Cultural Collision In Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart

In the novel Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, the cultural collision caused by the introduction of Western ideas into Igbo culture majorly affected are of the Igbo tribes greatest men, Okonkwo, in the way that he was conflicted with his sense of identity and struggled to fit in between the changes of accepting new ideas and staying with his common traditions. Before the arrival of the Europeans, the Igbo people thrived and peacefully lived among themselves; Okonkwo was a strong male warrior who wished to be seen as profoundly masculine and successful. With the arrival of the new culture, Okonkwo felt immensely conflicted, he lived to challenge the Europeans and all his thoughts along with what he spoke was directed against the newly arrived Christians. His unwillingness to change and accept the new culture left him with consequences to pay for. Through Okonkwo, Achebe shows the constant struggle between changing and staying with old traditions. Before the arrival of the Western cultures, Okonkwo was building a foundation of success for himself and his family in Umuofia. Left with the nothingness of shame and debt that his father gave him before death, Okonkwo strived to be a strong successful warrior that would never be referred to as weak or feminine.
This is shown when white men captured the six elders including Okonkwo and cut off all their hair to show them that it wouldn’t curse them. “The head messenger, who was also the prisoner’s barber, took down his razor and shaved off all the hair on the men’s heads. –Okonkwo was choked with hate,” (Achebe, page 195). Okonkwo was unable to accept these ideals and he waited for revenge. Throughout the novel Okonkwo and all of the other people of Umuofia struggled with the arrival of Christianity and holding on to their