Because of writers like Chinua Achebe and Camara Laye … I realized that people like me, girls with skin the color of chocolate, whose kinky hair could not form ponytails, could also exist in literature.
Chimamanda Ngozi AdichieRead
I think the history of western feminism is one that is fraught with racism, and I think it's important to acknowledge that and, at the same time, to say that feminism is not the western invention, that my great-grandmother in what is now south-western Nigeria is feminist.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Feminism has diverse roots across cultures and is not limited to Western influences.
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie highlights the intersectionality of feminism by acknowledging that the feminist movement's history in the West is intertwined with issues of racism. She emphasizes that feminism is a global concept, evident in the lives of women from various cultures, including her own great-grandmother in Nigeria, thus challenging the notion that feminism is solely a Western phenomenon.
Themes
FeminismRacismCultureHistoryIntersectionality
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech promoting global women's rights, one could use this quote to highlight the importance of recognizing diverse feminist histories.
More from Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
All quotes →The real tragedy of our postcolonial world is not that the majority of people had no say in whether or not they wanted this new world; rather, it is that the majority have not been given the tools to negotiate this new world.
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If I had not grown up in Nigeria- and if all I knew of Africa were of popular images- I too would think that africa was a place of beautiful landscapes, beautiful animals and incomprehensible people fighting sensless wars, dying of poverty and aids- unable to speak for themselves and waiting to be saved by a kind white foreigner.
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Stories can break the dignity of a people, but stories can also repair that broken dignity.
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You can't write a script in your mind and then force yourself to follow it. You have to let yourself be.
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Non-fiction, and in particular the literary memoir, the stylised recollection of personal experience, is often as much about character and story and emotion as fiction is.
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