Do you hold a single story of Africa?

For a long time, I did hold a single story of Africa. I don’t think that I do anymore, but very slowly I have been discovering the other side(s) of the story. We tend to think of Africa as a place where everyone needs to walk miles for water. Where everyone hunts and lives in small villages. But there is actually a lot of wealth in Africa. Not all places, but a lot of them.

What stories might you be missing?

Billions. There are billions of people in Africa, all with different backgrounds and experiences. Learning some of those different stories could completely change my perspective of Africa and Africans.

What is the ‘danger of a single story’?

The danger of a single story, in my opinion, is when you have only one story of a place or a people like Africa. The danger behind this is when you hold only that one story as the truth, and you don’t look any deeper into it. Once that happens, you begin to make assumptions, which tend to be more false than otherwise. This becomes problematic when you continue to make assumptions, and then what you really know becomes less and less. Then you can offend people of that place, or just make a fool of yourself when you talk about it.