The Atlanta Journal-Constitution,   Wednesday, January 21, 2004

 

'What we can learn from Africa'

 


Elaine Neil Orr will discuss her book "Gods of Noonday: A White Girl's African Life" at 3 p.m. Sunday at the Decatur Library, 215 Sycamore St.
For more information, call 404-370-8450, Ext. 2225, or go to www.dekalb.public.lib.ga.us/new/jan_auth.htm.
Elaine Neil Orr was born in Nigeria in 1954. Her parents were medical missionaries. She attended ninth grade at Decatur High School from 1968-69, when her parents, Southern Baptists, were on furlough. In 1997, failing health — she needed kidney and pancreas transplants — pushed her to write her memoirs. In the book, she writes about growing up in Nigeria and intersperses it with tales of her medical treatment. In 2000, Orr received her transplants. Writing about the land of her birth as she was being treated, she said, also helped her heal.
 
Now a professor of contemporary literature and women's studies at North Carolina State University, Orr spoke recently with Journal-Constitution reporter Yolanda Rodríguez about her book. Here are excerpts:
 

 
Q: You write: "What if outsiders had entered Africa with a true interest in Africa instead of out of Africa? Ah, what a difference it would have made." Talk about what that means.
 
A: The sentence is an allusion to the book "Out of Africa" [by Isak Dinesen]. I am pointing to the pattern of foreign interest in Africa, which is less focused on learning about Africa than it should be. There's an impatience. Often because the focus is perhaps on natural resources or human labor and not enough on what Africa itself already has and what we can learn from Africa.
 
Q: What can we learn from Africa?
 
A: A primary thing is about the human community and relationships, the land, our relationships with the land. That these core values — history, connections to ancestors and tradition — these are our abiding sources of power. Not money, not individual gain. Not even progress, if it means destroying or if it comes at the expense of the river, the forest, the sacred grove or the family.
 
Q: We see so much strife in Africa. Do you see these core values still coming through?
 
A: I visited Nigeria last January. It was a country experiencing tensions between the Muslims in the north and the Christians in the south. And there have been violent outbreaks, and people have been killed. It is a country very much trying to recover from years of military dictatorship. What I saw was both worlds. I still saw the world of tradition, where members of the clan meet under an umbrella tree and try to work out conflicts in the town. They try to do this by negotiation and consensus. And at the same time, I also saw ravaged towns, cities [and] roads, where people don't have the infrastructure for water, electricity, education, jobs, hospitals. So the system is broken. At the same time, I think there are very few people in Nigeria who want war in their country.
 
Q: Are oral traditions still intact?
 
A: Absolutely. There is great emphasis on art, literature, theater and dance. It's not separated from life. You don't pay to go to the theater as in New York. You have the theater right there. All those parts of life are integrated. That is something we can learn. We have to get in a car to go to any kind of artistic event. We have separated the arenas of our life — aesthetics, politics, economics, religion. In Nigeria, you can have religious rites, weddings, dance, theater in the same space. In the U.S., we build neighborhoods that don't even have sidewalks.
 
Q: What does the title "Gods of Noonday" refer to?
 
A: It's in response to "Heart of Darkness," [by novelist Joseph Conrad] that conveys the idea of Africa as a place full of evil that has been abandoned by the gods. My experience of Nigeria is a place where God dwells and a place full of light. It's "gods" because the Yoruba believe in one God, but they believe in many faces of God.
 
Q: Talk about your experiences when you were a student at Decatur High School.
 
A: When I was growing up, I thought most of the world was Nigerian and a small group were missionaries. But racial identifications were not what shaped my imagination. I never heard a racial slur until I came to the U.S. Decatur was a wealthy community. The white girls at Decatur High School wore very nice clothes, and there were the African-American children who were being bused in. I was outside any circle. The [racial] tension was palpable. I had never experienced whites and blacks occupying the same space as antagonists.
 
Q: Your parents were Southern Baptist medical missionaries in Nigeria, yet your book is filled with references to the Yoruba gods. Those gods seem to inspire you, heal you. What kind of reaction have you had from your family?
 
A: My family has loved the book, including my mother-in-law, who I would say is a conservative Southern Baptist. I have spoken to a lot of Southern Baptists, including former missionaries, and I haven't gotten any negative reaction. I'm not sure what that means. I think they like the evocation of Nigeria. I think many missionaries who have been in Nigeria know what I'm talking about is true. Nigerians who become Christians maintain many of their own beliefs.
 
Q: Do you feel displaced now?
 
A: I really feel some days there is no place for me, that my tribe is scattered across the globe and that I can't go back to life in Nigeria because of family and because of my transplants. There is no location in this country that will be as familiar as Nigeria.
 
Q: Are you a Southern Baptist?
 
A: I am a Nigerian Baptist. I have been touched by many gods or divinities, and yet I believe in one God