Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Danger of a Single Story

            I watched this TED Talk, Danger of a Single Story, about a month ago in my social work class.  Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is trying to create awareness of the danger of a single story and I think she does an amazing job!  She discusses how, when she was only seven years old, she began writing stories.  Though she lived in Nigeria, none of her stories ever depicted people or things from where she lived.  Her stories showed only the culture of American and British books that she had read.  She realized that the reason she never wrote about where she was from was because she did not know that it was possible.  Every book she read was about Americans or the British so she was under the assumption that that was the only places books were written about.  There were no books written about Nigeria.  Growing up, Chimamanda was shown only one side of literature, that it was filled with foreigners.  It was not until she discovered African books that she then realized that there are many stories of literature.

            My favorite story that Chimamanda told was of her experience at a university in the United States.  Her roommate had only heard one story about Africa.  The story where nobody spoke English, everyone listened to tribal music and the people of Africa did not know how to use modern technology.  "She had felt sorry for me even before she saw me. Her default position toward me, as an African, was a kind of patronizing, well-meaning pity. My roommate had a single story of Africa: a single story of catastrophe. In this single story, there was no possibility of Africans being similar to her in any way, no possibility of feelings more complex than pity, no possibility of a connection as human equals (Adichie, 2009)."

            When we only see one story of something, then we are quick to judge and stereotype.  The problem with one story is that it is constantly showing people as only one thing until that is was everyone else believes.  There needs to be a balance of stories.

            It took me awhile to figure out an example of a time when I had only one side of the story to something and I realized that I was thinking too much into it.  My dad is a public bus driver for RIPTA and growing up I always heard stories of the people he met.  Whether they were from Cranston, Pawtucket, Providence, Warwick, etc.; he always came home with stories.  Some were good and funny but many were negative.  Not really able to drive yet and go places on my own, I believed these stories.  I had it in my head that certain places were filled with rude and arrogant people, even sometimes dangerous.  What I did not realize back then was that these stories were only from certain people in these areas, and those people did not represent everyone.  As I grew up I quickly figured out the difference and that there are different sides to every story.

1 comment:

  1. I really enjoy your personal recollection of when you created a judgment and how it was formed. I think we have had so many experiences that were created based on stereotypes. But I think it's important that we know to create the next addition to the story and to teach youth to learn more than just a single story!