Achebe "On Nigeria" contd

G. Pascal Zachary on the 'The Oracle of Africa'

While Achebe criticizes Western thinkers on Africa, he also sets himself apart from other African intellectuals by his complex stance toward the Christianization of his people. The Igbo are among the most fervent Catholics in Africa, and evangelical Christianity is also strong among them. Achebe’s own father was enlisted by Anglican missionaries to convert other “natives,” and Achebe himself benefited from the schools established by foreigners. Yet he remains alive to the damage done by Christianity and relishes how traditional spiritual beliefs persist among Igbo and other Africans.

The critiques of the colonial and the Christian legacies in Africa come together in Achebe’s powerful indictment against Western do-gooders who, he asserts, demean and diminish Africans in their pursuit of helping them. “Lurid and degrading stereotypes,” he writes, are invoked by aid workers, humanitarians and missionaries in order to drum sympathy for African causes. Yet by “dehumanizing the sufferer,” advocates of assistance for Africa, abetted by international media and Hollywood, promote corrosive stereotypes that drown out authentic African voices.