Thursday, January 28, 2016
The Danger of Single Stories
Chimamanda Adichie sites a number of examples of single stories that she was presented with as a child. Are you aware of any single stories that you have encountered in your own life? Stories that make it seem like everyone has the same experience but you realize that the story isn't as accurate as it seems? If so, what was that realization like? If not, was it difficult to imagine what Adichie was describing? This is an open forum so feel free to share as much as you're comfortable sharing.
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At first, it was difficult for me to relate to the concept of Chimamanda’s “single stories.” My first glance at this blog assignment had me racking my conscience for how I could possibly define my “single story,” how people had ever wrongly perceived me, or how I have been the object of snap-judgments. I realized that while of course, everyone has been the victim of another’s single story about them, the primary single stories I’m affected by are the ones that I buy into or create. I love Chimamanda’s musings about how we could change our single stories just by opening our minds a tiny bit more. It takes so little effort to wait for an actual, authentic experience with a person before buying into a single story of that culture, family, or person. I am not innocent in any regard to having been one to believe or create my own single stories. I don’t think that anyone is innocent in such a regard. Single stories are everywhere and so hard to escape. I could easily relate to the story about Chimamanda’s roommate as I probably would have had the same reaction as she did. I don’t give much daily thought to what I consider “third-world” continents such as Africa and countries. As Chimamanda says, the single story is so dangerous. It hurts other people and it’s detrimental to the imagination and open-mindedness of its host. After hearing this talk and really taking in Chimamanda’s words, I realized that firstly, she is an incredibly profound and deep person with amazing insights, but also, everything is relative. I live and we all live in relation to our own single stories about ourselves and others. I admire Chimamanda so much for recognizing her own participation in taking part in single stories, for seeing the way out of them, and for shutting down the ones about her culture.
ReplyDeleteAdichie talked a lot about single stories in this TED Talk, and how we can’t judge, or create an image of a country or people based off of a single story. I think that this idea of single story can definitely be applied to my life, I have at times thought of places or people based on things I have heard about. Like Adichie said I look back and feel bad about making these assumptions especially after I learned that the place or people weren’t like what I thought. Listening to her talking about this definitely helps me open my eyes and realize that I do this everyday, but sometimes on a much smaller scale. Daily if I hear a story of something someone did I think to myself that that person is always like that, and to watch out for them doing that again, which is not realistic and not fair at all. I really liked watching the video because I felt like I was able to connect to Adichie’s very different life, and I was able to learn a lot about her. Also like Anna said I also admire Adichie for seeing that she also contributes to single stories, and is not proud of that.
ReplyDeleteI have definitely encountered lots of ‘single stories’ about other people or groups of people in my life. I’ve also experienced people’s reactions toward me when they realize that I am more complex than what they heard about me. I think it is just a matter of ignorance, and I don’t mean that with a negative connotation. It’s not possible to be informed about everything that is happening in the world, and a lot of times (probably more often than we think), a single stereotype is all we know about a person or a place. This eclipses the other information that exists about the topic because we are satisfied with knowing just this ‘single story’. This can lead to surprise when confronted with a more complex scenario. I believe that this is completely fine. It’s not reasonable to expect a person to be educated thoroughly on a wide range of topics, but this is where adaptation and education is key. When exposed to this kind of situation, an effort needs to be made to learn the other ‘stories’ about the person, so that you can form a holistic point of view in which you see the other person as a human and not a harmful stereotype.
ReplyDeleteMy experience with Adichie "single stories" are racial stereotypes. My childhood are the high school comedies or animated series which always feature a sassy, fashionable and most of the time, mean blond girl as the antagonist. A nerdy Asian who wear a pair of thick glasses and endless, creepy passion for technology and math. The black character would always be best friend with the main character, a white person, talkative, good at sports. Moreover, the influence of newspaper and media also shaped in our head a "general" look at particular nations and continents in the world. As mentioned in the TED talk, it's amazing to recognize how much I can relate her words to myself. Coming to Choate, I've entered a major cultural shock by the amount of people that go against the "status quo" in my head. I've met Asian who isn't interested in Science but rather a talented singer and artist. On the contrary, there are white people who, instead of carrying on and on about their social life like in the movie, are actually diligent, passionate people. Black people do poetries and theater. I've just overwhelmed by the actual diversity coming from the other side of the "single story" in my head. We made snap judgements when we encountered someone based solely on their race and nationality and made inaccurate or sometimes hurtful assumptions to others about their abilities. I found Adichie insights extremely valuable for everyone to understand and learn from. Stereotypes can't be completely erased in a day, it's something that has been so deeply grained in our mind and society. However, by opening to other and sharing our stories, we can gradually create our opposite version of this "single story".
ReplyDeleteWhile I was watching Adichi's "The Danger of a Single Story" a podcast I used to listed to was brought to mind. Called "Snap Judgement", hosted by Gynn Washington since 2010. The whole premise of the show is to tell stories that at first may seem like one thing when in fact they are something else entirely. A lot of the snap-judgements I make, or the single-stories that I create, have to do with just the everyday things, the everyday people, the everyday situations. The whole idea of snap-judgement, or the single-story idea, is that you make a quick assumption and then proceed based on that. While in some situations that is fine, it may even be warranted, people tend to be far more complex than any unilateral story you could dream up for them. In my experience, every time you create a single-story in your head, you are just setting yourself up for being proved wrong.
ReplyDelete-Eilidh Dunsmore
While I was watching Adichie's "The danger of the single story", I could relate to the concept of a single story. These stories that were of me, were not made by me but for me. Growing up, I was always the odd one out but because of my race or something like that. I never really "fit in" in the sense that I was always the one that liked reading and writing and knew what I wanted in the future. This notion was foreign to most kid my age. I was always the one you would go to for help or the one that could answer all the questions. Many kids had lost hope so young but losing hope was never part of my plan in life. Because of the race, many doubted me. I guess it was good to be oblivious as a kid. It helped me envision my future and surpass peoples expectations of me. Something that Adichie said was how important it is to have many stories. I agree with this because no human being just has one. We are so complex, the sum of our stories is not possible to tally.
ReplyDeleteIn the past, I have been exposed to single stories about different identifiers of groups of people. Although I will not be sharing specifically what they were, I vividly remember what it felt like to realize that I was applying those single stories to those groups of people. Simply put, I empathize with Adichie: I was enormously ashamed. However, once you find out that you are contributing to the propagation of single stories, I don't think it's right to just stop, mope, and feel bad about it. Simply the fact that you have recognized that this sort of thing is happening is the first step to stopping it - and I think that this first step is the hardest to make. As for dealing with this issue, I agree with Anna that we could eliminate single stories by being more accepting to new ideas. It is profound how much can change when you take some time to get to know a person or culture, and it also surprises me that people don't make the effort to do this. Even though it takes so little to make such a big difference, it's saddening how often people can take a single story as the sole identifying trait of anything just because it's easier to do it that way, or they don't want to bother with taking it one step further. As Sarah mentioned, taking that step further and making an effort are keys in avoiding stereotypes and building detailed and accurate stories about a person or culture.
ReplyDeleteI could to relate to Chimamanda Adichie to having encountering a single story and being guilty of believing in some of them. As an Asian American, I have lived where people make assumptions about me when they don’t know me at all. I went to a small predominately white school for nine years before coming to Choate. There was one other Asian girl in my grade who was one of my first friends. I clearly remember kids asking why I didn’t have an accent, or why my first name wasn’t Chinese. Perhaps the worst was when I told them I went to China, and someone asked me if I have ever eaten dog before. I told my classmate, who had never been to China, that people didn’t eat dogs there. He told me that he heard stories in the news that people ate dog there. I don’t blame my classmates for asking these questions; we believed what we were told. Thankfully it stopped as my classmates and I grew older. An unintended consequence from my classmates’ questions was that I was ashamed of being Chinese. I tried to make myself the more “American” as I grew up. I was worried people would judge me for it so I tried to separate myself from my culture. Since coming to Choate, I have embraced the fact that I am Asian American. I have also encountered single stories in my own mind that I am ashamed of. It’s human instinct that when you see someone you immediately have assumptions about that person based on their race, gender, appearance, etc. We can’t stop human instinct, but we can chose not to act upon our judgments.
ReplyDeleteI really really like the Ted talk that we watched last night. Because I had never thought about the power of a single story, but I believe in it. We base a lot of things off of only hearing one side of the story, or one part of the story. We need to remember that just because you don't hear about something it doesn't mean it's untrue. And that is difficult to do sometimes because like Chimamanda said about only reading American and British books, it is difficult to find the other stories. It takes a little more work to gain other perspectives. Whether or not that means researching a bit more or just being open to other sides of the story. When I read the blog topic I immediately started to try and come up with examples that related to my life. It is much more difficult to do than I thought. I feel like I had the same view of Africa as Chimamanda Adichie’s roommate, until I saw this Ted talk. One of the other big examples that I could think of is the fact that my family members are democrats. And so are most of my family's friends. All I have heard since I was born is that Republicans are bad and democrats are good. I have tried to not cement those facts in my head because I don't know the other side of the story but it is difficult to not believe that when that's what has been told to me since I was little. I say that I am a democrat but maybe later on in my life I will change my mind. There could be many more but one of the things with single stories is that it's hard to know if you only have a single story because most people don't try to do this on purpose.
ReplyDeleteNicola Sommers
Many single stories have been shared about me and through me. What i mean by this, is that i use to be judged and stereotyped, and i also returned the favor. In my community back home, that's just how it was. As a black student, you were suppose to be good at sports and not care about academics. You were suppose to be the class clown, and the person to hang out with. I fell into some of those assumptions but also cared about my academics. My parents always strived for me to do good in what i cared about. So in sports i also cared and was very good. As i got older my group of friends, comprised of whites and blacks, were identified as certain things. For example, if i told my white friend, you can't jump or you can't dance or you have money, it was totally ok. They didn't find it offensive. This was my short story prior to coming to Choate. Now another one is in the making. This one more positive, diverse, and knowledgeable. Chimamanda inspired me to tell my story.
ReplyDeleteI could relate to Chimamanda Adichie to having encountering a single story. In Thailand, I have never been judged or looked down upon because of my race. When I moved to America to attend a school called Choate, the way I see myself changed. People question me why I speak English so well because I came from Thailand. They asked me why my name is Pinn, and whether I was named after a pin or not. They asked me if I was on financial aid because I came from Thailand. I once complained to my friends that my grammar is really bad and they said, “yeah, it is understandable, you come from Thailand.” Someone came up to me and asked whether I ride elephants to school or not. Sometimes, I wish I had never told them where I came from or my real name. Coming from a ‘third world’ country makes me feel like an outsider, and that I don’t belong. From the western media, Thailand is seen as a poor country. I have seen many pictures and news in America about Thailand featuring: gaunt skinny kids, farmers plowing the land, beggars on the streets, and bombs in Thailand. Before I moved to Choate, I never saw Thailand in that way. I believe that like any other country there are beggars and homeless people in the streets. There was a bomb that exploded last year and killed several lives, however the western media focuses on that particular event making Thailand seem like an un-peaceful country. Coming from a third world country is not easy. I understand that people are curious and ask those question unintended to offend me. Sometimes I am afraid of being judged if I say something wrong in class. But I have to accept who I am as a person. I was given the name Pinn, which came from Papin. Papin means luck in Thai. Despite what others think of me and other third world country kids, we can’t change where we come from or our skin color or the way people think of us. I know that people are sometimes prejudice without even realizing, and I don’t blame them for it. I’m glad that coming to Choate, away from home, had opened my eyes and ears about the reality of the world.
ReplyDeleteI cannot personally relate so strongly to what Chimamanda had to say, but I very much agree that people look at others as a single story. Not viewing people based in stereotypes is difficult to do, especially when preconceived notions are embedded in our society. Coming to Choate has really allowed me to start to not judge people by where there are from or what they look like, as here no two people are the same. The only two ways that I feel people assign me a story is based one either my religion or my hobbies. Because I am jewish, people on occasion will make jokes about me being good with money or something of that nature. I do not find it particularly offensive, but after a while it begins to rub me the wrong way. As for my hobbies, I am into extreme sports, and as a result people may take me for someone who does not care about school or may not be particularly intellectual. I know that I have it very easy being a white male from America, but I do see based on my experiences how being given a single story can really make it hard to feel welcome in a new enviroment.
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