Eh The Danger of a Single Story

Metaphors

1) ‘They stirred my imagination‘

2) ‘They opened up new worlds for me‘

3) ‘We regain a kind of paradise‘

1) & 2) Shows her discovery of how impactful something can be with the right representation, and when put down into words, just like this text

3) Ending on a metaphor highlights the importance of stories and how powerful they are

Short Paragraphs

‘She assumed that I did not know how to use a stove‘

Puts a focus on this particular segment, as this is a speech, it allows the words to sink in, and the audience to contemplate her reaction to this assumption

Short Sentences (repeated)

1) ‘I’m a storyteller.’

2) ‘Stories matter.’

3) ‘Many stories matter.’

1) & 2) & 3) keyword, story to emphasise how powerful stories can be to audiences, especially on their understanding of particular groups

Lists

‘I wrote exactly the kinds of stories I was reading: all my  characters were white and blue-eyed, they played in the snow, they ate apples, and   they talked about the weather…’

These are highly descriptive and demonstrate how single stories were passed onto her, that stories couldn’t have characters that looked like her as she was engaging in English + American literature

Collective Pronouns

1) ‘We didn’t have snow, we ate mangoes, and  we never talked about the weather’

2) ‘… how impressionable and vulnerable we are in the face of a story’

1) “We“ refers to her African upbringing, and shows a contrast between her reality and what she had been reading. This shows how she could barely relate to what she was reading

2) “We” is also used to convict not also other, but also herself

Personal Pronouns

‘I’m a storyteller’

+ repeated uses of ‘I’

States facts, as it is relating to her life. Makes it more personal which helps to engage readers,

Plosive Alliteration

‘Her default position towards me, as an African, was a kind of patronizing, well-meaning pity,’

Suggests anger towards the stereotypical views and ignorance displayed by her American roommate, she sees them as condescending

Juxtaposition

1) ‘His mother showed us a beautifully patterned basket … that his brother had made. I was startled. It had not occurred to me that anybody in his family could actually make something. All I had heard about them was how poor they were.’

2) ‘Stories can break the dignity of people, but stories can also repair that broken dignity‘

1) Adichie contrasts the beautiful creation with her assumed views on the capabilities of Fide’s family and their poverty

2) Used to show people that rather than using stories to demonize or destroy the people as a demographic, instead it should be used as a means of empowerment, to repair the dignity once broken by false views

Emotive Language

1) ‘What this demonstrates, I think, is how impressionable and vulnerable we are in the face of a story, particularly as children‘

2)

Direct Speech