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child soldier Africa, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Ishmael Beah, Kony 2012, Long Way Gone, Mende, Oberlin, Paul Theroux, Radiance of Tomorrow, Sierra Leone, Taiye Selasi, UNICEF
I’ve heard prominent authors such as Paul Theroux, Taiye Selasi, and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie speak at Politics and Prose since launching this blog. The independent bookseller continues to impress me with the number of African or Afrocentric writers it hosts. This Friday, Ishmael Beah, a former Sierra Leonean child soldier, who shot to prominence with his autobiography Long Way Gone, spoke at P&P to promote his just released novel, Radiance of Tomorrow.
Beah was resettled in the US via an intervention from UNICEF and went on to gain a degree in political science from Oberlin. I was surprised to observe how many individuals with connections to the College were in attendance.
In his first novel, Beah explores life in Sierra Leone after the conflict in that country has ended. Beah launched his remarks by noting that the Western world displays a strong interest in countries in the midst of devastating conflict. However, as soon as the security situation improves, Beah notes that ‘we drop out of the news immediately.’ I cannot stress how much I agree with that assessment. Since moving to DC, I have observed this in numerous African contexts, most notably in the Ivory Coast and Mali.
Beah then spent quite a bit of time detailing the richness of his mother tongue, Mende, the importance of oral traditions in his culture, and his efforts to capture the complexity of Mende when writing in English. He lamented the urban youth of Sierra Leone (he enthusiastically proclaimed ‘I’m a village boy’), whose knowledge of local languages is being weakened by the increasing prominence of Krio as a lingua franca. He added that the process of writing the novel allowed him to rediscover the ‘intricacies, beauties, and wisdom’ of Mende culture. He stated that he sees as Sierra Leone as the most religiously tolerant country in the world.
Beah read two passages from Radiance of Tomorrow and engaged in a brief Q and A. He spoke on his experiences as a child soldier, noting that as a student at Oberlin he continued to experience flashbacks and nightmares as a result of his experience. Paradoxically however, he noted that his service allowed him to ‘build certain characteristics’ to mask his real emotions.
Beah made numerous criticism of Western thought – the yearning for a single truth, the irrational requests of US schools for his report card when he was seeking admission to high school, and the implausible tendency to equate happiness as the absence of challenge.
He also spoke passionately on the West’s coverage of Africa and its tendency to ‘sensationalize’ and ‘generalize’. He referenced Kony 2012 and noted that ‘people feel like they can generalize anything that has to do with Africa…but guess what? That is not going to happen anymore.’ He also spoke ill of people who make brief visits to Sierra Leone, stay in a fancy business hotel, and subsequently pass themselves off as experts on the country.
While I wholeheartedly agree with these assessments, I wonder how cognizant Beah is that someone, such as a former comrade in arms, could just as easily critique an individual in the diaspora, living a relative life of comfort, appealing to the West’s romantic knowledge of African traditions (such as oral storytelling) and making a living off of their previous misfortunes.
While Beah’s criticisms of the West’s stereotypes of Africa are entirely reasonable, I was struck by the extent to which he continues to embrace Sierra Leone as his home (I think it is safe to presume that he is now a US citizen). Beah is 33 years old and left Sierra Leone in 1997. He uses ‘we’ when referring to Sierra Leone, describes its inhabitants as ‘my people’, and notes that he feels that he does not know the US well enough to comfortably write about it. He describes himself as being ‘a Sierra Leonean with some American tendencies.’
In many respects, Beah’s remarks resembled those that I heard Adichie make, although I found the conscious decision to reject anything that smacks of the ‘Afropolitan’ label to be quite intriguing. I’m very interested to know what he will be doing and writing about in five years.
Africa in DC 
Hello. I’m a bit surprised that you didn’t mention the controversy over the facts portrayed in Beah’s memoir and the IRS’ revocation of his foundation’s tax-exempt status. In 2012 charity-rater Guidestar wrote of the Ishmael Beah Foundation (IBF) that “further investigation and due diligence are warranted,” and the organization cannot be found on Guidestar’s or Charity Navigator’s website. The IBF website describes the organization as a “private, independent institution” (and not a charitable, tax-exempt 501(c)3 org.) and asks that donations intended for it be made to an entity called the “Tides Foundation,” and sent to Tide’s New York office, this for “donor tax deductible purposes.” I found a tax-exempt Tides Foundation based in San Francisco, but its IRS documents show no indication that Tides serving a fiscal agent for IBF.
I’m not laying any of this at Ishmael’s feet, but believe these controversial issues to be important considerations for any thorough evaluation.
Thanks for your comment Jeff. I have to confess that I didn’t mention this because I didn’t know that Beah even had a foundation, much less one that has been entangled in controversy.
I do know that there was some controversy regarding his memoirs, with fact checkers noting that the chronology of some of the events he relayed didn’t add up, which lead to concerns that he had not been a child soldier for as long as he indicated.
I will emphasize that throughout the talk I was a bit concerned by his tendency to constantly reference how engaged he remained with Sierra Leone while failing to speak on the direction of the country and what he experienced on his frequent visits there. Knowing now that he has a Foundation engaged in the country, I find that even more odd.
Excellent write-up. I heard Beah speak at the American Library Association midwinter conference and his remarks were much the same as the ones you’ve recorded here.
When he criticized the U.S. during this presentation, did he do it jokingly? He told the report card story to us as well, but made it very humorous.