The danger of a single story | Chimamanda Adichie 2020

Summary

The speaker, a storyteller from Nigeria, reflects on the impact of 'the single story' on perception and identity. She recounts her childhood immersion in foreign literature, leading to a skewed view of her own culture, and later experiences with stereotypes in the U.S. and Mexico. She advocates for the importance of diverse narratives to counteract stereotypes, emphasizing the power of stories to both dehumanize and humanize, and calls for the recognition of multiple, complex stories within every culture.

Takeaways

• 📚 The speaker's early exposure to literature was limited to British and American children's books, which influenced her early writing, creating stories with characters that were foreign to her own Nigerian culture.
• 🌏 The realization that literature could also represent her own experiences came when she discovered African authors like Chinua Achebe, which broadened her perception of what literature could be.
• 🏡 Growing up in a middle-class Nigerian family, the speaker had a single story of her houseboy Fede's family as being poor, which was challenged when she visited their village and saw their creativity and craftsmanship.
• 🗣️ The speaker's American roommate had a single story of Africa as a place of catastrophe, which was based on stereotypes and not on personal experience or a diverse range of stories.
• 🌐 The power of storytelling is tied to power structures; those who tell the stories have the ability to define the narrative and shape perceptions of people and places.
• 📖 The speaker acknowledges her own participation in reinforcing single stories, as seen in her initial perceptions of Mexicans during a visit to Mexico, influenced by media coverage.
• 🔄 The importance of diverse stories is emphasized, as they provide a more complete and nuanced understanding of people and places, rather than relying on stereotypes.
• 🌍 The speaker calls for a 'balance of stories' to counteract the flattening effect of single stories, which can rob people of their dignity and humanity.
• 💪 The power of stories to empower and humanize is highlighted, with examples of Nigerians who are ambitious, creative, and resilient despite challenges.
• 🏛️ The speaker and her publisher have started a nonprofit to build libraries and promote reading and writing, emphasizing the importance of providing access to diverse stories.
• 🤝 The conclusion calls for the rejection of single stories to regain a sense of paradise, suggesting that a multiplicity of narratives leads to a richer understanding and appreciation of the world.

Q & A

What is the main theme of the storyteller's personal experiences in the transcript?

The main theme is the danger of the single story, which refers to the risk of forming one's understanding of a person, place, or culture based on a limited or stereotypical narrative.

Why did the storyteller's early stories feature characters that were white and blue-eyed?

The storyteller's early stories featured such characters because the British and American children's books she read as a child depicted characters that were foreign to her own Nigerian environment, influencing her early writing.

What was the storyteller's realization after discovering African literature?

The storyteller realized that people who looked like her, with similar cultural backgrounds, could also exist in literature, leading her to write about things she recognized and could personally identify with.

How did the storyteller's perception of her house boy, Fide, change after visiting his village?

After visiting Fide's village and seeing the beautifully patterned basket made by his brother, the storyteller was startled to realize that Fide's family was capable of creating something of beauty and value, challenging her previous single story of them being only poor.

What was the American roommate's single story of Africa?

The American roommate's single story of Africa was one of catastrophe, where she assumed that Africans were unable to speak for themselves and were in need of being saved by a kind white foreigner, reflecting a patronizing and well-meaning perspective.

How did the storyteller's experience in the United States influence her identity?

In the United States, the storyteller began to embrace a new identity as an African, as she was often turned to whenever Africa was mentioned, even though she knew nothing about some of the places being discussed.

What is the storyteller's view on the relationship between power and storytelling?

The storyteller believes that power is the ability to define the definitive story of a person or place, and that the power structures of the world influence whose stories are told and how they are told.

Why did the storyteller feel shame during her visit to Guadalajara, Mexico?

The storyteller felt shame because she realized that she had internalized the single story of Mexicans as abject immigrants due to the media coverage she had been exposed to in the United States.

What is the storyteller's opinion on the importance of having multiple stories about a place or person?

The storyteller believes that engaging with multiple stories is crucial for a proper understanding of a place or person, as it avoids the flattening of experience and recognizes the complexity of humanity.

What is the storyteller's initiative with her publisher to promote diverse storytelling?

The storyteller and her publisher have started a nonprofit called Farafina Trust with the aim of building libraries, refurbishing existing ones, providing books to state schools, and organizing workshops to encourage diverse storytelling.

How does the storyteller suggest we can regain a kind of paradise?

The storyteller suggests that we can regain a kind of paradise by rejecting the single story and recognizing that there is never a single story about any place, which allows for a more nuanced and respectful understanding of diversity.

Outlines

00:00

📚 The Perils of a Single Story

The speaker, a storyteller, recounts her childhood in Nigeria and the impact of reading predominantly British and American children's books. She describes how she unconsciously adopted the cultural nuances of these foreign stories into her own writing, creating characters that were white and blue-eyed, despite living in a Nigerian environment. The realization of this cultural disconnect led her to explore African literature, which broadened her understanding of diversity in storytelling and helped her to recognize the importance of representation in literature. This experience taught her about the vulnerability to single narratives, especially in childhood, and the transformative power of discovering a more inclusive range of stories.

05:03

🌏 The Consequences of Stereotyping

The narrative shifts to the speaker's experiences with the 'single story' phenomenon in her interactions with others, such as her American roommate's preconceived notions about Africa and Africans. The speaker reflects on how the single story can lead to stereotypes and a lack of understanding, emphasizing the importance of recognizing the complexity and diversity within any culture or place. She discusses the historical roots of such narratives in Western literature and how they have perpetuated harmful stereotypes. The speaker also acknowledges her own complicity in perpetuating single stories and the need to challenge these narratives to foster a more accurate and empathetic understanding of different cultures.

10:05

🌱 The Power of Multiple Narratives

The speaker delves into the concept of power in storytelling, illustrating how the ability to define a narrative can lead to the marginalization or misrepresentation of certain groups. She uses examples from her own life and the broader African context to highlight the damage caused by single stories and the importance of sharing diverse narratives to restore dignity and humanity. The speaker advocates for the recognition of multiple, authentic stories from different cultures and backgrounds, as a means to challenge stereotypes and promote a more nuanced understanding of the world.

15:05

🌟 The Transformative Impact of Stories

In the final paragraph, the speaker emphasizes the transformative power of stories in shaping perceptions and identities. She shares personal anecdotes that challenge the single story of Nigeria and Africa, highlighting the resilience, creativity, and diversity of the people. The speaker discusses her efforts to promote storytelling through workshops and a nonprofit organization, aiming to empower individuals to share their own narratives. She concludes by reflecting on the importance of embracing multiple stories to regain a sense of paradise, where understanding and empathy prevail over stereotypes and single narratives.

Keywords

💡Single Story

The term 'Single Story' refers to the phenomenon where a person or group is defined by one narrative or stereotype, ignoring the complexity and diversity of their experiences. In the video, the speaker discusses how growing up with British and American literature led to her writing stories with characters that were foreign to her own Nigerian culture. This illustrates the impact of a single story on personal identity and perception.

💡Impressionability

Impressionability is the susceptibility of being influenced or shaped by external factors, especially during early development. The speaker mentions being an early reader and writer, and how the stories she read influenced her own writing, showing that children are particularly impressionable and can internalize narratives that don't reflect their own realities.

💡Cultural Identity

Cultural identity is the sense of belonging to a cultural group, which is shaped by various factors including language, traditions, and shared experiences. The video emphasizes the importance of diverse cultural representation in literature, as the speaker's realization that she could write about things she recognized was tied to discovering African writers who reflected her own cultural identity.

💡Perception

Perception is the process of interpreting and organizing sensory information to form a coherent understanding. The speaker's perception of literature changed when she discovered African writers, challenging the single story she had internalized from the predominantly foreign books she read earlier in her life.

💡Stereotype

A stereotype is a widely held but oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing. The video discusses how stereotypes can rob people of their dignity by reducing them to a single narrative, such as the speaker's roommate's assumptions about Africans being unable to speak English or use a stove.

💡Empathy

Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. The speaker contrasts the patronizing pity she received from her roommate with the potential for empathy that could arise from knowing the full range of human experiences and stories of a person or place.

💡Dignity

Dignity refers to the state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect. The video argues that the single story can undermine dignity by reducing people to caricatures, whereas a diversity of stories can affirm the full humanity and worth of individuals.

💡Power Structures

Power structures refer to the distribution of power and authority within a society or system. The speaker discusses how power influences the stories that are told and how they are perceived, giving examples of how certain narratives become dominant and define the understanding of entire groups of people.

💡Authenticity

Authenticity is the quality of being genuine or real. In the context of the video, the speaker reflects on a professor's critique that her novel lacked 'African authenticity,' highlighting the problematic nature of expecting a single, authentic narrative to represent the diverse experiences of a continent.

💡Resilience

Resilience is the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties. The speaker describes the resilience of Nigerians who thrive despite challenges, such as poor infrastructure and government, emphasizing the importance of recognizing and sharing stories of strength and perseverance alongside narratives of struggle.

💡Humanization

Humanization is the process of attributing human characteristics or qualities to something. The video suggests that sharing diverse stories can humanize people by presenting them as multifaceted individuals with their own experiences and emotions, rather than as one-dimensional stereotypes.

Highlights

The storyteller's childhood in Nigeria was influenced by British and American children's books, leading to a limited perspective on literature.

Early writing reflected the single story of foreign characters due to the absence of diverse literature.

The discovery of African literature broadened the storyteller's perception of who could exist in literature.

The storyteller's encounter with her house boy, Fede, challenged her single story of poverty.

The storyteller's American roommate's misconceptions about Africa highlight the impact of a single story.

The single story of Africa as a place of catastrophe overlooks the continent's diversity and humanity.

The storyteller reflects on the power dynamics in storytelling, emphasizing the importance of diverse narratives.

The storyteller's experience in Mexico revealed her own susceptibility to the single story of Mexicans.

The storyteller discusses the limitations of stereotypes and the need for a balance of stories to restore dignity.

The importance of engaging with all stories of a place or person for a proper understanding is emphasized.

The storyteller's personal experiences in Nigeria showcase the resilience and ambition of its people.

The storyteller's nonprofit, Farah FINA Trust, aims to empower people through diverse storytelling.

The storyteller concludes that rejecting the single story allows for a regained sense of paradise.

Transcripts

I'm a storyteller and I would like to

tell you a few personal stories about

what I like to call the danger of the

single story I grew up on a university

campus in eastern Nigeria my mother says

that I started reading at the age of two

although I think four is probably close

to the truth so I was an early reader

and what I read were British and

American children's books I was also an

early writer and when I began to write

at about the age of seven stories in

pencil with crayon illustrations that my

poor mother was obligated to read I

wrote exactly the kinds of stories I was

reading all my characters were white and

blue-eyed they played in the snow they

ate apples and they talked a lot about

the weather how lovely it was that the

Sun had come out now this despite the

fact that I lived in Nigeria had never

been outside Nigeria we didn't have snow

we ate mangos and we never talked about

the weather because there was no need my

characters also drank a lot of ginger

beer because the characters and the

British books I read drank ginger beer

never mind that I had no idea what

ginger beer was and for many years

afterwards I would have a desperate

desire to taste ginger beer but that is

another story

what this demonstrates I think is how

impressionable and vulnerable we are in

the face of a story particularly as

children because all I had read were

books in which characters were foreign I

had become convinced that books by the

very nature had to have foreigners in

them and had to be about things with

which I could not personally identify

now things changed when I discovered

African books there weren't many of them

available and they weren't quite as easy

to find as the foreign books but because

of writers like Chinua Achebe on camera

I went through a mental shift in my

perception of literature 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

I started to write about things I

recognized now I loved those American

and British books I read they stared my

imagination the opened up new worlds for

me but the unintended consequence was

that I did not know that people like me

could exist in the choocha so what the

discovery of African writers did for me

was this it saved me from having a

single story of what books are I come

from a conventional middle-class

Nigerian family my father was a

professor

my mother was an administrator and so we

had as was the norm live-in domestic

help who would often come from nearby

rural villages so the year I turned 8 we

got a new house boy

his name was fede the only thing my

mother told us about him was that his

family was very poor my mother sent yams

and rice and our old clothes to his

family and when I didn't finish my

dinner my mother would say finish your

food don't you know people like fides

family have nothing so I felt enormous

pity for fides family but one Saturday

we went to his village to visit and his

mother showed us a beautifully patterned

basket made of dyed raffia that his

brother had made I was startled it had

not occurred to me that anybody and his

family could actually make something all

I had heard about them was how poor they

were so that it had become impossible

for me to see them as anything else but

poor their poverty was my single story

of them years later I thought about this

when I left Nigeria to go to university

in the United States I was 19 my

American roommate was shocked by me she

asked where I had learned to speak

English so well and was confused when I

said that Nigeria happened to have

English as its official lang

she asked if she could listen to what

she called my tribal music and was

consequently very disappointed when I

produced my tape of Mariah Carey she

assumed that I did not know how to use a

stove what struck me was this she had

felt sorry for me even before she saw me

had default position toward me as an

African was a kind of patronizing

well-meaning 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 I will say that before I went to

the u.s. I didn't consciously identify

as Africa but in the u.s. whenever

Africa came more people turned to me

never mind that I knew nothing about

places like Namibia but I did come to

embrace the sign new identity and in

many ways I think of myself now as

African although I still get quite

irritable when Africa is referred to as

a country the most recent example being

my otherwise wonderful flight from Lagos

two days ago in which there was an

announcement on the virgin flight about

their charity walk in India Africa and

other countries so after I had spent

some years in the US as an African I

began to understand my roommates

response to me if I had not grown up in

Nigeria and if all I knew about Africa

were from popular images I too would

think that Africa was a place of

beautiful landscapes beautiful animals

and incomprehensible people fighting

senseless wars dying of poverty and AIDS

unable to speak for themselves and

waiting to be saved by a kind white

foreigner I would see Africans in the

same way that I as a child had seen

fides family this single story of Africa

ultimately comes I think from Western

literature now here's a quote from the

writing of a London merchant called John

Locke who sailed to West Africa in

1561 and kept a fascinating account of

his voyage after referring to the black

africans as beasts who have no houses he

writes they are also people without

heads having their mouths and eyes in

their breasts now I've laughed every

time I've read this and one must admire

the imagination of John Locke but what

is important about his writing is that

it represents the beginning of a

tradition of telling African stories in

the West a tradition of sub-saharan

Africa as a place of negatives of

difference of darkness of people who in

the words of the wonderful poet Rudyard

Kipling a half devil half child and so I

began to realize that my American

roommate must have throughout her life

seen and heard different versions of the

single story as had a professor who once

told me that my novel was not

authentically African now I was quite

willing to contend that there were a

number of things wrong with the novel

that it had filled in a number of places

but I had not quite imagined that it had

failed at achieving something called

African authenticity in fact I did not

know what African authenticity was the

professor told me that my characters

were too much like him an educated and

middle class man my characters drove

cars they were not starving therefore

they were not authentically African but

I must quickly add that I too am just as

guilty and the question of the single

story a few years ago I visited Mexico

from the US the political climate in the

u.s. at the time was tense and there

were debates going on about immigration

and as often happens in America

immigration became synonymous with

Mexicans there were endless stories of

Mexicans as people who were fleecing the

health care system sneaking across the

border being arrested at the border that

sort of thing I remember walking around

on my first day in Guadalajara

watching the people going to walk ruling

up to tears in the marketplace looking

laughing I remember first feeling slight

surprise and then I was overwhelmed with

shame I realized that I had been so

immersed in the media coverage of

Mexicans that they had become one thing

in my mind the abject immigrant I had

bought into the single story of Mexicans

and I could not have been more ashamed

of myself so that is how to create a

single story show a people as one thing

as only one thing over and over again

and that is what they become it is

impossible to talk about the single

story without talking about power

there is award an award that I think

about whenever I think about the power

structures of the world and it is

uncanny it's a noun that loosely

translates to to be greater than another

like our economic and political walls

stories too are defined by the principle

of an cali how they are told who tells

them when they are told how many stories

are told are really dependent on power

power is the ability not just to tell

the story of another person but to make

it the definitive story of that person

the palestinian poet will read bad news

he writes that if you want to

dispossessed people the simplest way to

do it is to tell their story and to

start with secondly start the story with

the arrows of the Native Americans and

not with the arrival of the British and

you have an entirely different story

start the story with the failure of the

African states and not with the colonial

creation of the African stage and you

have an entirely different story I

recently spoke at a university where a

student told me that it was such a shame

that Nigerian man was were physical

abusers like the father character in my

novel I told him that I had just read a

novel called American Psycho

and and that it was such a shame that

young Americans were serial murderers

now now

now obviously I said this in a fit of

mild irritation but it would never have

occurred to me to think that just

because I had read a novel in which a

character was a serial killer that he

was somehow representative of all

Americans and now this is not because

I'm a better person than that student

but because of America's cultural and

economic power

I had many stories of America I had red

tile and of Dyke and Steinberg and gate

skill I did not have a single story of

America when I learned some years ago

that writers were expected to have had

really unhappy childhoods to be

successful I began to think about how I

could invent horrible things my parents

had done to me but the truth is that I

had a very happy childhood full of

laughter and love in a very close-knit

family but I also had grandfather's who

died in refugee camps my cousin Polly

died because he could not get adequate

health care one of my closest friends

Oklahoma died in a plane crash because

her fire trucks did not have water

I grew up under oppressive military

governments that devalued education so

that sometimes my parents were not paid

their salaries and so as a child I saw

Jam disappear from the breakfast table

then margarine disappeared then bread

became too expensive then milk became

rationed and most of all a kind of

normalized political fear invaded our

lives all of these stories make me who I

am but to insist on only these negative

stories is to flatten my experience and

to overlook the many other stories that

formed me the single story creates

stereotypes and the problem with

stereotypes is not that they are untrue

but that they are incomplete they make

one story become the only story of

course Africa is a continent full of

catastrophes that immense ones such as

the horrific Greeks in Congo and

depressing ones such as the fact that

5000 people apply for one job vacancy in

Nigeria

but there are other stories that are not

about catastrophe and it's very

important it is just as important to

talk about them I've always felt that it

is impossible to engage properly with

the place or a person without engaging

with all of the stories of that place

and that person the consequence of the

single story is this it robs people of

dignity

it makes our recognition of a equal

humanity difficult if emphasizes how we

are different rather than how we are

similar so what it before my Mexican

trip I had followed the immigration

debate from both sides the US and the

Mexican what if my mother had told us

that fides family was poor and had

walking what if we had an African

television network that broadcast

diverse African stories all over the

world what the Nigerian writer Chino

h-e-b calls a balance of stories what if

my roommate knew about my Nigerian

publisher Mukhtar Bukhari a remarkable

man who left his job in a bank to follow

his dream and start a publishing house

now the conventional wisdom was that

Nigerians don't read literature he

disagreed he felt that people who could

read would read if you made literature

affordable and available to them shortly

after he published my first novel I went

to a TV station in Lagos to do an

interview and a woman who worked there

as a messenger came up to me and said I

really liked your novel I didn't like

the ending now you must write a sequel

and this is what will happen

and she went on to tell me what to write

in the sequel now I was not only charmed

I was very moved here was a woman part

of the ordinary masses of Nigerians who

were not supposed to be readers she had

not only read the book but she had taken

ownership of it and felt justified and

telling me what to write in the sepal

now what if my roommate knew about my

friend for me under a fearless woman who

hosts the TV show in Lagos and is

determined to tell the stories that we

prefer to forget what if my roommate

knew about the heart procedure that was

performed in the legals Hospital last

week what if my roommate knew about

contemporary Nigerian music talented

people singing in English and pigeon and

EMU and Yoruba and I Joe Mixon

influences from jay-z and Fela to Bob

Marley to their grandfathers what if my

roommate knew about the female lawyer

who recently went to court in Nigeria to

challenge a ridiculous law that required

women to get their husbands consent

before renewing their passports what if

my roommate knew about Nollywood full of

innovative people making films despite

great technical odds films so popular

that they really are the best example of

Nigerians consuming what they produce

what if my roommate knew about my

wonderfully ambitious hair braider who

has just started her own business

selling hair extensions all about the

millions of other Nigerians who start

businesses and sometimes feel but

continue to nurse ambition every time I

am home I'm confronted with the usual

sources of irritation for most Nigerians

our field infrastructure our field

government but also by the incredible

resilience of people who thrive despite

the government rather than because of it

I teach writing workshops in Lagos every

summer and it is amazing to me how many

people apply how many people are eager

to write to tell stories my Nigerian

publisher and I have just started a

nonprofit called Farah FINA trust and we

have big dreams of building libraries

and refurbishing libraries that already

exist and providing books

state schools that don't have anything

in their libraries and also of

organizing lots and lots of workshops

and reading and writing for all the

people who are eager to tell are many

stories stories matter many stories

matter stories have been used to dis

possess and to malign but stories can

also be used to empower and to humanize

stories can break the dignity of the

people but stories can also repair that

broken dignity the American writer Alice

Walker wrote this about them her

southern relatives who had moved to the

north and she introduced them to a book

about the southern life that they had

left behind they sat around reading the

book themselves listening to me with the

book and the kind of paradise was

regained I would like to end with this

thought that when we reject the single

story when we realize that there is

never a single story about any place we

regain a kind of paradise thank you

[Applause]