Colonialism in Things Fall Apart

Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart chronicles the impact of British colonialism on Africans, particularly Nigeria and Igbo society. The era the novel illustrates extends from the late 1800s and the initial days of contact to wholesale British rule of the state. Achebe's work details how an alien and foreign culture will rip apart and destroy the values and customs of a conquered people. In this specific case, it will demonstrate how the Christian values of the British will destroy the rooted and traditional values of the Ibo people. The novel expresses how often an Imperial power will impose its values and norms on an oppressed people, positing the conquered as the evil or savage "other" whose traditional values and norms must be destroyed. We might say that such a justification or viewpoint is being illustrated by the Bush Administration's belief that the traditional values and norms of Arab cultures in the Middle East must be abolished in favor of superior Western values and norms. However, Achebe does not paint either the British all black or the Ibo all white. Instead, he attempts to show that the values, customs and norms destroyed by the British were not some "savage" or "evil" practices, but valuable and valid parts of the Ibo making sense of their world before things would fall apart.

Things Fall Apart depicts the falling apart of the stateless society of the Igbo people. This society has developed over many years and mirrors the environment in which it lives.

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ystem when they are imposed on a people. Achebe provides us with the values of the Igbo, particularly the best and brightest example of their culture, Okonkwo. Achebe tells us that Okonkwo is "tall and huge" and breathes so powerfully while asleep his wives and children hear him in their outhouses (Achebe 1990, 3). Okonkwo's fame rests upon his solid achievements. Such achievements reflect the social, cultural, and ethical values of his people and not those of the white colonizers. While his kind might seem like savage barbarians to the white colonials, he has achieved great things according to the measures and norms of his people. He has won fame as a wrestler, is a wealthy farmer with two barns full of yams, supports three wives, and is the owner of two titles won from strength and courage during inter-tribal warfare (Achebe 1990, 7-8). Okonkwo is Achebe's literary embodiment of a majority of the main values of his clan. He exhibits courage, industry, dignity, and material success. This is hardly the image of the Igbo natives had by the colonials. The European valuation of the Igbo values and norms was negative and Imperialistic. One of Achebe's main points is that colonial powers often tend to view conquered people et

Category: Literature - C