accessible to western society, while simultaneously excluding it. The incursion of the colonizing force is changing or threatening to change almost every aspect of their society: religion, family structure, gender roles, relations, and trade. In this novel Achebe uses the term Locusts to symbolize the arrival of white settlers who will feast on and exploit the resources of the Igbo. Achebe aims to show that Africa is not the uncivilized, simple country that it is portrayed as by other cultures. His work aims to show the reader to understand the tribe and assist the reader to think about the reasoning behind the beliefs that may be viewed as odd or illogical. For instance; that a child should be murdered or the spirits of the dead must be appeased, if not it can have grave consequences for some tribal members. Or the tribal concept of 'bloating' they simply take people suffering with it to the evil forest and leave them for dead, to them this perfectly logical. Paul Brians (Washington State University, 2002) states that "its most striking feature is to create a complex and sympathetic portrait of a traditional village culture in Africa. Achebe does not set out to prove that African society makes sense and is "right" but that it is not limited in the contemplation and reasoning." "During this time many Africans were ready to accept the European judgment that...
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...families and two communities. It illustrates different types of marriages that exist in the African societies. | Agbogun, James. "Nigeria, People and Culture: Housa Marriage." Nigeria, People and Culture: Housa Marriage. N.p., 4 Feb. 2012. Web. 18 Nov. 2013. <http://www.the-nigeria.com/2012/02/housa-marriage.html>. This article describes the Hausa tribe marriage in Nigeria. The Hausas live in northern Nigeria. They are also found in Ghana, Togo, and Benin. The Hausas generally attach great importance to premarital chastity. A Hausa husband who discovers that the girl he has married is not a virgin will proclaim her shame to the entire town by breaking a pot outside his house. Among most Fulani, and other sub tribes of the Hausa, custom forbids sexual intercourse between young people who are betrothed. Egbosiuba, Michael. "Yoruba Traditional Marriage." All Things Nigeria. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013. <http://www.allthingsnigeria.com/2012/yoruba-traditional-marriage>. The article describes the Yoruba marriage in Nigeria. Yoruba tribe is one of the three major tribes in Nigeria. Their wedding ceremony has always been colorful and very festive. Families and friends are dressed in their brightest and best attires. "Igbo Brides & Igbo Traditional Marriage Traditions & Customs - Igbo People of Nigeria." Igbo People of Nigeria. Ibopeople Support, 12 Dec. 2012. Web. 18 Nov. 2013....
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...In “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe the people of Nigeria are being colonized by Britain and trying to be converted to Christianity. For people that have only been familiar with one religion, learning new ways can be very controversial. When a civilization is predominantly led by chiefs of tribes these teachings make their status seem weak. All of the Igbos customs are based on religion, gender, and reputation. In chapter seventeen of “Things Fall Apart” Okonkwo and his son, Nwoye, get into a altercation. The reason being is Nwoye wanted to convert to christianity. To his father, this was considered ultimate dishonor. Although Nwoye felt as if it were the right choice, his father it, “Answer me!” roared Okonkwo, “Before I kill you!” (Achebe). Which expresses the importance of religion to Okonkwo. In this family, turning against customs is almost forbidden rejected but Nwoye thinks otherwise. The boy is content with leaving his father after all that has occurred. “Nwoye did not fully understand. But he was happy to leave his father. He would return later to his mother and his brothers and sisters and convert them to a new faith.” (Achebe). Okonkwo’s beliefs are far from christianity, as...
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...Journal of Postcolonial Writing ISSN: 1744-9855 (Print) 1744-9863 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rjpw20 “He does not understand our customs”: Narrating orality and empire in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart Jarica Linn Watts To cite this article: Jarica Linn Watts (2010) “He does not understand our customs”: Narrating orality and empire in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart , Journal of Postcolonial Writing, 46:1, 65-75, DOI: 10.1080/17449850903478189 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17449850903478189 Published online: 27 Jan 2010. Submit your article to this journal Article views: 501 View related articles Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=rjpw20 Download by: [Indiana University Libraries] Date: 24 February 2016, At: 16:43 Journal of Postcolonial Writing Vol. 46, No. 1, February 2010, 65–75 “He does not understand our customs”: Narrating orality and empire in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart Jarica Linn Watts* University of Utah, Salt Lake City, USA Downloaded by [Indiana University Libraries] at 16:43 24 February 2016 jarica.watts@utah.edu Jarica 0 100000February 46 2010 &Article OriginalofFrancis 1744-9855 (print)/1744-9863 JournalandPostcolonial 10.1080/17449850903478189(online) RJPW_A_448194.sgm TaylorLinnWatts 2010 Writing Francis This article delineates different strains of...
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...chaos that arises when a system collapses. That “the center cannot hold” is an ironic reference to both the imminent collapse of the African tribal system, threatened by the rise of imperialist bureaucracies, and the imminent disintegration of the British Empire. Achebe, writing in 1959, had the benefit of retrospection in depicting Nigerian society and British colonialism in the 1890s. Yet Achebe’s allusion is not simply political, nor is it ironic on only one level. Yeats’s poem is about the Second Coming, a return and revelation of sorts. In Things Fall Apart, this revelation refers to the advent of the Christian missionaries (and the alleged revelation of their teachings), further satirizing their supposed benevolence in converting the Igbo. For an agricultural society accustomed to a series of cycles, including that of the locusts, the notion of return would be quite credible and familiar. The hyperbolic and even contradictory nature of the passage’s language suggests the inability of humankind to thwart this collapse. “Mere anarchy” is an oxymoron in a sense, since the definition of anarchy implies an undeniably potent level of radicalism. The abstraction in the language makes the poem’s ideas universal: by referring to “[t]hings” falling apart as opposed to specifying what those collapsing or disintegrating things are, Yeats (and Achebe) leaves his words open to a greater range of...
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...native wrote Things Fall Apart a groundbreaking novel as a response to European writings about Africa such as Joseph Conrad Heart of Darkness and Joyce Cary Mister Johnson. Indignant at the way Africans were portrayed in those novels, Achebe looked for a way to show the world the richness of African culture, and in so doing, give his people a voice in the global society. Achebe announced that one of his purposes was to present a complex, dynamic society to a Western audience who perceived African society as primitive, simple, and backward. It was also a response to the Western beliefs that the Africans were uncivilized and barbaric. Achebe got most of his view from his own culture through the writing of Europeans. At first he related to the European writings, but as time went on, he felt they were poor caricatures and stereotypes of the actual people, and he tried to show this through his writing. In Things Fall Apart, Achebe illustrates this vision by showing us what happened in the Igbo society of Nigeria at the time of its colonization by the British. Because of internal weaknesses within the native structure and the divided nature of Igbo society, the community of Umuofia in this novel is unable to withstand the tidal wave of foreign religion, commerce, technology, and government. Unless Africans could tell their side of their story, Achebe believed that the African experience would forever be "mistold.” The events in Things Fall Apart take place at the end of the nineteenth...
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...Chinualumogo Achebe, Chinua Achebe was raised by Christian evangelical parents in the large village Ogidi, in Igboland, Eastern Nigeria. He received an early education in English, but grew up surrounded by a complex fusion of Igbo traditions and colonial legacy. He studied literature and medicine at the University of Ibadan; after graduating, he went to work for the Nigerian Broadcasting Company in Lagos and later studied at the British Broadcasting Corporation staff school in London. During this time, Achebe was developing work as a writer. Starting in the 1950s, he was central to a new Nigerian literary movement that drew on the oral traditions of Nigeria's indigenous tribes. Although Achebe wrote in English, he attempted to incorporate Igbo vocabulary and narratives. Things Fall Apart (1958) was his first novel, and remains his best-known work. It has been translated into at least forty-five languages, and has sold eight million copies worldwide. Chinua Achebe’s “African Trilogy” : Things Fall Apart, No Longer at Ease, Arrow of God captures a society caught between its traditional roots and the demands of a rapidly changing world. A titled Ibo chieftain himself, Achebe's novels focus on the traditions of Igbo society, the effect of Christian influences, and the clash of Western and traditional African values during and after the colonial era. His style relies heavily on the Ibo oral tradition, and combines...
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...The Great Warrior Men are the back bone of a tribal society, but women are just as important in taking care of their husband’s homes and children. There is a saying where behind every successful man is a great woman, and behind every unsuccessful man is a bad woman. In the Igbo culture, women do not have much to gamble with such as the men. The women take care of the household; take care of cooking, and the children. We can see this type of behavior in many types of old cultural ways of life. The Igbo culture is known for men to have multiple wives and I view this as a blessing in many ways such as having many different children who can carry out their father’s legacy or vice versa, especially in Okonkwo situation. At the end of this beautiful story we see that Okonkwo kills himself because of the changes that have come to his people. Was it just to see someone hang himself because of this? Well let us see how this had come to be. Okonkwo feared most was failure just like his father; however in my humble opinion his father was not really a failure but more down to earth type of person with problems just like many people in modern day society. Owing people is the same as having a credit card with debt. For Okonkwo to show his manly hood, he takes a very big leap of faith in becoming a well respected man within his tribe which comes with great deal of responsibility. Again, in this case responsibility for Okonkwo is to keep up and maintain his wives and children with food and...
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...The Biafran War, fought between the people of Nigeria and the people of Biafra, turned into a genocide that many of the world’s most powerful countries did nothing to prevent. In fact, many of those countries supported the side who brought on the genocide. Biafra was a short lived country that was in a war for practically the entirety of its existence, causing over one million people to lose their lives. Biafra no longer exists as a country today, but rather a territory of Nigeria, taking up about half of the southern coast. The Biafran War was devastating to its citizens, but today, some people still want it to be independent. To understand the situations of the war, one must know why the war started, what happened in it, and which other countries...
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...Saving Mr Ugwu Saving Mr Ugwu is a story that puts focus on the differences in the society in the African Country Nigeria. The difference the story focusses on is the difference between different cultures, ethnicities and individual rights which emerges from these differences. The story takes place in Nigeria with Mr Ugwu who is a Christian Igbo, which is an ethnic group in Nigeria. Because of Mr Ugwu’s job he has been forced to move from Lagos to the bush, which geographically is a step down in the social hierarchy. The bush is a place where the Hausas are the dominant ethnicity and rain is one of the rarest things you will see. Saving Mr Ugwu is a short story by Lin Anderson. The point of view in the story is a third person narrator and Mr Ugwu is the main character whom is followed by the reader. The reader gets to know Mr Ugwu’s thoughts and feelings. Mr Ugwu is also the only person that we are able to characterize, because he is the only person that the reader receives enough knowledge about to make a characterization of. Mr Ugwu is a Christian Igbo who works for the Baturi. The Baturi makes Mr Ugwu the scapegoat as they make him deliver the low payment to the Hausas for working. Despite of this Mr Ugwu appreciates his job and his employer. The appreciation he gives his work and employer can be seen in the following quotation from the text, “The company has been good to him, he reminds himself. Good to hisfamily. He is a company man. When the company tells him to go somewhere...
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...must understand where his story begins. Just as Okonkwo’s fall begins in Umuofia, it is the same story of his father, Unoka, framed within Okonkwo’s life. The reader first learns that Okonkwo’s father was a creative and loving man, with a great potential for happiness. In the environment of the Igbo culture, however, he struggled; he was considered a failure. And so Unoka retained his passion for beauty and joy, but became familiar with sadness and pain. Through it all, the man never let the scorn of others control his behavior. Unoka literally takes his flute to his humiliating grave. Okonkwo’s pride makes him vulnerable where his father was not. He vividly remembers a playmate call his father a name, bringing shame upon Okonkwo. This part of his story hints at not only the psychological origin, but the cultural significance behind Okonkwo’s “Chi”. Okonkwo’s pride makes him vulnerable to succumb to his great consuming fear of rejection and disapproval. He then turns his fear into a motivation: to become all that his father is not, and reject his father’s most treasured values. Okonkwo believes his own escape from his father’s fate can be directed in the forceful manipulation of the Igbo relationship between achievement, age, and respect. “As the elders said, if a child washed his hands he could eat with kings. Okonkwo had clearly washed his hands so...
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