How To Write About Africa

534 Words3 Pages
After reading the articles "How to Write About Africa" by Wanaina, "Looking East Africa" by the Economist, and "That Was No Welcome" by Clark, and watching the short films by Chinua Achebe and "The World According to Sesame Street", I was able to detect a common subject that they all touch upon. These articles demonstrates how people make erroneous mistakes and stereotypical generalizations about countries such as Africa and others. In "How to Write About Africa", the author uses sarcasm to describe Africa as one single entity. The message he conveys is that when people think about Africa, all they think about are black, hungry hunters living in forests eating monkey brains and chasing animals all day long, and that the idea of having white people with food and shelter is just not "African" enough for them. In the article "Looking East Africa", the author talks about how it is easier to travel with European Airlines inside Africa then it is to fly with African Airlines. He also mentions that the African Airlines are slowly improving, but still there are many difficulties ahead. What is supposed to be a positive story, is laced with ulterior undertones. The author implies that all African countries are alike, and that there would be no reason for them to take national flights. In the article "That Was no Welcome" by Clark, we are able to see the defiance of two different countries, Europe and Africa, in their first encounter due to their lack of cultural knowledge. The Europeans attacked the Africans because they assumed that the strange rituals performed by them were a sign of threat. The Africans believed the Europeans were "brothers" so they performed rituals to welcome them, however because of the sudden attack Africans realized they were enemies, so they attacked them back. Since Europeans did not know the local knowledge of the Africans, they assumed that the

More about How To Write About Africa

Open Document