Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: The Danger of a Single Story

Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist
Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice - and
warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a
critical misunderstanding.

https://www.ted.com/talks/chimamanda_ngozi_adichie_the_danger_of_a_si
ngle_story/transcript

I – READ the transcript of the TEDtalk “The Danger of a Single Story” and
answer the following questions:

a- Explain the humorous tone in the first paragraphs of the text.

b- What do Fide’s story from the author’s childhood and her US roommate’s story have in
common?
 c- Explain this quote from the text in connection with issues of power: “In this
single story there was no possibility of Africans being similar to her, in any
way. No possibility of feelings more complex than pity. No possibility of a
connection as human equals.”

d- Can the description of Africans by John Locke be taken literally? Explain

e- Explain the next extract in your own words.

“But it would never have occurred to me to think that just because I had read a
novel in which a character was a serial killer that he was somehow representative
of all Americans. This is not because I am a better person than that student, but
because of America's cultural and economic power, I had many stories of America.
I had read Tyler and Updike and Steinbeck and Gaitskill. I did not have a single
story of America.”

f- What does in fact the danger of a single story refer to?

g- What are the author’s reflections upon language and power?

II. FOCUS ON LEXIS

FIND IN THE TEXT SYNONYMS OF:

condescending, superior: ________________ without dignity:

automatic: ________________ ethnic: _____________ united:

III. FOCUS ON GRAMMAR

REPORTED SPEECH. Report what the author says using an appropriate

reporting verb and verb pattern.

- “Finish your food! my mother said.

- “Don’t you know that people like Fide’s family have nothing to eat?”

- “I must say that before I went to the US I didn’t consciously identify as African.”
TRANSITIVITY. According to Eggins, “Experiential meaning is expressed through the
system of transitivity or process type, with the choice of process implicating associated
participant roles and configurations.” (2004: 206).

Which are the dominant process types in paragraphs 1 and 2? Explain

why based on the extract’s genre.

Are the verbs in the following clauses transitive or intransitive? Identify

the necessary elements to explain why.

“We played in the snow”

“We ate mangoes”

“My mother sent yam and rice to his family”

SENTENCE TYPE ANALYSIS

1- My mother says that I started reading at the age of two, although I think four is
probably close to the truth.

2- So I was an early reader, and what I read were British and American children's books.

3-My characters also drank a lot of ginger beer, because the characters in the British
books I read drank ginger beer.

4- Now, I loved those American and British books I read.

5- I come from a conventional, middle-class Nigerian family.

6- I must say that before I went to the U.S., I didn't consciously identify as African.

MULTI- WORD VERBS

The following multi-word verbs were extracted from the text. Classify them into:
phrasal, prepositional or phrasal prepositional, and transitive or
intransitive.
 ● “How lovely it was that the sun had come out.”
● “ I grew up on a university campus.”
● “ I went through a mental shift in my perception of literature.”
● “They opened up new worlds for me.”
● “ But in the U.S., whenever Africa came up, people turned to me.”
● “...dying of poverty and AIDS…”
● “It had failed in a number of places.”
● “sneaking across the border
● “I remember walking around on my first day in Guadalajara.”
● “People rolling up tortillas in the marketplace…”
● “ I had bought into the single story of Mexicans.”
● “But to insist on only these negative stories…”

IV. WRITING

V- WRITING: Choose only ONE option and write an argumentative essay.

a- “Stories matter. Many stories matter. Stories have been used to dispossess and to
malign, but stories can also be used to empower and to humanize. Stories can break the
dignity of a people, but stories can also repair that broken dignity.”

Discuss in connection with the text and other examples you can think of.
a- Explore the building of cultural and social stereotypes through the use of language
and ideology in connection with Chimamanda Adicchie’s talk.