Born and raised in a middle class Nigerian family, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is the author of many novels and short stories; she is also the author of the TED Talk “The Danger of a Single Story”. Adichie details her experience with single stories and how they fail to represent groups accurately. Adichie shows her audience, fellow authors and journalists, that associating individuals with a singular story, or a singular stereotype, isn’t enough to describe an individual and all their experiences. Adichie shows her audience through her specific word choice, personal experiences, and historical evidence. Adichie was a reader and writer from an early age; she read mostly British and American children’s books. These books contained “characters [that]
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Adichie admits to only hearing about “how poor they were”, and how she didn't associate any other possible attributes to Fide’s family. Eventually, when Adichie finally met Fide’s family and was shown a wonderfully patterned basket, she was startled. She explains that it “had become impossible for [her] to see them as anything else but poor” and “their poverty was [her] single story of them”. By labeling Fide’s family as poor, it became hard for Adichie to characterize Fide and his family as anything other than poor. Adichie includes this personal story to show the audience her first experience associating a group with a singular …show more content…
Her roommate surprised her with questions; “where [she] had learned to speak English so well” and “if she could listen to what she called [Adichie’s] ‘tribal music’”. Adichie describes her roommate’s position toward her as “kind of patronizing”, but admits that she understood “[her] roommate's response to her”. She even confesses that if she was not born in Nigeria, she would think Africa is just full of “incomprehensible people, fighting senseless wars, [and] dying of poverty and AIDS”. She would have associated Africa with a single story just as she had with Fide’s family. However, Adichie knows that there is more to Africa than poor people and terrible conditions; she knows that associating all Africans with this stereotype doesn't Adichie included this in her literary narrative to explain the the audience her first experience being associated with a singular
Adichie admits to only hearing about “how poor they were”, and how she didn't associate any other possible attributes to Fide’s family. Eventually, when Adichie finally met Fide’s family and was shown a wonderfully patterned basket, she was startled. She explains that it “had become impossible for [her] to see them as anything else but poor” and “their poverty was [her] single story of them”. By labeling Fide’s family as poor, it became hard for Adichie to characterize Fide and his family as anything other than poor. Adichie includes this personal story to show the audience her first experience associating a group with a singular …show more content…
Her roommate surprised her with questions; “where [she] had learned to speak English so well” and “if she could listen to what she called [Adichie’s] ‘tribal music’”. Adichie describes her roommate’s position toward her as “kind of patronizing”, but admits that she understood “[her] roommate's response to her”. She even confesses that if she was not born in Nigeria, she would think Africa is just full of “incomprehensible people, fighting senseless wars, [and] dying of poverty and AIDS”. She would have associated Africa with a single story just as she had with Fide’s family. However, Adichie knows that there is more to Africa than poor people and terrible conditions; she knows that associating all Africans with this stereotype doesn't Adichie included this in her literary narrative to explain the the audience her first experience being associated with a singular