I have met a number of African-Americans that shrugged off Africa and said they were not Africans, that they were blacks, black Americans. One of them ridiculed Africa and told me he was not from the jungle. This class of African Americans are usually on the lowest levels of the educational or societal strata. On the other hand, I also met many strong-minded, and no-nonsense African-Americans that identify with their African roots. They don’t disparage us, African immigrants, but, do instead, like to mingle with us. They call us their brothers and sisters. Some of them who can afford it even go ahead to take DNA tests to pinpoint where their ancestors came from. One such man was a very good, specialist, medical doctor, a neurosurgeon, that operated on one of my relatives when he visited. He called his English name his slave name and told me he had no real name since he had not yet identified his tribe. Several years later, he did DNA tests and was happy to learn that he was, 80%, a Yoruba man. The exhilarated man said, “I am your fellow Nigerian”, and sought my advice on choosing a Yoruba name. I told him I wasn’t Yoruba, but referred him to a Yoruba man.
A relative of mine told me she met one “Chioma”, somewhere here in North America. Chioma was from Rivers State, Nigeria. Excited, this relative of mine started speaking Igbo, but Chioma told this relative of mine that she wasn’t Igbo, that she was from Rivers State. So, this relative of mine promptly told Chioma that Igbo didn’t want her kind anyway.
I recently read an article by Dr. Maduka Ogwueleka, titled, “5 Ways To Identify an Efulefu.” I won’t go into the details of Dr. Ogwueleka’s submissions on who is an Igbo Efulefu. I also read a small book by M. Farouk Radwan, an American-trained psychologist. Dr. Radwan’s book was titled “How to Get Over Anyone in Few Days.” While Dr. Ogwueleka focused on Igbos (or supposed Igbos) whose identities appear complicated to them and others, Dr. Radwan wrote about how to get over breakups in interpersonal relationships. However, a common theme that could be found in the two works was “identity crisis.” It appeared some people just couldn’t define themselves, or present themselves to be defined, in a straightforward and consistent manner. I once posted a photo of Major Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu, leader of the 1966 coup, who was from today’s Delta State, and I asked if he was Igbo and everybody was all over the place – various opinions; no consensus. Former Super Eagles coach, Sunday Ogorchukwu Oliseh, was once the subject of great discus and lampooning in social media when he said he wasn’t Igbo. Like, Chukwuma Nzeogwu, Ogorchukwu Oliseh was from Delta State. Many of my brothers from Delta and Rivers State speak what I understand more easily than I understand the difficult thing spoken by my friends from Nsukka and Abakaliki when they go into their dialects. I heard that I’ll even experience the same thing when I go to same parts of Benue State. I'm told that I’ll communicate with these Benue people smoother than I’ll do with someone speaking deep Afikpo dialect to me.
Why would a Chioma and an Ogorchukwu say they’re not Igbo? Why would someone with a black skin say he’s not African, and why would a jilted or abused lover find it hard to move on his or her own? I went into some articles in psychology. I will come back to what I got from psychologists, including Dr. Radwan, but we remember that, in the traditional slavery days, the slave master quickly stripped the new slaves of their identities. They gave the slaves new names, separated slaves from the same tribes and forbade them to speak their traditional languages or practice their cultural rituals and rites. It appeared the white man tied your identity to your name, your language, and did not allow you and your fellow tribesmen to keep each other company and do brotherly stuff together. In Igboland, the British de-Igboed the names of many Igbo cities. It still pains me to have to say Owerri, Onitsha, Omoba, Awka, etc. I wish I could revert to Owere, Umuoba, Onicha Ugbo, Oka, etc. There are Igbos that insist that they are Oji, instead of Orji, maybe for the same reason.
Whereas our brothers and sisters that were stolen from Africa may not have had any choice in keeping or ditching their identity once they arrived Oyiboland by force, Dr. Ogwueleka referred to those ones that did not know their own identities or who were ashamed of their identities or were tricked, blackmailed or intimidated into doubting or ditching their identities as efulefus. Dr. Radwan submitted that both classes of people were suffering from psychological identity crisis.
From Dr. Radwan’s work, I understand that identity crisis is a psychological term that describes someone who is in the constant state of searching for his or her identity. So, identity crisis doesn’t refer to the real crisis in the everyday sense of crises, but it just describes a normal stage of personality development. The black American that denies his African roots may find one day that his DNA traces back to Africa while a non-Igbo Chioma may discover that Chioma cannot mean anything but “Good God” (Chineke mara nma) and that it is not a Ga or Fante name found in Ghana or a Swahili name from Kenya. Now the real problem happens when the person fails to find a suitable identity and ends up with a fragile one, where he or she is neither this nor that in a consistent way. When plagues come for members of his or her supposed identity there’s no guarantee he or she will be spared. When goodies are distributed for people he or she is attached to, he or she is skipped sometimes (maybe, by mistake).
As soon as the person who didn't find the right psychological identity faces a big life challenge he will usually lose this fragile identity and ends up searching for a new one. To make his point, Dr. Radwan asks us whether we haven’t ever met a person who always seems to be trying new roles over and over without adhering to any of them? He explains that this is usually the behaviour of a person who is suffering from an identity crisis. He warns that identity crisis can give a powerful blow to a person’s self-confidence and his or her self-image, and hamper his or her achievements. He surmises that it’s the reason why building a solid identity is something that can make someone more confident and more solid when he or she faces life’s challenges.
Dr. Radwan worries that some people even go a step further and identify themselves with their relationship partners to the extent that they fail to get over those partners, even when those partners become very abusive. They become entangled with those partners, just because of the fear of losing the identity created for them, or attaching to an identity deemed disadvantageous.
I won’t go into the mental malady of co-dependency or the Stockholm Syndrome. Let’s leave those big ones for the experts.
This article was first published on the Facebook wall of Mazi Nwankama Nwankama.
You can reach him @ Nwankama Nwankama
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