Things Fall Apart: The Loss of a Tribe's Livelihood
In Things Fall Apart we witnessed the destruction of a traditional native culture. More specifically we witnessed the challenge and weakening of Igbo spirituality, as well as the death of the tribe's livelihood. The apparent cause can be found in a seemingly good intended mission acting as a gateway for the intrusion of a foreign government, and its quest to conquer and domesticate a self-sustaining, prosperous culture. Although the Igbo downfall was caused primarily by the invasion of "Christian missionaries," their own religious doctrine and passivity played a significant role in allowing the initial infiltration of an alien religion, and the final dissolution of a once prosperous culture.
It is also critical to consider if this downfall could have been prevented or channeled to produce a positive outcome. History tends to repeat itself within specific cultures, and this is possibly the most valuable tool we can harness to provide us a means of escaping the destruction of the mistakes we have made in the past.
In Things Fall Apart the Igbo village Umuofia fell apart in two distinct fashions. The first aspect of Igbo culture to break down was the village's spirituality, which was led by the arrival of the Christian mission. Second, this mission acted as a channel to allow a new government to infiltrate Umuofia and challenge the laws and customs that held together the former Igbo way of life.
Igbo spirituality weakened in two waves. First Christianity provided answers that the inhabitants of Umuofia and Mbanta were seeking. At the end of Part One Obierika's thoughts are expressed:
Obierika was a man who thought about things. When the will of the goddess h...
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...ent the total destruction of Umuofia, it is important to remember that it is impossible for societies to stay static. Our world is growing at an exponential rate and it is inevitable that the boundaries of different cultures will someday overlap; but perhaps it is not really a loss after all. In Chinua Achebe's words:
. . . the world is changing so fast around us, and a lot of it we are not in control of, but what we do control I think we should think about seriously. . . . Where one story stands, bring another one to stand beside it, and if that's a better story, then it should displace the bad one. I think that's the way it should be. If on the other hand, it is necessary to have the two of them side by side, then you don't lose anything. (Interview with Rob Baker and Ellen Draper)
Works Cited:
Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. Oxford: Heinemann, 1986.
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Chinua Achebe's 1959 novel, Things fall Apart, takes place in the 1890s, just before British colonization. The novel focuses on the nine Ibo-speaking villages of Umuofia, which is Ibo for "People of the Forest." Umuofia is the village in which Okonkwo, Achebe's protagonist, prospers in everything and is able to secure his manly position in the tribe. Now known as Nigeria, this land was a primitive agricultural society completely run by men. Umuofia was known, and as Achebe says, ."..feared by all it's neighbors. It was powerful in war and in magic, and priests and medicine men were feared in all the surrounding country" (11). Perhaps, its most powerful and feared magic was called .".. agadi- nwayi, or old woman it had its shrine in the centre of Umuofia ... if anyone was so foolhardy as to pass by the shrine past dusk he was sure to see the old woman"(12). The people of Umuofia are very devoted to their religion and their magic. These ancient beliefs were believed to give the people some sort of power over their oppressors.
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Through out the novel Thing Fall Apart, there are many situations have shown societal changes, and those changes always have influences to the characters. One of the specific societal change presented in the novel is the arrival of the white men and Christianity in Umuofia. White men and Christianity missionaries have arrived Umuofia and started to expand their religion. The arrival of Christianity and white men is consider as a societal change because the white men and the new religion have a lot of influence in Umuofia, they trade, built church, school and hospital, they also debates and discuss about religious with the local citizens. Many local citizens, like Okonkwo, rejected white man and Christianity at the first place, they even killed the white man who was the first one to arrive the clan. But slowly they
Things Fall Apart - White Missionaries Caused Umofia to Fall Apart Faith has always been a guiding force in man's life. Chinua Achebe's novel Things Fall Apart is a story that describes the effects of a new Christian religion in a tribal village in Africa. The tribe has their own language, known as Obi, a dignified culture and a value system that has continued for many years as they traced back into their ancestry. Yet, the snares are still there.
Both pieces of literature present the ways cultures can break apart both from within and from outside forces. In Things Fall Apart, the Igbo tribes have a strong culture and tradition, working together to produce crops, trade currency, and form agreements. When the European missionaries come to Umuofia, they spark a divide between the villagers and the cultural traditions that the Igbo have embraced for centuries. The Igbo perform many ceremonies to worship and respect the gods in their culture. When the missionaries come to the villages, they tell stories of one true god that rules over all life. This confuses many members of the community and leads them to look into the new religion. he Igbo start to choose whether they wish to continue to follow their culture and or embrace the new Christianity that has been presented by the missionaries. This provides evidence that it is the force of the white missionaries coming from outside that leads to the dividing and breaking up of their culture. The action of choosing one side over the other creates the consequence of mistrust between age-old traditionalists and the new-age converts. This places families, friends, and neighbors in a cultural divide based on what they believe in. This situation
This shows significance in two ways, in that Jesus had power over the demons even though he knew not their names and in the fact that this is not only one demon of Satan’s work, but a whole army.
In the face of change the strongest of traditions will struggle to grow and mature in order to survive. Things Fall Apart depicts how the introduction of intolerance and lack of understanding in society deconstructs a thriving, well functioning culture. As the culture and traditions of Umuofia is unchanged it
The friendship of utility is described as a shallow one that can be “easily dissolved”. He views them like this because he states this type of friendship is easily lost. The only true reason these relationships exist according to Aristotle is the idea that both or one of the people has something to offer that the other needs. The bond between the two people is held as long as it is beneficial to either one or both of the individuals in the friendship. So although the people may smile at each other or make small talk if they happen to run across each other’s path, no true relationship is present. If the bond is broken and one or both individuals are no longer being benefitted through the relationship, it ends. I agree with Aristotle’s idea of this specific type of friendship. The utility friendship appears to be just a normal acquaintance. In that case, that leaves a wide number of people this encompasses. There will be a massive amount of utility friendships one will obtain in his or her lifetime d...
As the English began to colonize the Igbo society, there were few natives who opposed it, they others just felt that the English would come and go, but they were wrong. Soon, the English began to introduce "white man's religion." This new religion was completely the opposite from what the natives were accustomed to. Christianity was rather intriguing to many of the natives and many of them turned away from their families and everything they were to become a member of this new religion. Before this, they natives had been very superstious, but as they new religion flooded over the peoples, their superstiousocity began to lessen and their belief in the many gods they had previously believed in.
many brutal wars, such as the Crusades, yet also founded many hospitals and charities, proving it difficult to categorize religion as a positive or negative influence. Author Chinua Achebe acknowledges this debate in his novel Things Fall Apart. This novel takes place in Nigeria during the late 19th century and shows the Ibo tribe’s transformation after Christian missionaries arrive. Achebe suggests that Christianity can guide a society by including outcasts but can also destroy a society by breaking family values and establishing schools.
When the missionaries arrived in Mbanta, the mother land of Okonkwo, they did not achieve their goal of convincing people at the first time. They talked about the new and only God and tried to persuade the Igbo that they had been worshipping the false Gods of wood and stone (145), but the Igbo only thought that they were mad, some even went away while the missionaries were speaking. However, the strangeness of those missionaries and the new religion somehow attracted the Igbo:
There are many themes evident throughout Things Fall Apart, but one of the most prominent is the struggle between change and tradition, in the sense that some people change, but others don’t. Nwoye’s callow mind was greatly puzzled” (Achebe 89). Nwoye finds the missionaries hymn soothing, but it leaves him more confused about what he believes. Nwoye finally finds the courage to convert after a violent encounter with Okonkwo, “He went back to the church and told Mr. Kiaga that he had decided to go to Umuofia where the white missionary had set up a school to teach young Christians to read and write” (Achebe 93).