An African Voice

Following today’s class discussion on “An African Voice,” I gained a number of insightful views concerning the power of culture and literature in the real world. 

My most meaningful takeaway was that concerning the influence and sway storytelling holds in our society.

Predating all forms of literature, storytelling lies at the very heart of who we are as humans. One could almost describe it as hereditary; the instinctive and intuitive feelings that drive storytelling rise from the very core of our consciousness, transcending all societal and cultural bounds.

In that sense of the word, one might expect history, the most all-inclusive of tales, to include the contributions of all to its writings. Nonetheless as Churchill so bluntly stated, history is penned by those who come up on top.

And it was this preconception that Chinua Achebe challenged when writing Things Fall Apart. Presenting an alternate depiction of people group that had long been subjugated; Achebe took the telling of his people’s story into his own hand and in doing so shattered the grounds on which slavery had long been justified. This seemingly simple act, revealed to me the power of storytelling and the revelation that a few words can contend a millennia worth of false ideology and turn it on it’s own head.