An Ordinary Man explores the way colonialism has shaped identity in contemporary Rwanda. Colonial policies to rule through ethnic division have reverberated through Rwandan history, amplifying animosity between Hutus and Tutsis, and ultimately leading to the Rwandan genocide.

Paul is bothered by the failure of his country to rise above European colonialist manipulations that stem from British explorer John Hanning Speke’s superficial theories about the origins of the Tutsis and Hutus. The history of conflict thus manufactured has replaced the oral traditions of African history, especially the poems and ballads, which are “lost in the fog of time” if they aren’t passed down (17). Instead, what remains are Speke’s tall tales that the Tutsis were “the carriers of a noble line of blood” (17), while the Hutus were cursed to be slaves—silly “ideas about race [that] were to become more than fanciful stories told over port at the Royal Geographic Society but an actual template for governing us” (18).

According to tribal lore, there are indeed two main ethnic groups in Rwanda. Paul illuminates the tribal conflict between Hutus and Tutsis, ultimately tracing the roots of the conflict to a time even before European colonization, when Tutsis enslaved Hutus. European colonizers adopted this division, further empowering Tutsis and depriving Hutus of all status.