When the John Hopkins University awarded Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie a honorary degree recently, it was only validating what many who love her work have always known. The prolific writer got the honour alongside seven other accomplished professionals, including American filmmaker and director, Spike Lee.
“My advice to the graduating seniors is, eat real food as often as you can. And embrace ignorance. Say those words ‘I don’t know’. Because by embracing ignorance, you open up the possibility of knowledge,” the writer said in a video to mark the occasion.
Spike Lee, who is known for combating racial and social barriers in America through his work, began his speech with the words: “Wake Up!”
“Wake up from the sleep, wake up from being comatose, wake up from the slumber that keeps your eyes shut to all the inequalities and injustices. Do this more often in the evil, crazy and insane world we live. Let’s move our unconscious minds from the back to the front to a conscious state, and wake up.”
Lee added: “We are at a very crucial moment in history in the United States of America. And the way I’m looking at it today, to tell you the truth, things are looking dicey. It can go either way.
“I wish you could be graduating into a world of peace, light and love, but that’s not the case. We don’t live in a fairytale, but I guess the one per cent does. After you leave here today, it’s going to be real life, and real life is no joke. It’s real out here for the 99 per cent, for sure. It’s up to the graduating class to make a better world.”
Born on September 15, 1977, Adichie is a non-fiction and short story writer. A MacArthur Genius Grant recipient, she studied medicine and pharmacy at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) for a year and a half. She left Nigeria at the age of 19 for the United States to study communications and political science at Drexel University in Philadelphia then transferred to Eastern Connecticut State University.
In 2003, she completed a master’s degree in creative writing at Johns Hopkins University.
Adichie was a Hodder fellow at Princeton University during the 2005/06 academic year.
In 2008, she received a Master of Arts degree in African studies from Yale University. The same year, she was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. She has also been awarded a fellowship by the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University 2011/12.