The African Students Association (ASA) is a relatively new organization that was started by a group of African students at Truman State University. The first Sights and Sounds program was hosted in 2001. In the 2002-2003 school year, ASA won the award for the Outstanding New Organization. Sights and Sounds is just one of the ways that ASA accomplishes its goal to educate Truman and the Kirksville community about Africa and the issues concerning Africa; this program is held during Black History month. In recent years ASA has planned the show around a central theme with this year’s being the idea of modern vs. traditional Africa with the theme entitled: Through my Eyes as an indicator that the event would share the insights of how people think about their Africa.

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Two ASA members MCed the event, which began with a welcome message from the ASA president. There were three skits that depicted situations that the students had experienced in Africa. Some students talked about an African experience or read a poem about Africa that touched them. There was a Keynote Address by a new Truman professor who is from Africa. Other entertainment included an African fashion show and a dance. The event ended with a large buffet of African food, which was all made by the ASA members. A general reaction from the audience of how well the event went, was amazing. Audience members were given a variety of entertainment acts to really have an understanding of what Africa is all about. A couple of the acts really stood out to me personally. Alexandria Smith had her talk on “My Trip to Kenya,” where she could have given us a brief summary of her mission-type trip this past summer. Instead she focused on the topic of her experiences with African weddings. She told how she was proposed to three times, one of the times in which the man was offering to give her father some kind of animal as a gift or bargaining tool. I felt like her talking about weddings was the perfect topic for the college-based audience to relate.

The other act I connected with was “The Africa you Never See on TV” by Uriel Yoemi. First he explained how the whole continent is not some dying, dry land with wild animals roaming around. He showed us pictures of beautiful buildings where he asked us to compare these pictures to how we imagine Chicago or New York City looks like-very similar. He then wanted to clear up some questions that he often gets asked such as how he knows English so well or how did he apply to Truman State University or does he see elephants and snakes everyday. While he giggled at how these questions, though wholesome, are silly to him, he answered that he was taught English at his previous African schools, he applied online (“duh” he said), and no. Uriel’s speech made my perspective of Africa change, and I know I became a little more open to how much I do not know about that entire continent.

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The main goal of the Sights and Sounds of Africa program is to educate the Truman campus and the Kirksville community on what Africa is truly about through a variety of entertainment. The entertainment ranges from dances, songs, poetry, talks, and more, which come together to present a show to inform the audience of their Africa. I believe they put on this program to share their love and passion for their original home to members of this community who are not able to experience Africa.

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For someone who has never been to Africa and who is ignorant of all that Africa has to offer, I received a true, diverse education on Africa. After the program, my eyes were more open to the diversity of the large continent of Africa. I know I am not the only one who thought of Africa as one large continent that was hot, with wild animals running around and unfortunate shelter. The program taught me that there are so many aspects to Africa and that I am not doing it justice when I group a huge continent with many countries all into one, believing that they are all the same. I learned that I have so much more to learn about Africa and that I need to be more aware of the differences and similarities of all parts of Africa and the people who call it home.

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I am overwhelmed with affirmation for the ASA members and other contributors of this program for all their hard work, effort and dedication to this amazing program. I am sure that the reason they did this was so that there could be an impact on the audience members; they were correct in thinking that. Instead of just random facts about Africa that could be easily obtained from the internet, the contributors of this program shared personal stories and experience with us to paint a real picture of Africa to the audience members. I am a better, more educated person because of this program, and I know that that is how the audience felt also.

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The idea of “sights and sounds” of anything or anyone could be adopted anywhere. The ASA formed a basic idea of sharing their beloved continent through sights and sounds in a show. Other campuses could take this basic idea and implement it for any location or organization. Anything that someone wants to share with others—sights and sounds could be used as the program technique to educate others.

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