Teilhard de Chardin and Senghor on the civilization of the universal

3.1.3. Against Inferiority Complex and Depersonalisation

We agree with Senghor that the African has to fight against the inferiority complex and that colonisation has helped in forging this complex in the Negro; but we will not totally free the Black man from the guilt of forging in him the inferiority complex because despite the side effects of colonialism, the African himself worsens the situation of this inferiority complex and split personality. In this light, Ferdinand CHINDJI-KOULEU affirms:

Le Nègre doit prendre ses responsabilités devant l'histoire. L'innocenter comme le fait le mouvement de la négritude, c'est le rendre passif, et par conséquent, c'est lui rendre un mauvais service. Rejeter toutes les fautes de la colonisation et de l'esclavage sur l'homme blanc seul, c'est continuer à cultiver le mythe du Nègre-bon-enfant, incapable d'accéder au statut adulte. L'esclavage des Noirs a été rendu possible par les Africains eux-mêmes, car ils ont accepté de vendre leurs frères. Et la faiblesse de leur technologie a permis la colonisation.^88(*)

The Black man actually has to face history and to accept his responsibilities. Instead of pushing the blame to the slave trader or the coloniser, he has to acknowledge that he is, at least partly, responsible for his inferiority complex because slave trade was also made possible by Blacks who accepted to sell their brothers, and colonisation was just the fruit of a weak technology.

The Negro also carries the blame of his depersonalisation because he always strives to be someone else, not himself. According to Frantz FANON, such a striving is a tragic and forlorn illusion. Fanon insists:

The black man wants to be white. The white man slaves to reach a human level...For the black man there is only one destiny. And it is white...but the white man is sealed in his whiteness, the black man in his blackness.^89(*)

It is thus true that we cannot find our identity by dreaming of becoming what we are not, by escaping from our identity. Even though caused by racism and colonialism, the inferiority complex in the African can be solved through a change in mentality. What we ought to fight is the attitude of not accepting one's own identity as black. In effect, Aimé CESAIRE observes that the Negro-African tends to reject himself and his whole ancestry which has made him into what he is. Let us listen to Césaire's expression of this denial of self:

[...] And those tadpoles which have hatched me form my extraordinary ancestry. Those who invented neither gunpowder nor compass, those who never knew how to tame steam or electricity, those who explored neither the seas nor the heavens but knew to its furthest corners the land of suffering. Those who knew only the voyages of uprooting, those who became flexible by their genuflections, those who have been domesticated and Christianized, those who have been inoculated with degeneracy, tam-tam of empty hands, innate tam-tam of resounding wounds, burlesque tam-tam of dried-out betrayals. ^90(*)

In effect, nobody can give another man an identity; one cannot even help him to find it; it is something personal: by helping him, one only succeeds in making him find a spurious identity, one which is and remains an appendix of that of his «benefactor». One can only remain oneself by oneself. Albert LUTHULI makes a similar point when he says:

It was no more necessary for the African pupils to become Black Englishmen, than it was for the teachers to become White Africans...I remain an African, I think as an African, I speak a an African, I act as an African.^91(*)

With much more regret, Ebénézer NJOH MOUELLE deplores this sorrowful state characterising the underdeveloped African. He presents the underdeveloped African as someone who is disorientated.^92(*)

In effect, the underdeveloped African is mentally and culturally disorientated and this leads to his depersonalisation. It portrays a lack of self-identity in the African, an inferiority complex vis-à-vis the European and the American cultures. In fact, the African is neither himself nor is he a European or an American; he suffers form a duality which affects his inward self.

As Njoh Mouelle observes, underdeveloped Africa is full of people wearing masks. Most Africans do not want to accept their culture as Africans and at the same time, unfortunately, they cannot be what they want to be. Most Africans feel that they have a culture which is inferior to that of Westerners.

Most Negroes who have lived in Europe and returned to their original environments convey the impression that they have added something to themselves, or that they have completed a cycle in their lives. They return literally full of themselves. Some cannot even speak their vernacular; they do not even want to listen to it and forbid it in their homes. This is because they want to feel superior; they think that the European culture is the best. Even those who have never travelled by plane or by sea claim to appreciate Western cultures locally, through the intermediary of boasting elite, television and other forms of media. This is reflected in the way young people dress, the type of films they enjoy, the type of music they like to listen to and to dance. Most of them consider the fact of speaking their vernacular very shameful and even when they speak English or French in public, they will endeavour to change the tone of their voices in order to imitate the white man's accent.

Inferiority complex reflects itself in Africa even in the domain of economics. In our markets, in order to sell an item at a high price and more easily, some sellers go as far as writing on locally made or even manufactured articles: `made in England', `made in Italy', or `fabriqué en France', `fabriqué au Canada', `made in USA' and so on. This will attract those who feel that God was so unjust that He created them Black Africans and those who feel that their culture is inferior and who spend their lives desiring with all their might to go to the above-mentioned countries and others. Ebénézer Njoh Mouelle wonders at this inferior mentality when he asserts:

Si à Yaoundé ou à Douala le commerçant se sent obligé, pour vendre ses oeufs camerounais ou ses poulets camerounais, d'y coller des étiquettes indiquant : « oeufs de France », « poulets de Normandie », c'est précisément parce que son compatriote de retour de France lui a inoculé la honte voire mieux le dégoût de ce qui est local au profit des « merveilles » d'Europe.^93(*)

We thus notice that the elite contribute a lot in the formation of the inferiority complex in their fellow brothers and this is why one would prefer to buy items that bear the stamp of a foreign trade mark.

In the light of the Civilization of the Universal, each culture, each race has to preserve its identity when seeking unity with others. Africans are therefore called upon to remain what they are, think as Africans, speak as Africans and act as Africans; while at the same time accepting those values that will enhance their identity and not lessen it. To contribute to the building up of the Civilization of the Universal, we need to accept our culture first, then choose what is good in other cultures and inculcate such values in an African personality, not trying to become like Europeans or Americans. Let us acknowledge our identity as Africans and value it.

* ⁸⁸ Ferdinand Chindji Kouleu, Négritude, philosophie et mondialisation, Yaoundé, 2001, p. 128.

* ⁸⁹ Frantz Fanon, Black skin, white masks, Great Britain, 1970, p. 12.

* ⁹⁰ Aimé Césaire, cited in Ruch, E., (ed.), African Philosophy, Rome, 1981, pp. 66-67.

* ⁹¹ Albert Luthuli, cited in ibid., p. 197.

* ⁹² Cf. Ebénézer Njoh Mouelle, De la médiocrité à l'excellence, Yaoundé, 1998, p. 43.

* ⁹³ Ebénézer Njoh Mouelle, De la médiocrité à l'excellence, Yaoundé, 1998, p. 43.