Arts/Literary
Why Art, Literature Are Vital To Democracy
Why are we here? Why
was I created? What’s the purpose of this thing called life?
To artists, whose essential purpose is creation, these grand questions are felt profoundly — the human condition is our stock in trade, even if it’s incredibly privileged to ponder it as one’s profession. As millions struggle to make enough money to eat, we struggle to make art. This is why every serious artist, at some point, questions: is what I do useful, or relevant to everyone — or is it simply luxurious?
As a creative writing practitioner and teacher, I wrestle with this constantly.
Beauty, identity, discourse, documentation, exaltation, or even just exposing a stink does indeed benefit humanity. But when the climate is changing alarmingly, and millions displaced by war are unwelcome in most places, and our leaders increasingly justify abusive power, it’s easy to question the value of telling stories or building sculpture. After all, what does a painting give to the populace? How can a writer take on a president?
Uncovering Larger Truths
The answers, perhaps, are found in art itself. One success proves the potential of all the rest.
If you remember in 2003, when U.S. Secretary of State, Colin Powell, was to deliver to the United Nations a declaration of war against Iraq, the tapestry depicting Pablo Picasso’s Guernica was covered up. It was said that the image of the fascist bombardment of civilians was too shameful to face. How could we discuss an unprompted war in front of one of history’s greatest rebukes to warfare?
The details, however, were apparently more mundane. Camera crews had simply worried about the cluttered background the cubist tapestry would present behind speaking officials. And the number of journalists attending the press conference had swelled, requiring a more capacious venue down the hall.
Those facts, it is said, were behind why Guernica was censored (so to speak). Yet the covering of it, for whatever reason, uncovered a larger truth that resonated around the world. The implicit irony became explicit commentary. Picasso had unveiled the image in 1937, yet 66 years later, and 36 years after his death, the painter was still speaking to us.
A Matter of Words
At New York University’s campus in Abu Dhabi, where I am a professor of literature and creative writing, one of my courses examines books that sought to accomplish what Guernica did. In “Novels That Changed the World,” my students wrestle with the few fictions that stretched beyond personal or literary influence and launched revolutions, addressed colonial abuse, improved public policy, forged cultural identity, or challenged repressive dogma. The 10 books span nearly a century and a half, by writers from around the world, yet, from Uncle Tom’s Cabin to The Satanic Verses,each shares a vital characteristic.
In 1896, the Filipino national hero Jose Rizal was tried for rebellion, sedition, and conspiracy, for satirizing the abuses of the colonial Spanish friars in a saga that started with his novel, Noli Me Tangere.
We all know how that turned out — he was executed by firing squad on the eve of the revolution that ousted Spain but was later hijacked by America.
In the early 1930s, Erich Maria Remarque’s honest condemnation of war, All Quiet on the Western Front, resonated around the world — so much so that a club-footed, insecure little man named Joseph Goebbels orchestrated mobs to attack the screenings of the film-adaptation. It was one of the first displays of Nazi thuggery. Thousands angrily set upon cinemas across Germany and Austria, which led to a ban on the film and the novel’s burning. Goebbels dubbed such attacks as a “cleansing of the German spirit.” Remarque’s citizenship was eventually revoked and he fled his own country, while the regime pursued its lethal attacks on “non-people.”
We all know how that turned out — millions were killed systematically as a continent was devastated by war.
In 1989, Salman Rushdie published a novel that, he said, criticized “a powerful tribe of clerics” who had “taken over Islam” — the religion of his upbringing. “These are the contemporary Thought Police,” Rushdie wrote even before a fatwa was declared by Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini, who was irritated at having his past exile satirized — portrayed in the book as an exiled imam aspiring to power. Khomeini condemned the book as a tool of the “world devourers” with the “entire Zionism and arrogance behind it”— a “calculated” plot on behalf of “colonialism.” Rushdie went into hiding, and those associated with the publication suffered murders, stabbings, shootings, arson, and bombs. This was, according to Khomeini, “so that no one will dare to insult the Islamic sanctity.”
We all know how that turned out — with many people now convinced that “free speech is responsible speech,” despite the fact that what is supposedly “responsible” will always be dictated by the powerful.
In my course, my students discovered that each novel on our reading list spoke against the injustices of its time, and in doing so highlighted the injustices of today. We found in every book a stubborn insistence on speaking out.
Everybody Raise Their Hands
Silence, it is said, implies consent. But that’s only half the story. Silence also confirms oppression, because the ability to speak out is too often a luxury of the privileged.
The aggressive populism we see today seems to be a testament to people refusing to be silent — and rightly so. Our societies have largely failed to provide equally for all, and technology now gives us new avenues through which to be heard, and with which to rebel against repressive ideas and structures. New leaders have latched onto that and now seek to speak for us, even though many of them are rallying us crudely around fear and mistrust.
But there is hope where there is life, even such as it is now. Because it reveals potential. This is where, counter-intuitively, literature and creative writing come in.
In 1969, Lee Kuan Yew, the president of Singapore, famously said: “Poetry is a luxury we cannot afford. What is important for pupils is not literature, but a philosophy for life.” In this, the founding father of that impressive small nation was wrong. A philosophy for life is precisely what literature teaches us.
You need only open a book, from oldest scripture to contemporary novels. Moses refused to be enslaved, Odysseus spoke truth to power, Atticus Finch did not compromise justice, and Hermione Granger showed us how things are done. Plato imagined a just nation, Thomas Paine proved the importance of universal human rights, and John Stuart Mill empowered the individual and revealed the necessity of freedom of expression.
It’s all there on paper and in the ether. The self and society, tragedy and triumph, right and wrong, values and ideals — Lee Kuan Yew’s philosophies for life are easily accessible through bookshops, libraries, and the internet.
Yet while it’s conventional that wisdom exists in literature, creative writing has always been seen as more rarified or intimidating. It has been celebrated as personally palliative, yes, but it’s never been considered a method to increase participation in society. After all, what good is composing poetry and writing stories when you need a job, or a nation must be founded, or a war has to be won, or cancer is ravaging the bodies both human and politic?
But creative writing can be anyone’s best training for speaking out — and if you’ve ever read novels, heard scripture, watched movies or TV, listened to songs, or learned folklore, then you’ve been studying your entire life how storytelling works. By applying your hand at creating it, you are not just attempting art, you are learning vital skills and life lessons.
Fiction teaches us about characters and empathy, plot and consequences, and the value of nuance to truth. Poetry teaches us how to distill language, value silence, and understand metaphor. Non-fiction (which certainly includes journalism) teaches us accountability to facts, critical thinking about the systems in society, and the importance of getting out into the world to listen to others. These are but a few of the skills one learns from writing creatively.
Are those life lessons not vital to democracy? To have a voice is to have a vote. To have a vote is to be represented in society. To represent ourselves clearly and confidently empowers us citizens to air our own concerns and our community’s grievances, to be accountable for ourselves, and to demand the accountability of our leaders. If we are not trained to articulate our arguments properly, we will never be heard legitimately, and we can be ignored too conveniently.
Speaking Of Democracy
My own philosophy for life comes from the art of storytelling. I persevere in participating publicly in a hostile world by knowing that good always outweighs evil. This seemingly naive notion is proven by the stories every despot or mass murderer must tell of themselves.
Adolf Hitler, for example, was convinced of his righteousness; he loved his dog Blondi, was proud of his country, and thought noble ends justified his violent means. Similarly, the terrorists who flew airplanes into the World Trade Centre on September 11, 2001, did so for a glory they believed was far greater than themselves; they must have thought they were heroically righting a historic wrong. The notion of good always prevails, even in warped minds that are objectively proven to be evil.
What’s perilous, however, is when such corrupted stories are believed by others. In the Philippines, where I am from, a subtle war is taking place — one of narrative; righteousness is its abiding theme.
The dictator Ferdinand Marcos, who stole billions of dollars and denied democracy for more than a decade, is having his story posthumously recast by his children and their allies who benefit from his undemocratic legacy. Fake news sites and online propagandists are being recruited by the powers that be to undermine human rights, due process, and the checks and balances required for democracy — that system that still remains our best course towards equality and the only method to ensure the bloodless removal of leaders who may turn abusive.
History, it’s said, is written by the victors, and in so being it all but guarantees that they remain the victors. This is why it’s estimated that some 80% of our higher elected offices in the Philippines remain in the hands of dynasties — which are family businesses that will always present a conflict of interest between kin and country. The story is theirs to tell.
This is why I write for newspapers, write novels, and teach creative writing. I see it as the long game — a dialogue with the subsequent generations who will hopefully learn from our mistakes of the past. Yet sometimes it feels that our leaders are so entrenched that an artist’s only recourse is to have the last word — to be brutally honest and mocking in judgment in works that we hope will outlive even the bronze statues these leaders erect to themselves. But there’s defeat in even that; in the Philippines we’d call that konswelo de bobo— the consolation of the stupid. The last word may be consolingly and powerfully final, but it’s still retroactive.
What would be proactive is helping others develop strong voices so that we citizens are no longer just arguing fallaciously on Facebook and Twitter over the daily outrage, while unsatisfactory leaders ride our division towards the next election.
The antidote to impunity is accountability. We all know that. But accountability can only be demanded if our voices have consequence. A lone voice, or the voices of the educated elite, cannot legitimately speak for the voiceless, and so cannot be truly consequential. If a voice is a vote, then they must be raised, as a majority, in demanding truer representation and better leadership.
So there is clearly work to be done. Not all art must be inclusive, but no art should be exclusive. Neither literature nor creative writing must ever be privileged as a luxury, for our story will be too easily controlled that way. And while art itself might not change the world, it’s abundantly clear that it can empower those who will.
This article, written by a Professor of Literature and Creative Writing, New York University, Abu Dhabi, was first published in 2017 as part of the World Economic Forum on ASEAN.
By: Miguel Syjuco
Nation building is a dynamic process involving all segments of the locality, including the often-overlooked and undermined youth population. Youths represent a vast and often untapped resource for immediate and long-term community development efforts. They also provide an invaluable resource for the progress of any society as well as its development. As youths are brought into and connected with national issues and programmes (they have often times been ignored/excluded), they can participate actively and contribute to decision-making at multiple levels.
As youths are engaged in more sustained positive relationships with adults, other youths and national development programmes, apart from realising that they are valued citizens of their nations, such collaborations and participation may lead to skill enhancement, empowerments and confidence-building traits, which will help prepare them for active interest and involvement in nation-building (even in future).
The total population of those between the ages of 15 and 34 was about 30 million in the 1991 census, equivalent to one of every three Nigerians. It was projected that by the year 2000, the total population of this category of young person’s would be about 38 million (National Youth Policy, 2001). In 2006, a nation-wide population and housing census was conducted to update the records. It indicated that the youth profile in the Nigerian population has tremendously improved to 53 million (NPC, 2006).
Apart from the issue of numerical strength, global trend is towards emphasising the primacy of youth in the developmental process, with deliberate efforts by national governments to create conditions that will encourage youth to utilise their energies and resourcefulness for growth and sustainable development of their nations. It was in the light of this development that the Nigerian Youth Organisations in their memorandum to the last National Political Reform Conference maintained that:
“Nigerian youth must have a voice and must be given a greater say to contribute in the way he is governed and allowed to play greater role in leadership and governance so that at all times, he is properly equipped to assume the mantle of leadership which inevitably must come someday. (National Political Reform Conference 2005:15).
However, the prevailing conditions in much of the developing nations, especially Nigeria, have seriously extenuated the potentials of the youth as agents of social change. These challenges range from the economic and social to the cultural. The treacherous triangle of poverty, illiteracy and unemployment in which the bulk of Nigerian youths are currently trapped, has severally challenged their sensibility and has in the long run given rise to what sociologists term as attitudes of fatalism, resignation and acceptance of the situation (Heralambos, 2001). The persistence of these social problems has created an environment where youth are cheaply available for manipulation by self-seeking politicians. Poverty, illiteracy and unemployment are interrelated conditions that generate human needs and therefore constitute a state of deprivation.
As the youth continue to remain in this state, there is pent-up emotions and untapped energies. They provide cheap labour to execute the design of political gladiators and ethnic champions. In an apparent indictment of the Nigerian politicians, Togbolo (2006) observed, “they take advantage of the poverty-stricken nature of the country to exploit the people; politicians are fond of using the youth restive nature as a political strategy to have their way.”
According to Gribble (2010), “more than half of the world’s population under the age of 25 (between ages 15 and 24) are in greatest need of empowerment, those who are younger will quickly come of age and share these same needs. This segment of the population (15 to 24) is expected to continue growing faster than other segments for at least 20 more years” (Gribble, 2010). With the swelling wave of young people, access, empowerment and their engagement in nation-building becomes critical if they are to contribute effectively.
Uhunmwuangbo and Oghator (2013) suggested two (2) major motivations which have brought the converge of youth (young persons) into the policy agenda of national governments, thus fascinate and prioritised youth inclusion to the building process of any nation. According to them, the first is the global process of democratisation, beginning in Southern Europe, extending to Latin America, Asia and Africa, and more recently to Eastern Europe (Almond, 2004).
The second is the phenomenon of globalisation that has seriously challenged the capacity of nation-state to govern and which, according to Heady, et al, embodied a transformation of the spatial organisation of social relations and transaction (Heady, 1979). The combined effects of these global trends have confronted and dismantled authoritarian regimes in a decisive way, and at the same time rekindled the spirit of civil society in the political process (Suleiman, 2006).
The youth as an important component of the civil society is in the process of self rediscovery in an era characterised by the intense movement of the social forces of democratisation and globalisation. As they interact with other actors in the social system, the youth express their interest and needs, they relate with relevant political institutions and political processes to articulate their views and promote shared interest (Suleiman, 2006).
The role of education positioning and providing youth with access to effective engagement in national development which is a way of incorporating them in the decision-making process of the nation’s governance, nation-building activities where they are welcomed, with accurate and comprehensive information which will empower them to make healthy decisions.
There is no how the untapped capacities in youth can be tapped and utilised with an all-inclusive, participatory and synergy approach; thus, a suggestive dimension for involving the youth in nation-building. Youth participation, according to Cornwall (2010), refers to the involvement of youth in responsible, challenging action that meets genuine needs, with opportunities for planning and/or decision-making affecting others in an activity whose impact or consequence is extended to others. i.e outside or beyond the youth participants themselves. Rajani (1999) notes that, “it is only through participation that youth develop skills, build competencies, form aspirations, gain confidence and attain valuable resources.” This shows that youth participation therefore is a product and strategy of sustainable human development.
Youth comprise nearly 30 per cent of the world’s population. These large members of young people are an opportunity; an investment to their country. Youth participation in nation-building programmes/activities therefore is to: Strengthen young people’s abilities to meet their own subsistence needs; prevent and reduce vulnerabilities to economic, political and socially unstable environemnts; promote owership and sustainability of change interventions; help gain entry into target communites and build up trust and social cpaital.
Nigeria with over 140 million people and over fifty percent of youths cannot afford to lock out the youths if they must compete politically, technologically and scientifically in order to align itself with the sustainable development in Africa in particular and the developed world in general. Nigeria can build a strong and viable nation if and only if there is an existence of common values, beliefs, attitudes, effective leadership and a will to live together as a nation. Such transformations must allow every group (especially the youth population) to participate in the economic, political and the social spheres of the nation.
The following recommendations are discernibly based on the foregoing: Youth should be given the opportunity to develop their capacities thrugh balanced education and exposure. Skills acquisition and entrepreneurship will help reduce idleness among youths and keep them from being involved in crime and other activities that are counterproductive in nation-building. Youths should be made relevant and involved in leadership at different levels of government. We must moderate our demands on our youths and as well condition their behavior in line with our cultural values.
The youth of today must not fail this nation.
Concluded
Immanmuel Rohi
Rohi is a member of the Nigerian Youth Volunteers, Rivers State.
What happened to you was not fair. You were merely a collateral damage on someone else’s war path, an innocent bystander, who got wrecked out of proximity.
We are all hurt by life, some of us from egregious wrongdoings, others by unprocessed pain and sidelined emotions. No matter the source, we are all handed a play of cards, and sometimes, they are not a winning hand.
Yet what we cannot forget is that even when we are not at fault, healing in the aftermath will always fall on us and instead of being burdened by this, we can actually learn to see it as a rare gift.
Healing is our responsibility because, if it is not an unfair circumstance it becomes an unlived life.
Healing is our responsibility because unprocessed pain gets transferred to everyone around us, and we are not going to allow what someone else did to us to become what we do to those we love.
Healing is our responsibility because we have this one life, this single shot to do something important.
Healing is our responsibility because if we want our lives to be different, sitting and waiting for someone else to make them so, will not actually change them. It will only make us dependent and bitter.
Healing is our responsibility because we have the power to heal ourselves, even if we have previously been led to believe we do not.
Healing is our responsibility because we are uncomfortable, and discomfort almost always signals a place in life in which we are slated to rise up and transform.
Healing is our responsibility because every great person you deeply admire began with every odd against them, and learned their inner power which had no match for the worst of what life could offer.
Healing is our responsibility because “healing” is actually not returning to how and who we were before, it is becoming someone we have never been, someone stronger, someone wiser, someone kinder.
When we heal, we step into the people we have always wanted to be. We also are not only able to metabolise the pain, we are able to effect real change in our lives, in our families, and in our communities. We are able to pursue our dreams more freely. We are able to handle whatever life throws at us, because we are self-efficient and assured. We are more willing to dare, risk, and dream of broader horizons, ones we never thought we would reach.
The thing is that when someone else does something wrong and it affects us, we often sit around waiting for them to take the pain away, as though they could come along and undo what has been done.
We fail to realise that in that hurt, we had the most important lessons of our lives and the fertile breeding ground upon which we can start to build everything we really want.
We are not meant to get through life unscathed.
We are not meant to get to the finish line unscarred, clean and bored.
Life hurts us all in different ways, but it is how we respond and who we become that determine whether a trauma becomes a tragedy, or the beginning of the story of how the victim became the hero.
Culled from January Nelson.
With the re-occurring traits of COVID – 19 in Nigeria, it is important that parents and gurdians take extra care of their children. Reports from Nigerian Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has it that,as from 16th to18th July, 2022, 478 new cases were confirmed and two deaths recorded.
A paediatrician and infectious disease expert, Dr Aaron Milstone at the Johns Hopkins Children Centre, has advised that it is important for parents and children to take every possible safety precautions and understand all risks and symptoms related to COVID – 19.
Dr Milstone talked about COVID – 19 symptoms in children, how to keep babies and children safe,the risk infected children may lose to others and an overview of Multi system Inflammatory Syndrome in Children (MIS – C), an unknown but serious condition that may be related to the exposure of the virus.
He added that coronavirus variants, including the very contagious omicron variant has continued to spread, particularly in areas with low rates of community COVID – 19 vaccination among populations such as children under 5, who cannot yet be vaccinated.
According to him, “For children too young to be vaccinated, and adults who have not received Coronavirus vaccines,it is important to follow proven COVID -19 precautions such as mask wearing when in public,indoor places to reduce the chance of becoming infected with the coronavirus. “Indoor activities are riskier than outdoor activities, but risk can be reduced by masking, distancing, hand washing and improved ventilation. Parents and caregivers should understand that children infected with the coronavirus can develop complications requiring hospitalisation and can transmit the virus to others,” Milstone said.
He noted that, in rare cases,children infected with the coronavirus can develop a serious lung infection and become sick with COVID – 19 and deaths have occurred. That is why it is important to take precautions and prevent infection in children as well as adults.
“According to U. S. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), it appears that women infected with coronavirus can in rare cases pass the disease to their babies. Adding that, infants can also become infected shortly after being born,and most newsborns who test positive for the coronavirus have mild symptoms or none at all and recover, but serious cases have occured.
Pregnant women should take extra precautions,including talking to their doctors about getting a COVID – 19 vaccine to avoid the coronavirus.
Milstone also noted that,there is no evidence that the virus causing COVID – 19 is present in breastmilk but because there is a possibility of spreading COVID – 19 during breastfeeding through respiratory droplets,it is very important for pregnant women to follow safety guidelines.
“Generally, COVID – 19 symptoms in children and babies are milder than those in adults and some infected children may not have any signs of being sick at all; the symptoms include cough,shortness of breath or difficulty in breathing, muscle or body aches,sore throat, loss of smell or taste, diarrhea, headache, new fatigue, nausea or vomiting and congestion or running nose . Fever and cough are common COVID – 19 symptoms in both adults and children, shortness of breath is more likely to be seen in adults . However, serious illness in children with COVID -19 is possible and parents should stay alert if their child is diagnosed with or shows signs of the disease”, Milstone said.
By: Ibinabo Ogolo
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