Africa is a whole Continent, not a page out of ‘Tarzan’
By Krys Ochia
The Oregonian ran an article in January on a white Zimbabwean doctor who was charged with causing the deaths of some of his black patients.
The article then digressed to discuss the country’s land-reform efforts, including how the government was turning over white-owned farms to landless black peasants. The article presented the black African country as basically hostile to Zimbabwean whites. Ultimately, the reader’s attention was focused on the country’s politico-economic conditions.
As demonstrated by one published response to the article, the Oregonian should be applauded for raising controversies related to an African country, its people for economic maturity.
When I migrated to this country from West Africa in the mid-70’s, some students at UtahState, the university I attended, were curious about the mode of transportation I had used. They wanted to know if I had ever ridden in a car or seen an airplane.
They were thrilled that I was fluent in the English language. As far as they were concerned, having descended from the treetops where my family lived to stay away from wild animals, I must be extraordinarily intelligent to speak and understand American English upon my arrival in New York.
What was certainly evident was the limited knowledge, perhaps heavily tainted by doses of Tarzan television episodes, these college students had of Africa. To them Africa must be inhabited by savages who wear loin cloths and forage for food.
The educational system has contributed to the limited knowledge of the African continent and its inhabitants. Some of the biases over time have been accepted by the public as fact, and some media coverage continue to propagate them through the use of inappropriate visual images or articles.
Another recent story in the Oregonian labeled traditional healers in Africa as “witch doctors” and the American who was apprenticing in Swaziland was described as responding to African, not Swazi spirits.
In many African countries, non Western-educated healers are actually referred to as “native doctors,” because the word “witch” has a negative connotation. These “doctors,” or traditional healers, fill an invaluable niche in countries with chronic shortages of Western-trained doctors and modern medicine, The naturally occurring ingredients used by most of them are not different from those harvested, chemically treated and bottled or engineered into capsules or formulated into tablets and sold in Western pharmacies.
Until recently, not very many high school students and adults realized that Africa is not a country. To many Africa is synonymous with Kenya and safari and people always visited “Africa” even though they might have visited a single African country.
Even today, people still ask me if I am from Africa. This may be equivalent to referring to a Canadian or a Brazilian as plain American. When I respond that I am not from Africa, but from Nigeria they are astounded.
My response is an attempt to debunk the myth that Africa is a village state. Appearing intelligent, these people try to reveal their knowledge of African geography by guessing that Nigerian must be close to Algeria or Liberia or any other African country featured lately in the news. I am usually amused.
To assist the media in its work, a number of us have formed Africa in the Mass Media – with representatives from Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Uganda and Zimbabwe – to educate the public and correct erroneous or misleading information related to the nations of Africa and their people.
Africa is a whole continent, not a page out of ‘Tarzan’
- Who wrote the story?
- By reading the title, what do you think the article is about?
- From paragraph 2, what do the following words mean?
- Digressed
- Politico-Economic
- When and from where did the author come from?
- What were the students at UtahState curious about? (From the Author)
- What does the author think that the America’s impression of Africa is? (paragraph 6)
- What did a recent story in The Oregonian label traditional healers as?
- Why are these Natives Doctors so valuable to many parts of Africa?
- Compare the cures the Native Doctors use with Western Medicine.
- The author felt that high school students and many adults did not realize that Africa was a ______and not a ______.
- What do you think the author meant by the term “VillageState”?
- Do you think the author makes some legitimate points? Why?