Misinterpretations About Africa

Africa has long been the target of an unfathomable amount of stereotyping. People often perceive it as an impoverished continent suffering from decades of severe conflicts, diseases, and environmental problems. These widespread negative public images of Africa stem from common social ideas as well as our life experiences and beliefs. John Iliffe (one of the preeminent historians of Africa in the twentieth century), described Africa as an abandoned and inhospitable place. His inaccurate views about Africa are challenged by the two travelers in nineteenth century, Muhammad al-Tunis and William George Brown, who portrayed Africa as a thriving place with abundant resources. After examining the two excerpts written by the travellers, it is clear
According to John Iliffe, the poor environmental conditions, such as ancient rocks and poor soils in Africa, made it impossible for agricultural productions.1 He mistakenly thought that the many problems that were harming the residents consisted of living with limited food and water. This argument is challenged by Muhammad’s experience in Africa. In Muhammad’s travel account, he expressed his inner thoughts and gustatory responses about typical food of Africa. When he was first presented with the food weykeh, which was used to welcome guests, he felt it was impossible to touch and eat it because it was so stinking and disgusting to him. However, it was considered as a great delicacy to the African residents, who think of weykeh as a favorable and healthy food. It is understandable that people from different cultures have different senses of taste, and they might react differently to various foods that are provided. Foods such as weykeh and un-winnowed millet might be perceived as untypical and even intolerable to people from another culture, but Africans enjoy them. This experience demonstrates that just because the nonresidents (like Muhammad) didn’t enjoy the local food of Africa, since the food of their culture was so much different, it does not mean that there is a shortage of food and natural resources in Africa. Later in the article, Muhammad wrote about how he was also served with other natural
In addition, William George stated that there was an ample amount of water that had always been supplied to the residents. “The wells which are dug for domestic consumption, except during the rainy season”, 3 “the rainy season lasts from before the middle of June to the middle or end of September”,4 and "I have observed that the rain, which is generally very heavy.”5 These descriptions of usage of water resources indicate that there was a great amount of water available for daily use. Therefore, these facts opposed John Iliffe’s assertion about lack of resources in Africa. Regardless of the conflict of individual perspectives on the food, the evidence proves that Africa was indeed habitable with sufficient resources such as food and