Christianity and Western civilization-what countless crimes have been committed in thy name!
NGUGI WA THIONG'OPeople went to war as a result of it and even today, every Sunday.
More Ngugi wa Thiong'o Quotes
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What is translated from English and into English – and in what quantities – is a question of power.
NGUGI WA THIONG'O -
Another phenomenon developing in Kenya is ethnic cleansing – and that’s the thing that has made me very sad. Because some people will use the cover of the problems of rigged elections to do things that are unacceptable like ethnic cleansing and displacement of people. It’s completely unacceptable.
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A person who acquires English has access to all the things that that language makes possible.
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It was a revelation for me, in a practical sense, that you could write in an African language and still reach an audience beyond that language through the art of translation.
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Those 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
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You get another person who operates only in an African language and there are many persons who operate only in African languages; he or she is excluded from all the goodies that come with English.
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The same questions are there in Native American languages, they’re there in native Canadian languages, they’re there is some marginalized European languages, like say, Irish.
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Through the act of translation we break out of linguistic confinement and reach many other communities.
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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.
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Then they begin to see through their language that the problems described there are the same as the problems they are having. They can identify with characters from another language group.
NGUGI WA THIONG'O -
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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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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How could Europe lord it over a continent ten times its size? Why does needy Africa continue to let its wealth meet the needs of those outside its borders and then follow behind with hands outstretched for a loan of the very wealth it let go?
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I’m writing for those people in Kenya, but in Irvine and in New York.
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There is no way we can survive as a nation in the world without finding unity.
NGUGI WA THIONG'O






