Our lives are a battlefield on which is fought a continuous war between the forces that are pledged to confirm our humanity and those determined to dismantle it.
NGUGI WA THIONG'OThose who strive to build a protective wall around it, and those who wish to pull it down; those who seek to mould it and those committed to breaking it up; those who aim to open our eyes, to make us see the light and look to tomorrow […] and those who wish to lull us into closing our eyes
More Ngugi wa Thiong'o Quotes
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Why did Africa let Europe cart away millions of Africa’s souls from the continent to the four corners of the wind?
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The Bible in translation is being read to thousands and thousands in Africa. It is an integral part of their functioning and the way they look at the world.
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I was wondering why I was put in prison for working in an African language when I had not been put in prison for working in English. So really, in prison I started thinking more seriously about the relation between language and power.
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We can appreciate each other’s languages. And the question of being uncomfortable about our languages would go away.
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What’s good about writing is that when you write novels or fiction, people can see that the problems in one region are similar to problems in another region.
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Christianity and Western civilization-what countless crimes have been committed in thy name!
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People went to war as a result of it and even today, every Sunday.
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The Pan-Africanism that envisaged the ideal of wholeness was gradually cut down to the size of a continent, then a nation, a region, an ethnos, a clan, and even a village in some instances But Pan-Africanism has not outlived its mission.
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In terms of language, English is very dominant vis-Ã-vis African language. That in itself is a power relationship – between languages and communities – because the English language is a determinant of the ladder to achievement.
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So we’re talking about the Bible itself being a translation of a translation of a translation. And, in reality, it has affected people’s lives in history.
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The Bible has affected their lives, but in translation, since they do not read the Bible in the original Greek or Hebrew.
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What is translated from English and into English – and in what quantities – is a question of power.
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A person who acquires English has access to all the things that that language makes possible.
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I’m writing for those people in Kenya, but in Irvine and in New York.
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If a novel is written in a certain language with certain characters from a particular community and the story is very good or illuminating, then that work is translated into the language of another community.
NGUGI WA THIONG'O