Ignorance In Things Fall Apart And Disney's Zootopia

Okonkwo soon learns about this and confronts his son, Nwoye about his secret meetings, Okonkwo soon becomes enraged and disowns his son after hearing about his experience not before abusing him of course. This action causes an effect which ultimately leads to Okonkwo’s downfall. Okonkwo enraged by the spread of Christianity within his own village self-proclaims war on the “white man”. Okonkwo eventually was detained as a result of his actions towards the “white man”. After he was released from detainment Okonkwo killed a courier and began to truly understand he was a rebel without a cause as his fellow Tribesmen would not help him with his internal struggle. Okonkwo knowing, he would be caught and executed for his crimes, instead decided to ultimately end his own life by hanging himself. Okonkwo’s major downfall in the story was his inability to co-exist with the white man and began his own personal vendetta against the Christian missionaries. Throughout the story the main essential theme Achebe tried to relay to us would be the fact that even though individuals may be of different religions, skin color, and have different personalities there is a realization that

Zootopia, from the largest to the smallest, from the vicious to the innocent, Zootopia is an infested mammal massacre where all animals thrive and live in harmony. The concept? A world without humans, where predators and prey have learned to interact and create a city featuring sections built to accommodate different animals and lifestyles. This Disney hit doesn’t disappoint when it comes to exploring deep, demon-like predicaments that come with proclaiming Zootopia as home. This one hit wonder displays an attention grabbing plot which aids the viewer to picture a brand new view point of the positive and negative impacts that stereotypes, discrimination and prejudice have on the characters in Zootopia. Stereotyping can be seen as a widely held image or idea of a particular type of person or thing. Likewise, discrimination is to treat someone poorly due to their race, age or sex.

Following Okonkwo’s seven year exile, the village Okonkwo once knew has changed due to the influence of Christianity and the influence of the British missionaries and officers. Okonkwo’s initial reaction is to arm the clan against the Colonisers and drive the British people out of Igbo.

Starting with the first effect of imperialism, the introduction of Christianity in Umuofia, Okonkwo’s fatherland. Four years into Okonkwo’s exile, his good friend Obierika payed him a visit, informing Okonkwo of the arrival of missionaries in Umuofia. The Christian followers had to come to Umuofia to build a church and to convert locals into their anomalous religion. Most importantly, “what moved Obierika to visit Okonkwo was the sudden appearance of the latter’s son, Nwoye, among the missionaries in Umuofia.” (Achebe 143) The introduction of Christianity was one of the many effects set upon the African villages. Locals were becoming

    The Ibo culture in Things Fall Apart began to experience colonization, all after Okonkwo was exiled. He was sent away for seven years for killing a clansman. As soon as Okonkwo had left, Umuofia was greeted by Christian missionaries. They were there to convert the villagers to Christianity, to build churches, schools, and hospitals for them. When Okonkwo was exiled, Nwoye snuck off to be among the Christians. He enjoyed being around them and examined their religious views. But, Okonkwo was not happy about Nwoye’s decisions. Okonkwo chokes him by the neck, and demands Nwoye to tell him where he has been. “I don’t know, he is not my father.” (Achebe 137) Being almost killed by his own father really encouraged Nwoye to disassociate himself from his father completely and to head back home to Umuofia. Nwoye was drawn to Christianity because it made him feel welcomed, rather than when he was apart of his native religion.

The Effect of White Missionaries on an African Tribe in Things Fall Apart by Achebe

After shooting Ogbuefi’s son, which is a crime against the earth goddess, Okwonko is sent to Mbanta for seven years. When Okwonko returns to Umuofia after seven years, he notices many changes within the Igbo community. Just like Okwonko, Kumalo goes to Johannesburg and experiences a whole new society. When Okwonko comes back, he discovers that many men renounced their titles and has converted to Christianity. Kumalo keeps seeing evidence that Johannesburg destroys traditional values and social relations. After the influence of the white men’s church, Okwonko’s tribe has also fallen under their oppressive government. Kumalo isn’t fond of Johannesburg because he sees how people have to work so that they could get a title for their own selfish reasons, and speak in English, which destroys his traditional values. The missionaries go to Umuofia to start a school, and Nwoye leaves Okwonko’s hut to attend the school. Kumalo finds out his daughter Gertrude is in a horrible situation, and that his son Absalom has murdered someone. Okwonko is unhappy about the changes in Umuofia, and things start to fall apart for him. On the other hand, Kumalo stays strong is eager to find his son and help him. After Mr. Brown, the missionary, becomes ill, a new missionary named Reverand Smith comes and things start to really fall apart for Okwonko. The major experience of Johannesburg and all that is happening to

Okonkwo’s adherence to a tradition of cruelty that harms large groups of minorities leads to a pronounced division once Western missionaries establish their church: a church which allows for aspects of life that tribal law did not. His adherence to traditional law and inability to compromise — rigidity in a culture of flexibility — alienates family members, members of his community, and furthers an internal pressure which ultimately helps the pressures of colonialism. Okonkwo’s inflexible interpretation of tribal law, borne of a need to escape his father’s seemingly feminine weakness, leads to morally bankrupt decisions. Unable to settle on a compromise between law and morality, he murders Ikemefuna: although correct in the eyes of law, the action lacks morals, is purely driven by a need for social power and fear of seeming weak. Such personal conflict culminates in intense inner pressure on both Okonkwo’s part and on the part of the community as a whole, leading to a collapse of long standing unity when faced with the external pressure of missionaries, providing a “way out”. This culminates in a scene in which tribal leaders call for an attack on colonialist forces, including other tribal members which have joined the

     When Okonkwo returns to the village, he finds that the white man has moved in, bringing Christianity with him. This is a struggle that shows Okonkwo’s inflexibility and objection to change from tradition. Eventually, Okonkwo slay’s a man working for the British and ends up hanging himself as a result of his actions. Suicide is forbidden by the clan,

The missionaries conflict with everything Okonkwo believes or values. The missionaries are so outlandish to Okonkwo that his first reaction is just to laugh at them. This is shown on page 147, paragraph 4, “ At the end of it Okonkwo was fully convinced that the man was mad. He shrugged his shoulders and went away.” Okonkwo later begins to understand the threat the missionaries pose to his society and passionately speaks for forcing the missionaries out of Umuofia. However when his people will not listen to him, he feels like he is forced to take matters into his own hands. This is shown on page 204, paragraph 7,” Okonkwo’s machete descended twice and the man’s head lay beside his uniformed body”. The Ibo people do not join in on the violence as Okonkwo had hoped, which contradicted with Okonkwo belief that the Ibo were warrior people. This final loss of Okonkwo’s core beliefs is what shatters Okonkwo’s final sense of identity as a man. As Okonkwo is no longer any of the things he has come to identify himself as, and Okonkwo blames the missionaries for this, his final response to the missionaries is to take his own life. Okonkwo's death is shown on page 207, paragraph 3 “ Then they came to the tree from which Okonkwo’s body was dangling, and they stopped dead.” When Okonkwo identity was ripped from him he no longer saw a point in living and his fight with the

The fact that these missionaries have started to really make an impact was unprecedented by the Ibo people; their continuous misunderstandings of one another contribute to make this situation frustrating to both the Ibo clansmen and the Christians that view their religion as superior. Okonkwo returns back to his home village of Umuofia after his exile to Mbanta, and he arrives to see missionaries have overtaken the village, created a government, and many Umuofians have joined the church. As Okonkwo and his friend Obierika are talking, Obierika says of the missionaries and their impact, “He says that our customs are bad; and our own brothers who have taken up his religion also say that our customs are bad. How do you think we can fight when our own brothers have turned against us?...He has put a knife on the things that held us together and we have fallen apart” (176). The white men and missionaries have been successful in coming in and gaining power. They believe the customs to be “bad”, showing their disregard of Ibo culture, and how their motives for infiltrating Ibo life is based off of selfish ideas- only to gain more followers to their religion. Furthermore, by actually being successful in drawing Umuofians into their religion, they have turned

The missionaries needed land to build their church and houses, so the Ibo men gave them a portion of the Evil Forest with the beliefs that they would be die quickly. Once time passes, none of the missionaries die, which implants questions in to the Ibo tribe about their own faith, and the missionaries win their first three converts. Okonkwo was staunch in his own religion, and primarily hated that the tribe was so weak that many people kept converting to Christianity. Okonkwo was “deeply grieved… He mourned for the clan, which he saw breaking up and falling apart and he mourned for the warlike men of Umuofia, who had so unaccountably become soft like women.”

Achebe reads Joseph Conrad’s novel, Heart of Darkness, and realizes that it’s extremely racist and stereotypical. In parts of Conrad’s book he calls the African people “Savage”, “Prehistoric” and “Wild”. Achebe finds Conrad’s work unfair in the way it is told. It gives the idea that Africans really are savage and wild. Achebe writes an essay that clearly points out many of the racist and rude comments towards Africans.

Fear is a powerful tool that if used incorrectly, can control how one lives. Okonkwo’s life is one that is dominated by fear. Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart follows the Ibo people, set during the time of the colonization of West Africa, in the town of Umoufia. The protagonist, Okonkwo, is a strong follower of his culture’s rigid expectations and practices. While Okonkwo’s steadfast adherence earns the respect of the townsmen, many detest the cultural expectations and practices they are forced to follow. When Christian missionaries introduce Christianity to Umoufia, many of the Ibo people are quick to convert, including Okonkwo’s own son. This new religion slowly undermines the Ibo culture and religion Okonkwo firmly believes in, leading to his downfall. In Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, Okonkwo’s fear of weakness along with the arrival of Christianity causes Okonkwo’s downfall.

Achebe’s essay “An Image of Africa” analyzes the book Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. He dissects the false representation of the african people and the bias in his book. In “Heart Of Darkness,” Conrad feels that the people of Africa are undeveloped and they are savages; he looks at all their culture and tradition and only sees it as uncivilized, he has no appreciation for their beliefs. This relates to Achebe’s book, Things Fall Apart, because Conrad’s views represents the white colonist and their feelings towards the africans. The colonists did not respect their culture or their gods. Okonkwo is well-respected by his tribe, he is extremely traditional and values his culture. The colonists are a threat to that because they do not understand or respect the African ways, they want to change it and convert them to Christianity. Okonkwo has a need to stand up for his culture and his beliefs, he feels he has to be able to prove that he is a strong and powerful man. Okonkwo worries that if he does not protect his customs, he will be seen like his father: cowardly and feminine. He has been haunted by that fear his whole life, “It was the fear of himself, lest he should be found to resemble his father. Even as a little boy he had resented his father’s failure and weakness, and even now he still remembered how he had suffered when a playmate had told him that his father was agbala”(Achebe 12). His need to distinguish himself from his father and protect his people are what drive him to make do things like kill Ikemefuna and the messenger. Things fall apart for Okonkwo because the other villagers do not have the same passion and drive as him. The