The use of our language and words has great power and influence in shaping not only our perspective of others but also of themselves. I recently realized that I’m just as guilty for othering, stereotyping and distortion as the European authors and writers who twisted the original stories of Non-Europeans, when we discussed the work of authors and listened to TED talks , but my blog will be based on Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED talk, The Danger of a Single Story, as I spotted similarities in it.

Coming from a lower-middle class household, in an urban area, Gauteng, the City of Gold , life was easy compared to my cousins from Limpopo, in the villages, well, that’s what I thought. When I listened to Ngozi’s TED talk, her story about Fide, their house boy, reminded me of my cousins, who I looked down upon because I lived more comfortably . I was constantly reminded by everyone around me about how privilege I was to have my basic necessities satisfied and enjoy some luxurious and how other children in the rural areas lack that. I was exposed to the typical idea of how European and Non-European children lived trough Media .The fact that I’m lighter in complexion and I look mixed race, coloured to be specific, was the cherry on top. Compared to them, I lived and looked like the Europeans, and I stereotyped them as poor forgetting their richness in our culture and traditions, which I’d lost.

 After listening to Ngozi’s TED talk , I learned the dangers of stereotypical and inaccurate representations of people. This affects the inferior group as it dehumanizes them and takes away their dignity. It also makes it harder for people to connect and understand each other because of otherness the “us vs them” mentality.