A Portrayal of Clashes of Ideologies Among the African Natives in African Writing in English: A Study of Ngugi Wa Thiong'o's The River Between And Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Purple Hibiscus

Abstract

In African writing in English, the conflict between the Western and the Native has been a recurrent theme for many writers. The impact of colonialism and Christianity on the natives' ways of thinking and living and the resultant conflict among the natives because of the clashes in the opinions is another issue that finds expression in the African literature. When the colonials started inhabiting African nations they started with conversion of the natives to Christianity and affected a change in their mentality. They propagated the beliefs in their minds that their native ways of living and worshiping are savage and irrational. They promised them a deliverance from the pagan beliefs and showed them a refuge in White Western culture. They denigrated their roots and origin by emphasizing their blackness in a derogatory manner and propagated the belief that conversion to Christianity and following Western views is the ultimate solution for their liberation. Many of the natives failed to see through their lies and believed in their strategies of putting the natives against each other and breaking the bonds that had always kept them united. They discouraged communal gatherings and traditional rituals where people used to unite and share a common heritage. These strategies eventually worked in favour of colonial masters who successfully created confused hybrids. These hybrids could neither embrace Christianity completely nor could they reject their native ways which were part and parcel of their existence. The present paper deals with clashes of ideologies between such hybrids and the native believers who refuse to give in to the twisted colonial teachings. The works taken for the study include The River Between by Ngugi Wa Thiong'o and Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Ngugi Wa Thiong'o is a Kenyan writer and was born in 1938 while Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is a Nigerian writer, born in 1977. Though both the writers belong to different times as well as places, still they seem to share the pain and effects of colonialism quite similarly.