We Should All Be Feminists

This study guide will help you analyze Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED talk “We Should All Be Feminists”. In addition to help with your analysis, you can find a summary of the text and ideas for putting it into perspective.

Presentation of the text

Title: “We Should All Be Feminists” (2012)

Sender: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Genre: TED talk

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (b. 1977) is a Nigerian author whose novels and short stories reflect her cultural heritage and interest in African culture. Adichie is also a feminist and often explores the experience of women of color in her work. Her work is internationally recognized and has received several awards. Adichie’s TED talk “We Should All Be Feminists” was delivered to a local audience at TEDxEuston, an independent event. In 2014, Adichie published the book-length essay We Should All Be Feminists, which is inspired by her TED talk.

Extract

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Audience and medium

The TED talk “We Should All Be Feminists” was delivered by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie at an independent TEDxEuston event in 2012 in London. The TEDxEuston event is organized by a team of African professionals, who invite African leaders to speak about issues important to Africa. Therefore, Adichie delivers her speech to the local audience attending the conference. The TED talk has been also shared online and has been viewed more than five million times by people around the world.

In her speech, Adichie targets society in general. When she uses the collective “we”, she addresses both men and women as a way of showing that they are both equally responsible for the current situation in African society and culture:

We teach females that in relationships, compromise is what women do. We raise girls to see each other as competitors -- not for jobs or for accomplishments, which I think can be a good thing, but for attention of men. We teach girls that they cannot be sexual beings in the way that boys are. If we have sons, we don't mind knowing about our sons' girlfriends. But our daughters' boyfriends? God forbid...