Re-thinking Africa
In my African Philosophy lecture today I was made aware of something that I never thought I suffered from. Our lecturer gave us an exercise to do. She asked to take a piece of paper and write down , without thinking, the first 5 things that came to mind about Africa; and the first 5 things that came to mind about Europe. The results were a big surprise! In a class of about 6 students doing their Masters in African Studies, we were all guilty of seeing Africa in a negative light. Some of the words that came up were ones you would expect from people outside of Africa, who have only been exposed to Africa through media accounts about the continent. This made me realize that even though as Africans we know better, the way in which Africa is constantly portrayed has led to our minds being colonized and in us looking at Africa through western viewpoint. What was even more amazing to me was that I had this white Afrikaans woman, telling me, no correction, showing me that my mi...