From Gobal Post
Timothy McGrathNovember 7, 2014.
Let's say it together:
That's
easy to forget when reading news reports about the "Ebola outbreak in
Africa." Yes, there's an Ebola crisis ravaging several West African
countries, but just in case you've never seen a map before, it's a huge
place.
The problem is that the
people and nations of the African continent are too often lumped together as a
single, imaginary "Africa" that's a natural and
seemingly inevitable site of disease, conflict, and famine. That imaginary,
flat version of Africa is the one that serves as the backdrop for some of the
patronizing and eyeroll-worthy charity initiatives that attempt to
"save" it.
There
are real, complicated problems affecting some African countries, but most of
the problems aren't "African" problems, but rather, problems created
by the wealth nations that stole its people and bonded them into slavery,
colonized its land, seized (and continue to seize) its natural resources, and
created oppressive and corrupt power structures that persist in various forms
till this day.
That's more or less the perspective of a development
organization in Norway called SAIH, which, among other projects, works to break down stereotypical ideas
about "Africa" in order to solve real problems in African
nations.
Part of
breaking down those stereotypes means calling them out wherever they appear,
including among mostly well-meaning, often white volunteers who don't see how
their own impulses to help are rooted in and perpetuate the very stereotypes
that do such harm.
And so
we get this incredible video from SAIH, "Who Wants to Be A
Volunteer":
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