Uzodinma Iweala Quotes

Uzodinma Iweala

Profession : Author

Birth : November 5, 1982

There are multiple levels of 'we' and multiple groups that can constitute this idea of who we are. We need to be aware of who we are including and excluding.

Uzodinma Iweala

I find the sort of unwitting European American outsider who wants to come to Africa to help is a very problematic construction. It's problematic because you don't want to tell people don't aid, don't help, when people feel a need to.

Uzodinma Iweala

It's a beautiful thing, the desire to help a fellow human who is maybe in a rough spot.

Uzodinma Iweala

No one can really relate to somebody who has given up entirely.

Uzodinma Iweala

I feel like it's not Africans who are afraid of China's rise in Africa. It's the West that's afraid of China's rise in Africa.

Uzodinma Iweala

There are some people who will tell you oil is the greatest thing that ever happened to Nigeria. And there are other people who will tell you it's the worst thing that ever happened.

Uzodinma Iweala

I think South Africa would be in a lot worse position had you not had visionaries like the Mandelas or the Oliver Tambos or the people there who came together after... both during apartheid and afterwards to create and structure their society.

Uzodinma Iweala

It takes time for people to understand how to hold leaders accountable.

Uzodinma Iweala

It takes time for people to understand how, as an individual, I can have an impact on the way that society works.

Uzodinma Iweala

The images that we see of Africa are so... that are so engrained in our minds are of this place that is terrible - like hell on earth. And that doesn't acknowledge the positive things - the many, many, many positive things - that people are doing.

Uzodinma Iweala

People don't talk about the amount of destruction in terms of human lives that happen, whether it's through slavery, or through, for example, what Belgium was doing in the Congo - the fragmentation of society that happened after that destruction of human life.

Uzodinma Iweala

I think the fact that we don't really... that the world really doesn't acknowledge how bad and how detrimental colonialism was; that people don't really try to explore it, you know, in popular media and news articles; that... that it's just kind of glossed over as this thing.

Uzodinma Iweala

We grew up going to church, and I believe in God. I don't know that I have the ability to define what or who or how God is. You know, I think that religion kind of messes people up in that regard. That's just my own personal philosophy.

Uzodinma Iweala

I don't think that one should beat himself or herself over the head if immediately you're not like Jesus Christ or, you know, Gandhi or whoever. But I think the idea is to... to look at those examples and try to... try to operate in a way that every day you live or every interaction you have pushes you further along to operating with that mindset.

Uzodinma Iweala

Sometimes you just wanna go out, see your action movie, be done with it, come home. You know, and, like, you see 'The Matrix' or whatever, you see whatever film it is, and you're like, 'Oh cool,' whatever.

Uzodinma Iweala

I hear a good song and I start thinking, 'Oh shoot. You know there's a story that can be told to this,' and whatnot.

Uzodinma Iweala

I don't think there is enough understanding of how diverse black America actually is.

Uzodinma Iweala

People just think Africa is this one thing. So if you're from Nigeria, then you're the same as somebody from Kenya; not realizing that within Nigeria, right, we have 250 different ethnic groups, right? Two hundred and fifty different languages.

Uzodinma Iweala