"Things Fall Apart" by Chinua Achebe (Postcolonialism Anlysis)

           "Things Fall Apart" is generally seen as Achebe's way of taking back from Joseph Conrad and Heart of Darkness. This novel focuses on the Igbo people in the years leading up to the arrival of the first Christian missionaries. The Igbo are the second largest group of people living in the southern Nigeria. They are socially and culturally diverse, consisting of many subgroups. Although they lived in scattered groups of villages, they all speak one language. It follows Okonkwo, a respected member of a tribe, as he build up his reputation. Basically we get to see the ins and outs of pre-colonized Africa and get a hint of what's to come when the missionaries show up.

            How does the writer do anything to question, "problematize", or revolutionize that dominant language so that we as readers are aware of the problems when it comes to writing and speaking the "master's language"?. The Chinua Achebe incorporates the language of the Igbo people into the story itself is often seen as his attempt to put a "native" language other than English.

            By naming sounds, things, people, places are all given to change over time and place. That's how we get different languages and cultures. Achebe shows us how invented language fundamentally. Many indigenous language are seldom spoken because of the influence of colonial power that comes in and forces a new language on the people on the other land. That's the reason why indigenous language starts to fade away. People starts to forget it and the whole generations will no longer speak the Igbo language because they're speaking English or some other language. Let's say, one day if we really decide to write a novel like "Things Fall Apart" as an author we ends up writing a story or a novel in English language and not in Igbo language. This means that the writer is forced to translate his or her culture in another language.