famine, death, and hopelessness. Because the children or adults pictured are rarely named, the people remain abstract, symbolic, and no longer individuals. That starving toddler or weeping mother or child soldier is “Africa.” This projection only makes the task more difficult for those of us on the ground trying to help Africans to help themselves.
In addition, Africans themselves see these images of suffering and dysfunction on television, in newspapers, on websites, and in fund-raising appeals, and begin to internalize them. A dangerous and unfortunate psychological process ensues that subtly and perhaps unconsciously affirms to Africans their inability to be agents of their own destiny. Eventually, it may destroy the sense of confidence they should and must have to make progress.
Moreover, these depictions fail to capture another reality, which is that every day, tens of millions of African women and men go about their business, live their lives responsibly and industriously, and look after their immediate and extended families, even if they lack certain material possessions, higher education, or access to the range of opportunities and goods available to the wealthy in other countries, or even their own. These are the real African heroes, and it is these images the world should see more of.
I don't believe that charities or celebrities are buying into the stereotypical images of African helplessness and suffering in an effort to undermine Africans; the photos do, after all, represent a reality. Too many children
are
hungry in Africa or being forced to commit atrocities as child soldiers; or they are misusing drugs or sniffing glue on the streets of the continent's cities or are abused and raped and unable to go to school. And certainly, African governments have not paid enough attentionto the continent's myriad problems, in part because in Africa they aren't viewed with the same gravity as elsewhere, or be cause communities have become used to them (as may be the case with malaria and other preventable diseases), or because Africans are surrounded by so many challenges that the particular condition being highlighted doesn't seem as problematic to them as it does to those in the developed world. To a degree, these governments may need to be shamed into taking on these problems.
An example of this was when Bob Geldof visited Ethiopia in 1985 to see for himself the effects of the famine devastating these proud and confident people. It was only because a Kenyan cameraman, Mohamed Amin, traveled with Geldof that we Kenyans learned about the tragedy unfolding in the country next door. Why weren't we told that our fellow Africans were suffering? Why didn't the Kenyan government mobilize its citizens with the means or skills to assist the victims of the famine, which had been greatly exacerbated by a dictatorship and a devastating civil war that had uprooted the underpinnings of Ethiopia's agricultural economy?
The challenge, therefore, is not only for the international community to use more positive depictions of Africa, but for Africans themselves to stop providing so many images of dysfunction in the first place. No one in Africa can be happy that a child with a belly distended from malnutrition comes to represent a particular country or the continent at large. Clearly, it's incumbent upon Africans to project themselves better and more affirmatively, without pretending that underdevelopment isn't real. They must recognize that these challenges exist, and then decide that they will work toward resolving them.
The governments must ask themselves what policies they can adopt and what commitments they can make, notwithstanding the availability of aid, so that the images of Africanchildren express a new reality: one not of malnutrition, but of health; not child soldiers or street children addicted to drugs, but hardworking students and intact families. This should not be because the hungry have been hidden away, or the
In addition, Africans themselves see these images of suffering and dysfunction on television, in newspapers, on websites, and in fund-raising appeals, and begin to internalize them. A dangerous and unfortunate psychological process ensues that subtly and perhaps unconsciously affirms to Africans their inability to be agents of their own destiny. Eventually, it may destroy the sense of confidence they should and must have to make progress.
Moreover, these depictions fail to capture another reality, which is that every day, tens of millions of African women and men go about their business, live their lives responsibly and industriously, and look after their immediate and extended families, even if they lack certain material possessions, higher education, or access to the range of opportunities and goods available to the wealthy in other countries, or even their own. These are the real African heroes, and it is these images the world should see more of.
I don't believe that charities or celebrities are buying into the stereotypical images of African helplessness and suffering in an effort to undermine Africans; the photos do, after all, represent a reality. Too many children
are
hungry in Africa or being forced to commit atrocities as child soldiers; or they are misusing drugs or sniffing glue on the streets of the continent's cities or are abused and raped and unable to go to school. And certainly, African governments have not paid enough attentionto the continent's myriad problems, in part because in Africa they aren't viewed with the same gravity as elsewhere, or be cause communities have become used to them (as may be the case with malaria and other preventable diseases), or because Africans are surrounded by so many challenges that the particular condition being highlighted doesn't seem as problematic to them as it does to those in the developed world. To a degree, these governments may need to be shamed into taking on these problems.
An example of this was when Bob Geldof visited Ethiopia in 1985 to see for himself the effects of the famine devastating these proud and confident people. It was only because a Kenyan cameraman, Mohamed Amin, traveled with Geldof that we Kenyans learned about the tragedy unfolding in the country next door. Why weren't we told that our fellow Africans were suffering? Why didn't the Kenyan government mobilize its citizens with the means or skills to assist the victims of the famine, which had been greatly exacerbated by a dictatorship and a devastating civil war that had uprooted the underpinnings of Ethiopia's agricultural economy?
The challenge, therefore, is not only for the international community to use more positive depictions of Africa, but for Africans themselves to stop providing so many images of dysfunction in the first place. No one in Africa can be happy that a child with a belly distended from malnutrition comes to represent a particular country or the continent at large. Clearly, it's incumbent upon Africans to project themselves better and more affirmatively, without pretending that underdevelopment isn't real. They must recognize that these challenges exist, and then decide that they will work toward resolving them.
The governments must ask themselves what policies they can adopt and what commitments they can make, notwithstanding the availability of aid, so that the images of Africanchildren express a new reality: one not of malnutrition, but of health; not child soldiers or street children addicted to drugs, but hardworking students and intact families. This should not be because the hungry have been hidden away, or the
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