Throughout history there have been many instances where opposing cultures have been involved in wars due to miscommunication. It is evident through past events that conflict is avoidable through communication and negotiations to understand issues that may be present. Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart illustrates the importance of communicating well with one’s associates or peers. Achebe highlights the value of the Ibo to prove that communication between cultures limits the risk of societal clashes.
When cultures fail to acquaint themselves with foreign or unfamiliar cultures before making assumptions regarding their intentions the risk of calamities is significantly higher as a result of the lack of understanding. In the Ibo culture, it is customary for many people to be familiar with most, if not all of the clans in their region, therefore it is highly unsettling for the Abame tribe to meet by a strange white man riding into their land on his iron horse. The tribesman killed the strange …show more content…
There are specific crimes in the Ibo culture that are inexcusable and too heinous to even think of. One of the men that had converted to Christianity, Enoch, was so hell-bent on proving that he had renounced anything to do with the Ibo that he committed the greatest crime known to the Ibo. “One of the greatest crimes a man could commit was to unmask an egwugwu in public… and this is what Enoch did… Enoch had killed an ancestral spirit, and Umuofia was thrown into confusion,” (Achebe 186). The unmasking of the egwugwu was the final chance the Ibo were willing to give to these Christian intruders, and therefore they decided to force them to tear down the church because of the evils is brought upon the village. The miscommunication between the cultures is indisputable at the time due to the glaring confusion regarding the true intentions of each religion due to the
When cultures fail to acquaint themselves with foreign or unfamiliar cultures before making assumptions regarding their intentions the risk of calamities is significantly higher as a result of the lack of understanding. In the Ibo culture, it is customary for many people to be familiar with most, if not all of the clans in their region, therefore it is highly unsettling for the Abame tribe to meet by a strange white man riding into their land on his iron horse. The tribesman killed the strange …show more content…
There are specific crimes in the Ibo culture that are inexcusable and too heinous to even think of. One of the men that had converted to Christianity, Enoch, was so hell-bent on proving that he had renounced anything to do with the Ibo that he committed the greatest crime known to the Ibo. “One of the greatest crimes a man could commit was to unmask an egwugwu in public… and this is what Enoch did… Enoch had killed an ancestral spirit, and Umuofia was thrown into confusion,” (Achebe 186). The unmasking of the egwugwu was the final chance the Ibo were willing to give to these Christian intruders, and therefore they decided to force them to tear down the church because of the evils is brought upon the village. The miscommunication between the cultures is indisputable at the time due to the glaring confusion regarding the true intentions of each religion due to the