The Paradox of Cultural Decolonization through the Colonizer's Language in Achebe's Things Fall Apart

Abstract

An important area of concern in postcolonial studies is language. In order to redeem the culture, some African writers have emphasized the need to reclaim the pre-colonial languages and cultural modes. Writers like Achebe were only concerned with finding ways in which English could be refashioned and appropriated to meet the requirements of the new context and thus overcome the disjunction between the experience of place of the colonized and the alien medium used. Achebe in his appropriation of English wanted not only to depict his own set of experiences but more significantly to achieve cultural decolonization. What strategies and techniques has he followed to turn English, the colonizer's language into a means of cultural decolonization? The answer is what this paper attempts to provide by examining Things Fall Apart. In their studies of Achebe’s novel, critics have examined the language's role in evoking the native culture. But the significant role Achebe’s version of English played in making the novel an important endeavor in the cultural decolonization is what this paper attempts to explore.