People go to Africa and confirm what they already have in their heads and so they fail to see what is there in front of them. This is what people have come to expect. Its not viewed as a serious continent. Its a place of strange, bizarre and illogical things, where people dont do what common sense demands.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of open-mindedness and the need to see beyond preconceived notions when exploring different cultures.
Chinua Achebe's quote critiques the tendency of people to impose their biases and stereotypes onto Africa, preventing them from truly understanding the continent and its complexities. It highlights how preconceived ideas can cloud perception, leading to a narrow understanding of a diverse and rich culture, which often goes unappreciated. Instead of engaging with the reality of Africa, many travelers confirm their biases, which diminishes the potential for genuine knowledge and appreciation of the continent's true nature.
In practice
In a presentation about cultural sensitivity, this quote can be used to illustrate the importance of being open-minded when exploring new societies.
In fact, I thought that Christianity was very a good and a very valuable thing for us. But after a while, I began to feel that the story that I was told about this religion wasn't perhaps completely whole, that something was left out.
Writers don't give prescriptions. They give headaches!
Mr. Brown had thought of nothing but numbers. He should have known that the kingdom of God did not depend on large crowds. Our Lord Himself stressed the importance of fewness. Narrow is the way and few the number. To fill the Lord's holy temple with an idolatrous crowd clamoring for signs was a folly of everlasting consequence. Our Lord used the whip only once in His life - to drive the crowd away from His church.
It is the storyteller who makes us what we are, who creates history. The storyteller creates the memory that the survivors must have - otherwise their surviving would have no meaning.
Writing has always been a serious business for me. I felt it was a moral obligation. A major concern of the time was the absence of the African voice. Being part of that dialogue meant not only sitting at the table but effectively telling the African story from an African perspective - in full earshot of the world.
An angry man is always a stupid man.
The Church was founded upon Peter: although elsewhere the same is attributed to all the Apostles, and they all receive the keys of the kingdom of heaven, the strength of the Church depends upon them all alike, yet one among the twelve is chosen so that when a head has been appointed, there may be no occasion for schism.
The work an unknown good man has done is like a vein of water flowing hidden underground, secretly making the ground green.
Wherever there is a man who exercises authority, there is a man who resists authority.
There is nothing by which men display their character so much as in what they consider ridiculous... Fools and sensible men are equally innocuous. It is in the half fools and the half wise that the great danger lies.
No race has a monopoly on vice or virtue, and the worth of an individual is not related to the color of his skin.
If everybody's not a beauty, then nobody is
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