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Things Fall Apart

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Hello class, for our IO presentation, we will be focusing on the cultural and religious differences found throughout the novel, Things Fall Apart written by a Nigerian author, Chinua Achebe. For this novel, we will be centering our attention towards the clash of cultures and how common symbols used throughout the novel manifest the loss of culture as the Christians colonize and destroy the societal ramifications. SLIDE 2- SHAMRIN To start off, we will talk about the conflict between the two different religions in the book by analyzing this quote. "All the Gods you have named are not Gods at all. They are Gods of deceit who tell you to kill your fellows and destroy innocent children. There is only one God and he has the earth, the sky, you and me and all of us." From this quote, we can tell that the two religions, this novel talks about are Christianity and the Igbo. Christians being the white and the other being a local African tribe called the Ibo tribe who follow a set traditional actions. As we know from reading the book, the Christians think that they are doing good for the Ibo tribe by bring in a new religion. The Christians think that their religion is more developed and is better than the Ibo tribe's because the Christians only have one God and that God does not tell people to …show more content…

All of these factors convinced many of the people of the Ibo tribe that maybe the Gods weren’t real, leading most of the tribe to convert into Christians. However, not everyone could handle the amount of change that was going on. Some tribe members could not let go of everything that they once believed in. Okonkwo was one of those people who could not let go of his old life and he also could not handle the fact that all his friends and family were changing. The conflict between the two religions was to much for Okonkwo so he ended up ending his own

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His tribes gods are manifestations of the earth and seasons and nature. Okonkwo gained his wealth by farming crops his entire life. To the Umuofia clan, respecting the gods that help with weather and rain is highly important since it is how they survive. Without their beliefs they wouldn't take care of their “home” as well as they do and Okonkwo wouldn't have turned into the man the reader sees in this novel. When the white missionaries come to their clan and try and change their belief system Okonkwo is enraged.

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Once again, Nwoye found peace away from his father when the Christian missionaries came to Mbanta, the motherland where Okonkwo and his family were exiled to. Nwoye converted to Christianity and escaped the force of his father in their household. Okonkwo, of course, didn’t support his son’s decision and was completely against Nwoye leaving behind the tradition the Okonkwo followed so deeply. A paragraph in chapter seventeen reflects on Okonkwo’s thoughts. “To abandon the gods of one’s father and go about

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Thus, it can be concluded that the African and Native American idea of the high god is quite similar with few differences in different tribes. But the main concept of both is similar because both were immensely influenced by Christianity. Christianity, being a monotheist religion, when influenced both these religions it brought in the concept of the high

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Chapter 10: In chapter 10 of Things Fall Apart, the author had purpose in all text. The text supported the author’s purpose of being a female is difficult. Females had to deal with having their thoughts or opinions not important. “There were many women, but they looked on from the fringe like outsiders” (Achebe 87).

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Okonkwo's father was seen as a failure by the Ibo culture and by Okonkwo himself, this made him fear that he would

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His father was the exact opposite of what the Igbo people stand for. Unoka, Okonkwo’s father, is a “coward [who] could not bear the sight of blood” (Achebe 6). In turn, Okonkwo became a ruthless warrior who was known across the different tribes. The worst aspect of Unoka is that he was considered to be a failure. This caused Okonkwo “even as a little boy [to resent] his father’s failure” (13).

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