The Danger of The Single Story

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Recommended: Media as a factor influencing public perception

The single story, a concept brought into focus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, a Nigerian writer can be connected to my life and greatly associated with Sisterhood. Adichie's idea of a single story reinforcing the ideas and stereotypes collected by people through society is easily connected with my experience of racism during my years in junior high school (TED, 2009). The theory of brotherhood as well as the military being patriarchal and purely capitalist is also a single story shared by many. The concept of the single story is everywhere and it has greatly affected the way I perceive knowledge and it has allowed for my perspective to grow.
Adichie exposes the danger of a single story which shows the people only one perspective of a group of people. The single story is the single stereotype fed to society through media and cultural norms of an idea, a person, or a group of people (TED, 2009). Growing up, I attended a private school where racism thrived. There was an immature gang culture shared amongst the students of the school who were predominantly Caucasian or Asian. From the beginning I had to pick a side, and being Indian, I chose to hang out with other Indians. Soon I had realized that I was considered to be lower than most within the group because I was a Christian Indian.
The essentially Sikh group that I had associated myself with often asked me if my mother was white. My so called friends carried the single story that Christianity was considered a "white" religion. If only I had the knowledge to tell them that Christianity was brought to India almost half a century after the death of Christ. Because of that gang culture we immersed ourselves in, I thought I could gain the respect of my friends taking part in the fig...

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...rence between the two in the first place. Our single story of brotherhood being different from sisterhood is what fuels patriarchy just like how the single story of my friends in junior high school believing that Christianity is a "white" religion fuelled racism. Through my experiences, I have learned that our minds have truly been conditioned into accepting the dangerous single story.

Works Cited

Gloria Watkins, (2000). Feminism is for Everybody. 1st ed. Canada: South End Press. Retrieved from http://excoradfeminisms.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/bell_hooks-feminism_is_for_everybody.pdf
TED (2009, October 7). Chimamanda Adichie: The danger of a single story. Retrieved May 28, 2014 from, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9Ihs241zeg
TED (2014, May 23). Sebastian Junger: Why veterans miss war. Retrieved May 28, 2014 from, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGZMSmcuiXM

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