By E.C. Osondu
In this speech, I will gently posit about the need for Ndi Igbo to embrace the Minor Musical Keys or what Chinua Achebe calls less boisterous virtues. I will also be offering a re-evaluation of the character Unoka from the novel Things Fall Apart as a character who in some way is worthy of emulation, re-evaluation and rehabilitation.
In the second part of my talk I will dare to suggest that the word Igbo may not actually be an Igbo word at all, that it may have come from another ethnic group’s way of describing Ndi Igbo and may actually be a nickname that metamorphosed into a proper name. We shall return to this but let us visit the much maligned and under-appreciated Unoka.
First unlike the name Okonkwo which is actually what Ghanaians call a day name e.g. Kofi which is the name for a male child born on Friday. Okonkwo means a male born on Nkwo market day. Beyond that, the name seems more like a placeholder and less meaningful when compared to Unoka which means home is supreme, family is supreme, no place like home. Etc. Now that is a beautiful name.
As readers, we always focus on Okonkwo’s bravery while highlighting Unoka’s cowardice and his hatred of the sight of blood. However, here again we see that Unoka was a pacifist or a peacenik in a war-like society, a man who would rather jaw- jaw than war- war. The combative Okonkwo hangs himself but his friend Obierika who is described as a thinking man survives and gives his funeral speech. Thereby, confirming the Igbo proverb that the coward stands in his homestead and points at the ruins of what used to be the home of the warrior.
I will pause here and suggest that Achebe’s Things Fall Apart for the foreseeable future may remain the greatest African novel. Not that I am not aware of other great novelists including myself. The truth is that Achebe will forever occupy the position that Shakespeare occupies in English drama. Britain has produced many fine playwrights including Shaw and Pinter who both won the Nobel Prize for Literature but Shakespeare remains the master.
We now come to an interesting but often-unnoticed distinctive quality about Unoka. He was creditworthy. Otherwise, how did he accumulate all that debt? People knew he was a debtor but continued to lend him money. We must ask why. Well, he was a man with the power of persuasion. The Power of persuasion is a part of the minor keys and needed by Ndigbo today.
Unoka was a musician an artiste and for this, he really got no respect or reward. Igbo society rewarded the strong man who was a warrior, a champion wrestler and a farmer and husband of many wives but not the artiste.
I’ll tell you a story. A couple of years ago a Governor from the east who liked to show off his love for learning would visit schools and pretend to teach Government. On this day, he said he wanted to visit the school that produced the best overall student in JAMB and NECO. The students were said to be particularly good in the Sciences
When he got to the school, he walked into the classroom and asked who was the best student in this class. A frightened boy stood up.
Turning to the boy, he asked—who wrote Macbeth?
The frightened, now sweating little boy looked up looked down and looked at the Governor and said: I did not write it sir.
You did not write it? The shocked Governor retorted.
No, sir I did not write it. My classmates always say I did stuff that I did not do because they are jealous that I often come first in class, the boy said in his defense.
When the Governor left the school, he went on a courtesy visit to the King’s palace. The Eze was honored to be hosting the Governor. They got talking and the Governor reported what transpired at the school to the Eze.
Can you imagine that I asked the best student in the school who wrote Macbeth and he said he didn’t write it.
The Eze laughed long and hard.
Don’t mind those students all they do is lie, children of nowadays are all liars. One of them wrote it I am sure.
On their way home the governor turned to his police orderly and said—can you imagine what just happened. None of them knows who wrote Macbeth.
The orderly laughed and said to the Governor: Oga just send me to that school with three of my boys from CID to investigate. We will find out who wrote it and we will arrest him and bring him to you for punishment.
So you see, Ndigbo need the artiste, the painter, the novelist, the musician and of course the trader and business person. We all need to know who wrote Macbeth among the many other things that we know. Unoka was at peace with his neighbors and with the earth. Okonkwo the man of war hangs himself, his friend Obierika the thinking man and philosopher sings his dirge.
That is to say that is to say that there is room among Ndigbo for the man of war and the man of words. To paraphrase an American president, Ndigbo should learn to walk gently but carry a big stick. The man of words would know the correct answer to the question—who wrote Macbeth?
This brings us to the second part of this conversation. This is in the form of a question—what is Igbo about the word Igbo? Please note that I am not propounding a Thesis but propounding an Argument of Inquiry. Is it possible for instance that the word Igbo was a nickname that evolved into a proper name. This happens a lot if we closely examine what I call Nomencleture Cultures among various peoples of the world. Take the term Barbarian for example. To the ancient Greeks the language of the foreigners sounded like the ba ba ba of bleating sheep.
Among the Igbo people many nicknames evolve into proper names—Ogbuagu, Dimgba, Dike and so forth. The Wawa people do not call themselves Wawa. Onicha Nmili is actually Onicha Idu na Ado. There is a community in Delta State called Ukwu Nzu. These people are surrounded by clay hills. When they walk from their community to other places, their legs are covered by a fine dusting of clay and their neighbors would call them—Ndi ukwu nzu—people of clay covered feet. This became their name. The word Benin is from the expression ile ibinu—meaning place of vexation. This nickname has eclipsed the word Edo which is what the people call themselves. Among Westerners nicknames become proper names easily e.g. Sharp, Smart, Wiley, Red, Brown and so forth. Occupations become names—Cole, Milner, Harbor, Sawyer, Baker etc, Nationality evolves into names e.g. Scott, Wales, English etc. Names also emerge from parentage—John’s son becomes Johnson, Jackson, Williamson, Fredrickson and so forth. This is even more prevalent among the Icelandic people where a new born child takes the first name of their father alongside son of or daughter of dottir.
This is a roundabout way of saying that the word Igbo may have been a nickname for the people who live in the tropical rain forest or Awon Ara Igbo in Yoruba meaning the people who live in the forest. A pejorative descriptor would have been Awon Ara Oko which means bush people. It is therefore no surprise that we find the word Igbo in the names of such Yoruba towns/communities such as Igbomina, Igbokoda, Ijebu-Igbo.
Remember that the Japanese do not call themselves Japanese but Nippon so sometimes people end up assuming the names foisted on them by others. Of course prior to the term Igbo, Ndigbo have identified themselves by other terms such as Ndi Ngwa, Ndi Aro, Ndi Ohafia, etc. Was there a time these groupings came together and called a meeting and said—we are all Ndigbo—I think not?
Another possibility is that the term Igbo was a geographical description for the location of the Igbo people. Take the expression—Olu na Igbo which could translate as East and West.
Igbo’s refer to Hausa’s as Ndi Ugwu, to Riverine people as Ndi Mba Mmili and so forth and so on.
My position is no way definitive but I hope I have opened up the opportunity for scholars and researchers in the field to ask questions. As an Igbo proverb says—the person who asks questions never loses his way.
May Ndigbo never lose their way.
E.C. Osondu is a Professor of English at Providence College in Rhode Island U.S.A., a winner of the Caine Prize, the Pushcart Prize, the BOA Fiction Prize among others and the author of novels and story collections gave this keynote address at the 20th Annual International Conference of the Igbo Studies Association at Dominican University River Forest, Illinois, U.S.A.
