Oh dear!
Gloria in excelsis Emeagwali has tickled my funny bone...
Perhaps some explanation called for?
In Sweden it's a part of what's called "social kompetens",remembering and correctly pronouncing the names of people you meet and so, in Nigeria from day one, I had to start setting in order some new mnemonictricks of associating face with name since it was for the very first time in my life that I was meeting so many people named after the Christian saints and Christian virtues such as "Sunday" , "Blessing", Comfort", " Patience","Goodluck", "Charity","Gloria" etc, and of course, "Mary". In Catholic Spain it's relatively easy – almost every other guy is called "Jesus" - just as in Bangladesh every male (potential jihadist) has Mohammed as his first name and role model. However, in Nigeria I did not meet anyone called Jesus – only heard about him...
Re- "The Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the World - have mercy".As you know, the good boys and girls of the Holy Roman Catholic Church faithfully recite the Agnus Deis
Now about the perceived triple transgressions of Mercy
That's what the atheists sometimes joke about (but I don't joke about it since, just as the Islamic Kalam informs us that Allah will forgive anything except shirk, so too the extreme Christian theologians have informed the general public that the Almighty is capable of forgiving everything except some ribaldry about "The Holy Ghost"– the Third Person of the Holy Trinity; consequently, I have never and hope that I will never joke about Him or Her – but I still recall the headmaster of the primary school in Bakana - he resided just outside St. Scholastica - and obviously I would not like to mention his name, but we were once discussing the impact of Christianity on Nigeria's cultural traditions when he told me everything was Ok,except that "They should not interfere with our traditional marriage customs", and pressed a little further as to what those marriage customs were, he told me: Holy Polygamy– and then added, rather unexpectedly - he seemed visibly angry when he popped the question: "And why should the Holy Ghost have crossed Mary? How do you think that Joseph the carpenter felt about someone else crossing his lawfully wedded wife?"
Of course The Holy Ghost not being just any "someone else", at that time the headmaster only succeeded in reminding me of Soyinka's Lakunle saying - Act 1 Sc1 in The Lion and the Jewel :
"No wife of mine, no lawfully wedded life,
Shall eat the leavings off my plate –
That is for the children".
Not that I seek your martyrdom, Gloria in excelsis Emeagawali.
And here are the words of the 4th Tempter in that excruciating verse drama once brought alive to us by Michael Brunson our English teacher in lower six - the year was 1964 - he was fresh from Oxford where he studied theology and more importantly had been active in the student theatre group, so it was not just some dead verses some live impersonations from him and from us in "Murder in the Cathedral" ) :
4th Tempter.
"As you do not know me, I do not need a name,
And, as you know me, that is why I come.
You know me, but have never seen my face
To meet before was never time or place"
One last thing - after the basics, I then covered the subject of marriage and divorce according to the five schools of fiqh in al-Islam and therefore now tell you authoritatively, according to the Sharia the aggrieved hus-band is supposed to say "Talaq" (I divorce you) at intervals, on three separate occasions. Unfortunately, nowadays, in for example Pakistan where people tend to be more hot-tempered and impatient, the irate husband usually says talaq talaq talaq and may add and you can go to hell, at one and the same occasion. The divorced woman must marry another man and be divorced from him before he can have her back for which reason, no matter how enraged the husband may be I think that he had better think twice before saying the third talaq
Ah, Gloria, vorbei sind die Zeiten von Sotah
Yesterday it was party time, received over forty guests at home, all types, from Nigeria, Tunisia, Judea, Sierra Leone, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Professors, psychologists, artists, journalists, you name it...
I must update
This evening
On Sunday, 5 January 2014 23:33:08 UTC+1, Emeagwali, Gloria (History) wrote:
"Lord Have mercy! Gloria!
Straight to the heart<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPy9hRv3YQ8 >.....
And there's this poem<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > by MarcusUTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Marcus+Garvey+% 3A+Lying+and+stealing+is+the+ white+man's+game
Of course there are all types of people, ......" CH
Well you simply remind me of a joke concerning a woman named Mercy.
Her jealous husband decided to divorce her after hearing
'Lord have Mercy',
'Christ have Mercy'
and ' God have Mercy.'
Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History & African Studies
________________________________
From: Cornelius Hamelberg [cornelius...@gmail.com]
Sent: Saturday, January 04, 2014 6:21 PM
To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Cc: Emeagwali, Gloria (History)
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Achebe, Armah , missionaries
updated:
Lord Have mercy! Gloria!
Straight to the heart<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPy9hRv3YQ8 >
And there's this poem<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > by MarcusUTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Marcus+Garvey+% 3A+Lying+and+stealing+is+the+ white+man's+game
Of course there are all types of people, there's this famous one<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > for instance who said "Thank God for slavery "<https://www.google.se/UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Keith+Richburg search?sourceid=navclient&aq= > . You'd never hear someone like Hon. Minister Louis Farrakhan<https://www.google.hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Keith+Richburg+ %3A+Thank+God+for+slavery se/search?sourceid=navclient& > say that sort of thing – and by the way Mattias Gardell<https://www.google.se/ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Hon.+Minister+ Louis+Farrakhan search?sourceid=navclient&ie= UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Mattias+Gardell > ( a White man ) did his doctoral thesis on the Nation of Islam<https://www.google.se/ search?sourceid=navclient&aq= > . He also wrote a book on Islamophobia<https://www.hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Mattias+ Gardell+%3AIn+the+Name+of+ Elijah+Muhammad%3A+Louis+ Farrakhan+and+The+Nation+of+ Islam google.se/search?sourceid= >.navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz= 1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q= Mattias+Gardell+%3A+ islamophobia
I have hundreds of Muslim friends here, in London, in Iran, in Iraq, in Lebanon, in Israel, in Gaza in Judea and Samaria, in Egypt, apart from Christians, Witnesses, Buddhists, Hindus, Sikhs, atheists, and a few Seven Day Adventists...
As I've already mentioned, I attended the only secondary school that didn't have religion studies on the agenda – and apart from singing the praises of that school which was opened by the Prince of Wales in 1925 and is named after him, I should like to mention that by the time Sierra Leone was granted Independence in 1961, the Brits left behind them a stable currency, a well-functioning judiciary and appeal court - the highest appeal court was then the Privy Council, and in addition they left behind them a very well staffed educational system (apart from UK VSOs like Michael Brunson<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Michael+Brunson > our English teacher in lower six) and American Peace Corps, most of the teachers in my school were Oxford and Cambridge graduates ) - other good schools were the CMS Grammar School, St. Edwards , the Albert Academy, The Methodist Boys and the Methodist Girls High School, the Annie Walsh Memorial School, Christ the King College in Bo , St. Joseph's Convent, The Freetown Secondary School for Girls, Harford School for Girls in Moyamba, The Collegiate School, The Government Secondary School in Bo. The Brits also left behind them a scholarship award system based on merit, a civil service based on meritocracy, and in Freetown which then had a population of roughly 200, 000 people, an uninterrupted 24 hours a day electricity and clean water supply from the Guma Valley dam administered by Mr. Tommy Hope.
About the religion business, tolerance, that's me. As an unaffiliated free electron I bathed in the Ganges a few years before my full immersion baptism when the Brethren nearly drowned me in the holy river waters in Umuahia. In 1985 I explored the Citykyrkan and the following orthodox churches in Stockholm: The Ethiopian, the Greek, the Russian, the Syrian, the Finnish, and the Estonian (which had the best choir) and in 1991 had to fight my way into the Egyptian Coptic Orthodox church in Alexandria – since I wore a green galabeya and looked like a fellaheen from Northern Sudan. The liturgy in Arabic was interesting to listen to. I know all about Shia Islam<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > , lastly digested the resalah of marja-i-taqlid Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Hussein Sistani<https://www.google.se/UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Shia+Islam search?sourceid=navclient&aq= >, circa 1994...hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Grand+ Ayatollah+Sayyid+Ali+Hussein+ Sistani
Whilst you may carry on with your erudite commentaries on the effects of past and present Christian missions in Africa's heartlands – (I would recommend some of Lamin Sanneh's<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient& > work on that) we should not lose sight of the indigenous African Christian communities in Africa –in Ethiopia and Egypt, as you've even been talking about a North African St. Augustine – both of which communities of were pre-Islamic, before the advent of Islam as was St. Augustine , because Islam came several hundred years later) - and whilst Brother Kwame Zulu Shabazz has breathed the idea of "cultural genocide" we could also take into our consideration what been happening lately: the very strong resistance from the African Church<https://www.google.se/ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Lamin+Sanneh search?sourceid=navclient&ie= >, currently the last bastion of earlier churchly morality in its battle against homosexuality<https://www.UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=african+ churches+and+homosexuality google.se/search?sourceid= > vis-à-vis what Brother Obama said in Senegal<https://www.google.se/navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz= 1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q=The+ african+church+and+ homosexuality search?sourceid=navclient&aq= >hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Obama+in+ Senegal%3A+tolerance+for+ homosexuality
I appreciate the ingenious Gloria in excelsis Emeagwali flexing some rhetorical muscle when she says ( advertisement) that she doesn't want to mention certain things or talk about them even as by some sleight of hand (clever one) – in this case some sleight of the tongue she's goes right ahead and mentions them when she says, "If I speak ill of the missionaries and bring up topics such as pedophilia<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient& >, child abuse<https://www.google.se/ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=pedophilia+(+ catholic+priests search?sourceid=navclient&aq= >, 'deAfricanization<https://www.hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=child+abuse+( church google.se/search?sourceid= >,' cultural imperialism<https://www.navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz= 1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q= deAfricanization google.se/search?sourceid= >, paternalism<https://www.navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz= 1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q= cultural+imperialism google.se/search?sourceid= >, and so on..."navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz= 1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q= paternalism
Many thanks for bringing our attention to these matters.
Nota bene: Love never fails<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > ! : "If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal."UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=1st+ corinthians+13
As you know, I like you, but I don't love your saying that with my tongue on fire, I and I would "rant about the evils of that religion." (Islam). I demand an apology - otherwise, no forgiveness for Emeagwali - and I won't forget what you said. (This is serious O!) I demand that you say "astagfirullah", Gloria. You can also say three Hail Marys and put in $5 in the collection tray – for me. O else!
I have nothing against Islam or Muslims. I have more Muslim friends than Jewish ones. The ratio of Muslims to Jews being
25 million: 1.5 billion.
The Prophet of Islam (s.a.w.) is reported to have said "I am the city of Knowledge and Ali is the gate"<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= >. I believe that someone who sincerely follows the Sufi mystical path of Islam will arrive.UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=%E2%80%9CI+am+ the+city+of+Knowledge+and+Ali+ is+the+gate%E2%80%9D#q=I+am+ the+city+of+Knowledge+and+Ali+ is+the+gate
The evil of which you speak is clear for all to see – it's the militarization<http://www.memritv.org/ > of the religion and it's what's happening in Syria, right now, in Iraq, in Libya, in Egypt in Pakistan, and all that the terrorist jihadists are doing in Israel<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= >, the holy land and of course what your brothers in Boko Haram<https://www.google.se/UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=What+the+ terrorist+jihadists+are+doing+ in+Israel search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > will be surely showing you throughout 2014 in the Federal Republic of Nigeria to further exacerbate the North-South / Muslim -Christian divide as a run-up to the 2015 presidential elections.UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Boko+Haram
All of the above
Sincerely said
We Sweden
is waiting<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTc0-gJFeDg >
On Saturday, 4 January 2014 09:49:27 UTC+1, Emeagwali, Gloria (History) wrote:
"I'm patiently waiting for .........." Cornelius Hamelberg
Sorry Cornelius, You won't be hearing much from me on this missionary palaver. If I speak ill of the missionaries and bring up topics such as
pedophilia, child abuse, 'deAfricanization,' cultural imperialism, paternalism, and so on, I would be
bombarded with testimonies of missionary largesse, humanitarianism, self -sacrifice, anticolonialism and what have you. You would be falling over yourself to
prove how wonderful the missionaries were. Buttons with the inscription "I love missionaries" will be distributed online.
Your face will light up, eyes a-glowing, while you reminisce about the wonders of the CMS and how fortunate the continent was to have these direct and indirect
agents of imperialism. And by editorial fiat, without consultation and without my permission, I would be made a Muslim, which I am not, fortunately or unfortunately,
so that you could rant about the evils of that religion.
I lost two good friends over issues related to religion, and ever since then,
I run to the hills when this kind of topic comes up.
The first friend I lost was actually a cousin who happened to be a nun. I paid her a visit in her
convent around 2007, and expressed my dismay at the iconography of whiteness splattered all over the walls of her convent.
"Are there no Black angels, I asked in dismay? Why do you tolerate this kind of propaganda? Are you still perpetuating white supremacist
thinking, in this day and age? Would this kind of biased imagery not have a negative impact on the psyche of your parishioners?
What would happen if you diversified your flock of saints and angels? Will the congregation run away, I asked."
"Cousin, the missionaries taught us how to read," she blurted out.
"But you don't have to be a Christian to use the Lebanese -Greco-Roman script, anymore than you have to be a Muslim to write
Arabic," I retorted.
" Why do you continue to perpetuate the image of a blonde, blue-eyed Germanic, your Savior? What is the real purpose and
true impact of your message?"
My cousin stopped talking to me after that.
I lost the other friend in La Paz, Bolivia. He was a wonderful guide, caring and helpful. He showed me around the city. We talked about the thousands of
enslaved Africans forced to work in the silver mines of la Paz in earlier days. We went from one restaurant to another sampling
food and cocoa tea so that I could cope with the high altitude of 15,000 feet. We really developed a nice, friendly rapport. But all this
evaporated into thin air when I asked him about the Germanic- looking figure with arms outstretched
on the top of the hill- dominating the city, as it were , in a familiar paternalistic pose.
"Most of your population is Native American but here you have this figure dominating your city.
Isn't this a form of propaganda," I asked? What would happen if you changed the image? Will the city crumble?
He, too stopped talking to me after that.
So I have learnt my lesson on matters related to religion, nuns and missionaries.
Run to the hills.
Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History & African Studies
vimeo.com/user5946750/videos<http://vimeo.com/user5946750/ >videos
________________________________
From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com<https://webmail.ccsu.edu/owa/ > [usaafric...@googlegroups.com<UrlBlockedError.aspx https://webmail.ccsu.edu/owa/ >] On Behalf Of Cornelius Hamelberg [cornelius...@gmail.com<https:UrlBlockedError.aspx //webmail.ccsu.edu/owa/ >]UrlBlockedError.aspx
Sent: Friday, January 03, 2014 8:44 PM
To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com<https://webmail.ccsu.edu/owa/ >UrlBlockedError.aspx
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Achebe, Armah , missionaries
Dear Brother Kwame Zulu of the Shabazz family,
So you guys are still discussing the role of
Christian missionaries in the scramble for the pastures of Africa<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq= > ?hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Christian+ missionaries+in+the+scramble+ for+Africa
Fortunately for me, the secondary school I attended was the only one in the country that did not teach religious knowledge or offer it as an exam subject. That's why I don't know much about these things.
I'm patiently waiting for Gloria in excelsis Emeagwali to butt in, then and only then will I butt in too, with some good stories about the glory of C.M.S<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > in West Africa.UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=The+Church+ Missionary+Society#q=The+ Church+Missionary+Society+%2F+ CMS+in+West+Africa+
As if we don't know that the first slave ship to transport incarcerated Africans to "The New World" was called "The Jesus of Lubeck"<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > . I wonder what the sons of the devil and the slave and plantation owners were called.UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=The+Jesus+of+ Lubeck
As if we don't know the first Maroon Church outside of Jamaica is located in Freetown, Sierra Leone. And what do they now say about Blyden's Christianity, Islam and the Negro Race<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq= > ?hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Edward+Wilmot+ Blyden+%3A+Christianity%2C+ Islam+and+the+Negro+Race
Don't mind them.
You see what happened to Martin Bernal. They ganged up against him and almost threw him into the dustbin.
Yet, the Yosef Ben-Jochannan<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid= > // Ivan Sertima<https://www.google.se/navclient&aq=hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8& rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q= Yosef+Ben-Jochannan search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > // John Henrik Clarke<https://www.google.se/UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Ivan+Sertima search?sourceid=navclient&aq= > school is still exerting a lot of influence and to some extent is helping to instil some of the missing pride - in them - and to de-programme some of the gullible and most susceptible to missionary propaganda about not only the origins of their religion, but the origins of their own ancestors, not to mention their very selves. Cultural genocide is putting it mildly. What goal or destiny does anyone have when he / she doesn't know who he/she is, or where he/ she is from – if he/she thinks that on the authority of some missionary - testifying to "the blood of Jesus", no matter what he does his destination is heaven.hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=John+Henrik+ Clarke
Reminds me of this line by the Last Poets:
"Niggers play football, baseball and basketball
while the white man cuttin' off their balls"
I'll have to re-read Armah to locate where he asks what happens to the soul/ identity of an African child who grows up being called Mike/ Michael. Unfortunately, many of our Brethren and Sistren who are the products of missionary education/ institutions feel that you are attacking them personally or pulling the magic carpet to heaven from under their feet and that it's nothing less than blasphemy or historical heresy when you level any criticism of the missionaries of their sacred religion. For the really superstitious, it could be the curse of Ham<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > controlling such perceptions.UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=The+curse+of+ Ham
In the words of Archbishop Desmond Tutu: "When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said 'Let us pray.' We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land"
And here we are talking about the Dutch Reformed Church whose theology<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/despatches/africa/ > provided the theological foundations for Apartheid. Goodness knows how the Mormons<https://www.google.se/33032.stm search?sourceid=navclient&aq= > would have fared in colonial Africa since it's only recently that they too "apologized" probably in the name of Jesus of Nazarethhts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=The+Mormon+ Church%3A+Issue+an+official+ apology+for+racist+teachings+ that+declared+Blacks+cursed
However another cautionary note, having taken in what Professor Mbaku has just written - that even though the Christian missionaries belong to the same general flock by their deeds / works them can be differentiated one from another. So let's face some facts: Hitler was a Roman Catholic. So were the guys who perpetrated the Inquisition - is there enough ink with which to write their iniquities?
Don't get me wrong. I just posted Eric's "Don't Ever Let Nobody Drag Your Spirit Down"<http://chordify.net/chords/transatlantic-sessions- > on the Biafra Genocide facebook site – in response to this message<https://fbcdn-sphotos-eric-bibb-dont-ever-let- nobody-drag-your-spirit-down- steven-stoddart b-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak- > to encourage some Brethren and Sistrenfrc3/379670_365391433595020_ 1844094436_n.jpg
Nor should we forget that the Black Churches provided the organisational structure that contributed so tremendously to the Civil Rights Movement in America and the anti-Apartheid campaign worldwide, over here in Sweden the Lutheran Church was quite active and once again on 24th December at our dinner table I heard once more about how my Better Half shook hands with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther king, when he was over here...
In the meanwhile we're all supposed to turn from evil and to do good.
Sincerely,
We Sweden<http://www.thelocal.se/blogs/corneliushamelberg/ >
On Saturday, 4 January 2014 00:11:06 UTC+1, kwame zulu shabazz wrote:
Prof. Nketia is extraordinary. I think he must in his mid 90s by now. I interviewed him several years back and I hope to work it into something publishable at some point. Armah is my favorite writer and he is super popular amongst Black cultural nationalist/Afrocentrist of which I am a (critical) member. As you note, he has switched gears a bit since his earlier writing. He now focuses a lot on Kemet and other Afrocentric themes. Yes, Armah offers a strong critique of Christian missionaries (and Muslims) which, in his view, were the catalyst for cultural genocide.
kzs
On Friday, January 3, 2014 9:44:19 AM UTC-5, Cornelius Hamelberg wrote:
Amended.
As I follow the missionary thread started by Oga Kwabena Akurang-Parry - the name Kwabena echoes that of another great man, the only one who lectured with a smile on his face: Professor Kwabena Nketia <https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8& > and thoughts about him re-turn me to the Black Star nation. I wonder, did Francis Bebey<https://www.google.se/rlz=1T4NDKB_enSE548SE548&q= Professor+Kwabena+Nketia search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > smile in the same way?UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Francis+Bebey
The impact of the African–American presence in Ghana cannot be underestimated – from W.E. B Dubois through Satchmo, Malcolm X<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > and James Brown, to Stevie Wonder. It's a long story, about six personal chapters. In the late sixties, early seventies of the last century, hundreds of African-Americans made it to Ghana each year, in quest of their roots. It was also Black Power times. In 1968 I also travelled by road in a Renault car with some friends from Freetown, through Liberia and Ivory Coast to Accra, the Golden City, and saw the so called National Liberation circle in downtown Accra, for myself - returned by air...UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Malcolm+X+in+ Ghana+
In 1970 at a point where Ayi Kwei Armah's "The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born" was still being celebrated I remember having a long conversation with one of my African-American neighbours in Ghana, Cyprian Lamar Rowe<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= > about the relative merits of Chinua Achebe and the new kid on the block, Ayi Kwei Armah. Cyprian, as unctuous as ever "the body is an aesthetic instrument "etc to reflect his very colourful clothing – the colours of the Ghanaian flag, the dashiki, it was the era of the Afro too – Cyprian elevated Chinua Achebe(now in the eternal beyond) far above Aye Kwei Armah who at that point had only written the Beautyful Ones and "Fragments" - in short, his main point was that Achebe opened his eyes to traditional Africa - and of course that too is to be celebrated but thought that Armah - a returnee (biographical heresy there) was viewing his society almost like a stranger, a "Westerner". Some of Armah's later work has put paid to that. One thing that Achebe and Armah have in common is their critique of missionary activity - and here Armah is even more awesome than Achebe, particularly in his venom against missionary Islam in his novel "The Healers"UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Cyprian+Lamar+ Rowe
Ayi Kwei Armah --- On His Work<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDx20O37KqI >
O. S. Ogede: The question of identity in Ayi Kwei Armah's "Why Are We So Blest?"<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&aq= >hts&oq=&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=O.+S.+Ogede%3A+ Thequestion+of+identity+in+ Ayi+Kwei+Armah%E2%80%99s+%E2% 80%9CWhy+Are+We+So+Blest%3F% E2%80%9D
Ayi Kwei Armah : The Healers<https://www.google.se/search?sourceid=navclient&ie= >UTF-8&rlz=1T4NDKB_ enSE548SE548&q=Ayi+Kwei+Armah+ %3A+The+Healers
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