Modernity and Progress Theme Analysis

Chinua Achebe’s “Dead Men’s Path” tells the story of Michael Obi, a “young and energetic” educator who accepts the position of headmaster of the Ndume Central School. Ndume is an “unprogressive” institution (presumably in British-ruled colonial Nigeria), and Obi is appointed specifically because of his outspoken rejection of “the narrow views” of older teachers. His wife, Nancy, shares his passion for the “modern methods” and decides almost immediately that everything in the new school “will be just modern and delightful.” Obi’s enthusiastic push towards modernization backfires, however, after he insists upon barring locals’ access to a sacred ancestral footpath that cuts through the school’s campus. Through the resultant conflict between Obi and the villagers, the story suggests the perils of disrespecting meaningful markers of tradition in the name of a subjective Western ideal of modernity.

Though it is never stated explicitly, the setting is implied to be Achebe’s native Nigeria at a time when the nation’s independence from British rule is still more than a decade away. This is the complicated colonial terrain that Obi encounters by accepting the position of headmaster and by seeking to impose his ideas about progress and modernity. When the story begins in 1949, the British govern Nigeria as a protectorate. It is important to note that while the British, during this time, left the day-to-day activities of the colony to the Native elites, they nonetheless played a huge role in policing conduct, ways of dress, social norms, religion, and education in the name of bringing the colonial subjects out of the past and into a modernity based on European ideals. Indeed, the fact that Obi has been appointed by the Mission authorities, the religious colonial body that spearheaded the creation of the school, reveals that progress is primarily signified by a rejection of traditional paganism and an embrace of Christianity. Thus, modernity is not an objective marker of progress but rather a measurement of how well a community adheres to Western sensibilities.

This, expectedly, creates conflict with indigenous traditions and a clear rift between Obi and the community he has been sent to serve. Obi is set in his ways to the point that, though he is relatively young, he haughtily thinks of himself as the best person for the job because it will “be a grand opportunity […] to show these people how a school should be run.” Obi cannot help but laud himself for how the position separates him from the other teachers at the school, whom Achebe hints are also from the “backwards” community by describing them as “older” and “less educated.” This suggests that Obi finds his colleagues’ modern sensibilities lacking: in short, they have not internalized the modern teachings of British colonial rule adequately enough for Obi. This again presents visions of “progress” as mere means to erase cultural history rather than actually improve peoples’ lives.

Upon finding evidence of a pagan ritual near school grounds, Obi promptly prohibits the use of an ancestral footpath that connects the community’s village shrine to their place of burial because of its violation of the “modern” values of the school. When questioned about this act of disrespect, Obi cites the irrationality of the villagers’ beliefs as a reason for his actions: “Dead men do not require footpaths. The whole idea is just fantastic.” This implicitly presents the villagers’ belief as juvenile. Seeking to tie modern values with the future progress of the community, Obi uses the closing of the footpath as a way to ensure that the school will serve as bastion of a narrowly defined “modernity,” based on British values, for the children of future generations to come. Nevertheless, the villagers ultimately reject Obi’s plans for modernity. In protest, they tear down the hedges near and around the footpath, trample the gardens, and destroy a school building so that Obi wakes up “among the ruins of his work.” While this may at first seem like a victory for the villagers, the story doesn’t end here. Rather, it ends with the image of the white supervisor taking stock of Obi’s failure, particularly why it may have happened, and reporting back to the Mission authorities. This gives the impression that the work of modernity will continue with or without Obi, because it is a project that is deeply embedded within the colonial authorities who make the true decisions behind the scenes. In light of this, the villagers’ victory over Obi feels less like an overwhelming mandate for preserving indigenous customs in the face of modernity and more like a brief hiatus in the inevitable colonial project.