A 'SUMMARY'
BY NWANI UCHENNA WILLIAMS
The capitalist powers of
Europe carved an entire continent with a multiplicity of people, culture and
languages into different colonies. The political and economic activities were
seized, while the colonial power that came with a bible and sword imposed their
culture on us. The struggles of Africans to liberate their economy, culture and
politics proved infertile. The African writers’ conference held in Makerere
deliberated on our literature very much.
Africa was divided into different languages of the European
powers namely: English-speaking, French-speaking, or Portuguese-speaking
country. Thus, to air our grievances, we have to literally translate it from
our mother tongue to a foreign tongue. Even for our literature to be applied,
it has to be put in a foreign language. During that conference, Africans who
wrote in their mother tongue were excluded, keeping behind only Africans who
wrote in English.
Language basically is a means of communication and
carrier of culture. But in countries like Denmark, Sweden, English is only
spoken and written, but not a carrier of culture. It serves only as a means of
communication. Our African language has refused to go extinct regardless of
what it has passed through; it was actually preserved by some peasants who saw
no variance between speaking their own mother tongue and integrating into a
larger continental or national geography.
Why should we promote and
honour their language to such a height? We have to reconnect ourselves to
create a higher democratic system, love and appreciate our mother tongue, and
write with it without reservations for the world to see. That is our blessing
and inheritance from God.
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