This is Africa: useful mantra or ugly prejudice?
This is Africa: useful mantra or ugly prejudice?
"This is africa" or TIA is used to dismiss a number of inconvenience, but maintains its occasional use of harmful stereotypes?
Africa has more than any other continent a PR problem. Popular culture tells the West that Africa is a country of conflicts and famines in which progress is slow and corruption is widespread. Even the "better" half of Africa is full of clichés: the huge red sun, open savanna and fearsome tribes in local robes.
The most widespread cliché may be wrapped in a snappy nickname: "This is Africa" or its reduction form TIA.
tia is used by Africans and non-Africans equally as a word word and resignation sigh. It is used to ignore a number of inconvenience, from power outages and road work to general inefficiency, annoying bureaucracy and questionable ethics. Tia is an instruction to swim with the electricity, to take a chill pill, sit down and relax, because hey, that happens in Africa.
alt = “This is africa”> Atlas & Boots Tia is used to dismiss poor infrastructure and general inefficiency
During our month in Ethiopia we heard "This is africa" several times to explain power outages, delays and general confusion at a low level.
We used it more than once to calm each other down in stressful times (many of which existed). TIA has its benefit as a calming mantra, but it is fair to ask whether the term is reducing.
Africa is still widely perceived as a homogeneous unit today. The Kenyan author and journalist Binyavanga Wainaina satirizes this wonderfully in his essay how to write about Africa: "Treat Africa as if it were a country. It is hot and dusty with hilly grasslands and huge animal herds and large, thin people who are hungry. exact descriptions. ”
There were websites, apps and Twitter accounts that challenged experts, treating Africa as a single country-but even Africans recognize that Africa has a whole problem.
I in Africa: Why don't we get it, what is going on with us, why are we like that?
I everywhere else: Africa is not a country, damn it is a continent of nations that completely differ in color and language, to be precise, this reductive imperialism is the root of all of our suffering https://t.co/24xlc0sth
- Nesrine Malik (@nesrinemalik) December 13, 2017
nesrine Malik's suffering was repeated by several people on our travels, most of which had founded or tried this in African countries.
Haile, a hotelier from Gonder, Ethiopia, explained the temporary lack of electricity, hot water and WiFi with a sad smile and "This is africa".
camie, a businessman based in Dschibuti, informed us that the Dschibutian government recently lifted its visa-on-arrival option for tourists. The cancellation took five days for angry local business people to lift them. These five days happened to come together with an international trade fair to strengthen the country's economy. Camie plug with her shoulders. "This is Africa."
tia probably synthesized an accepted truth. It is a calming mantra and a knowing allusion to the current state of affairs, but keeps its use in such a casual stereotypical?
Yes, say several luminaries. TIA has a number of negative consequences that are worth examining.
tia promotes negative stereotypes
Jacqueline Muna Musiitwa, founder and managing partner of the Hoja Law Group in Rwanda, says: "Although I surround myself with Afro optimists, I have never heard of a positive connection. As such, it is immortalized by Africa."
"Africa for norway" gently mocked stereotypes about Africa
The lawyer and activist Rosalia Gitau agrees: “Since the live AID movement has conquered the hearts and wallets of the people in the western world, the pale-faced Ethiopian child has become a symbol of Africa: exotic and victim. But Africa is so much more than that. The continent houses a variety of languages, cultures, skin colors, Stories, ambitions, dreams and future. ”
tia hinders the human connection
The author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie says that throwing all African nations hindered human connection. In her Ted Talk in 2009 she shared her experiences with studying in the USA as a teenager: "My American roommate was shocked by me. She asked where I learned English so well and was confused when I said that Nigeria happened to have English as an official language."
alt = “The author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie was asked how she got to speak English (her country's official language).”> Ted; Fair use The author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie warned of the dangers of a "single story"
Adichie explains: “What struck me was the following: she was pity with me, even before she saw me. Her standard attitude towards me as African was a kind of condescending, well -meaning pity. My roommate had a single story of Africa: In this only story, there was no way that Africans are in any way similar, no way of feelings than Pity, no possibility of a connection as a person at eye level. ”
Adichie concludes: "Of course Africa is a continent full of disasters ... but there are other stories that do not act from disasters, and it is very important to talk about it."
tia influences the economy
tia or the way of thinking it represents can harm the stable countries of the continent. If a civil war breaks in the Democratic Republic of Congo, this can have an impact on tourism in countries as far away as Senegal and Swasiland.
If Ebola is found in Guinea, this can affect the number of visitors in Botswana and Namibia. The fusion of 54 different nations means that they are unfairly connected - in good and bad.
tia creates apathy
Rosalia Gitau says Tia Apathie creates. On the subject of corruption, she says: "[It is] a global crime. It affects everyone, everywhere, everywhere. Black, white, woman, man, rich or arm - corruption is a real equality.
But why is corruption so universal, even though we don't know what it is? Because we give him euphemist expressions such as "This is life" or "C’est la vie" or tia. We assume that people do things by "cutting some corners", "lubricating some hands" or "looking in the other direction". This social apathy and the names associated with it must now stop. ”
Jacqueline Muna Musiitwa agrees: “Africa changes quickly and the idea of TIA hinders the intellectual development of these changes. How can you expect changes to occur if you constantly repeat a vote of no confidence by expecting the worst or expressing a shock if the worst does not occur?
> Atlas & Boots tia: "How can you expect changes if you constantly repeat a vote of no confidence?"
The revered British writer and critic AA Gill once said: "You understand Africa or you don't understand it" as if the continent exists to serve a specific purpose instead of just existing. At Atlas & Boots, we have (very simple) (very simple). We loved Mauritius, but hated Morocco. Egypt was fun, Tunisia too, and both were different from Kenya and Tanzania.
Maybe it's not about whether you understand Africa or not; Maybe it is because there is no Africa.
Mission statement: Dreamstime
.