[They] don’t say “Malawi”; they just say “Africa.”
[…] Of course this isn’t really about Madonna. It is about a formula that well-meaning people have adopted in looking at Africa, a surface-only, let’s-ignore-the-real-reasons template that African experiences have all been forced to fit in order to be authentically “African.”
If I were not African, I wonder whether it would be clear to me that Africa is a place where the people do not need limp gifts of fish but sturdy fishing rods and fair access to the pond. I wonder whether I would realize that while African nations have a failure of leadership, they also have dynamic people with agency and voices. I wonder whether I would know that Africa has class divisions, that wealthy Africans who have not stolen from their countries actually exist.
I wonder whether I would know that corrupt African countries are also full of fiercely honest people and that violent conflicts are about resource control in an environment of (sometimes artificial) scarcity. Watching David Banda’s father, I imagined a British David visiting him in 2021 and I wondered what they would talk about.
Negrophile
If everyone would only take the time to really learn each other and who we really are as an individual, people and nation.
Comment by Stephen Bess — 30 November 2006 @ 6:32 pm
…and then I find you have more to say then the brilliant poetry.
Both pages are wonderful reads.
Thanks again.
Comment by GoGo — 2 December 2006 @ 2:09 pm
I wonder if what I am about to say sounds painfully naive. Are not most people more than the image of their countries’ politics and socio-economic status? Sum of people being more than the whole of the country? I hope never to be judged on the actions of the political enviroment of the country I live; but wait, I already know that I have been.
Comment by Chelle — 16 December 2006 @ 9:34 pm
It seems to me that the world is full of ignorance, no matter where people are from. I cringe to think of how people toss ‘Westerners’ into one category, ‘Asians’ into another, ‘Arabs’ and ‘Africans’ in others. Somehow we neglect to think about how I, as a Canadian may well have more in common with someone native to South Africa, China or Iraq than I do with the boy next door to me.
Comment by Stephanie — 8 January 2007 @ 11:26 pm
These comments have been invaluable to me as is this whole site. I thank you for your comment.
Comment by Rosie — 30 April 2007 @ 4:36 pm