Passage: “The disregard for alternative viewpoints and the decision to exercise power instead of engaging in real, ongoing debate lead to destruction in ‘Dead Men’s Path.’ Here, [Chinua] Achebe focuses on a black African, Michael Obi, who, under the influence of white educators, adopts a position of arrogant superiority in relation to his countrymen and their values. Obi assumes that his people’s ‘evolutionary’ destiny is simply to become more like Europeans. After being appointed the new headmaster of Ndume village school, he becomes intent on imposing his ideas, which he perceives as progressive, on a community that happens to value its traditions. By the end of the story, his disdain leads to social unrest. Obi could be described as one who accepts what Frantz Fanon has termed ‘the colonizer’s invitation to identity,’ an invitation that reads, ‘You’re a doctor, a writer, a student, you’re different, you’re one of us.’”
Directions: Write a paragraph that includes
1) a summary of the scholar’s main idea(s),
2) a sentence using a direct quote from the passage, and
3) a sentence where you paraphrase from the passage.
Make sure to include an in-text citation in MLA style where appropriate.
