Every empire, however, tells itself and the world that it is unlike all other empires, that its mission is not to plunder and control but to educate and liberate.
Every empire, however, tells itself and the world that it is unlike all other empires, that its mission is not to plunder and control but to educate and liberate.
“(the romans) were no colonists; their administration was merely a squeeze, and nothing more, I suspect. They were conquerors, and for that you want only brute force - nothing to boast of, since your strength is just an accident arising from the weakness of others. They grabbed what they could get and for the sake of what was to be got. It was just robbery with violence, aggravated murder on a greater scale, and men going at it blind - as is very proper for those who tackle a darkness. The conquest of the earth, which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion or slightly flatter noses than ourselves, is not a pretty thing when you look at it too much. What redeems it is the idea only. An idea at the back of it; not a sentimental pretence but an idea; and an unselfish belief in the idea - something you can set up, and bow down before, and offer a sacrifice too…”
Directed by Phillip Noyce. With Everlyn Sampi, Tianna Sansbury, Kenneth Branagh, Laura Monaghan. In 1931, three aboriginal girls escape after being plucked from their homes to be trained as domestic staff and set off on a trek across the Outback.
Take a look at our interactive learning Mind Map about Frantz Fanon and Racial Identity in Post - Colonial Contexts. An online Mind Map which displays an overview and keys terms for all you need to learn for your exam.
Postcolonialism is the interdisciplinary study of the residual social, political, economical, and psychological effects of the era of European colonialism/imperialism on the countries that were colonized.
Hunters for gold or pursuers of fame, they all had gone out on that stream, bearing the sword, and often the torch, messengers of the might within the land, bearers of a spark from the sacred fire. What greatness had not floated on the ebb of that river into the mystery of an unknown earth!…The dreams of men, the seed of commonwealths, the germs of empires.
Identity through a postcolonial lens: A different History
A quest/search for identity: roots, language, culture, values, education, morals, economics, religion, conflicts etc…
A different history, Sujata Bhatt
Throughout this poem, the theme of identity is explored thanks to the theme of language, culture and other postcolonial themes. The writer is confused and, perhaps angry: she comes from India, but migrated to America. The use of the English language by the Indians disturbs her, due to their postcolonial past. She can not understand why Indians would enjoy, talk and write in the language of the oppressor.
Thus, this depicts an identity crisis. For example, the choice of the greek god ''Great Pan'', the god of Nature, shows a crisis: he is half goat, half human. This choice illustrates the theory of Hybridity by Said: she has mixed feelings about both her roots and feels part of both.
The semantic field of violence with ''murder'', ''torture'' and ''cropped'' shows how violent the colonials were during the conquering of India: there was pain, bloodshed and fighting. However, they use their language,that the ''unborn children grow to love'' which highlights the angry, confused and mocking tone of the writer. Her confusion his emphasised with the rhetorical questions and the anaphora ''which language has not been the oppressors tongue''. This questions make her reflect on her identity, but also engages us to do so.
This inner dilemma is shown, and her quest for identity is disturbed by it as she links language with identity. Furthermore, she criticises the indian culture for disrespecting the books, the trees and the god of Literature: Sarasvati.
This poem leaves us with food for thought: how do we treat language and how do we use it? and is language an important aspect of our identity?
Identity through a postcolonial lens: Things fall Apart
A quest/search for identity: roots, language, culture, values, education, morals, economics, religion, conflicts etc…
Jackie Kay, Things fall Apart-
Jackie kay is an orphan and tries to reconnect her roots by searching for her parents, but most importantly, her identity. Her quest is personal, but then became universal, with the numerous readers that related to this poem.
The first stanza illustrates the semantic field of religion, a postcolonial theme, with ''birth'' :'' lifted his hands above his head'' and most importantly ''the white mask of God''. The mask can relate to the missionaries work: to convert, it can also illustrate the multiple aspects of the Dad, as he may hide or deny his roots. He can also change his identity, due to his over overempowering faith.
This meeting with her dad, is a catastrophe as she imagined a man resembling the famous Nigeran poets such as ''Wole Soyinka'' or ''Chinua Achebe'' The alliteration in [s] ''the sun slips and slides and finally drops into the swimming pool'' depicts soft sounds, expressing this idea of ''things falling apart'' such as the title states: her quest to find her Dad, and identity falls a part and ends. However, despite their differences, the father had ''my hands'' illustrating the idea that a part of themselves is shared within the other- their identity is not harshly different as at least they have one point in common. Through her search for her own identity, and her will to reconnect with he roots, Kay learns that things change, evolve and most importantly ''fall apart''.
Identity through a postcolonial lens: The immigrants
A quest/search for identity: roots, language, culture, values, education, morals, economics, religion, conflicts etc...
Margaret Atwood, The Immigrants-
A search for one's identity, one's home. The immigrants leave their country in order to find happiness or a better way of life elsewhere. Maxime of Characters migrate, by Umberto Eco. The immigrants live a harsh life as they stay on the ''sidewalks'' of society (edward said--> the other theory, and orientalism--> carpet bags). They miss their hometown: ''the old countries recede, become perfect''. Their country is not only missed, but romanticised, and their image of them becomes fragile, as they ''dwindle (...) in a light paperweight clear''.
In addition, the maxime of ''characters migrate'' is emphasised with the theme of diaspora: the repetition ''year after year'' and ''further and further'' highlights the distance and time they traveled. Another theme explored throughout the poem is the mimicry theory by Bhabha as the immigrants hide their ''features with beards of shawls'' as they try to mimic and imitate the westerns, in order to integrate in their society.
However, all this themes and the use of language contributes to the search of ones' self. Thus, the poem holds an universal message: we are all immigrants. Therefore, this poem depicts the search of one's identity, but also questions everyone on their identity, and where they come from.
“We first learn of our world, its boundaries, possibilities, and its nature through our contact with education. In school, from both teachers and peers, we learn what is normal, and what is not; what is acceptable, and what is not; what is valued, and what is not; further, we learn who is and is not these things. We learn how to relate to other people, how to view ourselves, and how our society and culture are structured. The role of the educator is a particularly powerful one in terms of the capacity for influencing how generations of students and citizens envision themselves, their families, their communities, their country, and the relationship of these entities to the world in which they are situated.”
The control and manipulation of the educational systems is a particularly powerful and enduring manner of ensuring that the population is taught from an early age, political, social, and cultural philosophies that are conform to the desires and aspirations of the ruling powers, reinforcing the subjectification of the indigenous peoples, playing to the maintenance of colonial control, by making sure they saw themselves as colonial subjects.
“The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem with stereotypes is not that they are untrue, but that they are incomplete. They make one story become the only story.” -Chimamanda Adichie
"UNTIL THE LIONS HAVE THEIR OWN HISTORIANS, THE HISTORY OF THE HUNT WILL ALWAYS GLORIFY THE HUNTER."
Chinua Achebe
“The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.”
-Abraham Lincoln
“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”
-Nelson Mandela
-Scientia potentia est: Wisdom is power
-"ipsa scientia potestas est" ('knowledge itself is power') Bacon's Meditationes Sacrae (1597)
“Education is the key to unlock the golden door of freedom.”
-George Washington Carver
The colonizer had a secondary motivation for taking over the education of the indigenous: the “white man’s burden” according to Rudyard Kipling, his duty to civilize.
Rudyard Kipling, The White Man's Burden, 1899
This famous poem, written by Britain's imperial poet, was a response to the American takeover of the Philippines after the Spanish-American War.
negative portrayal of indigenous people
the white man’s burden
motivations for the colonizer
Take up the White Man's burden--
Send forth the best ye breed--
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild--
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child.
Take up the White Man's burden--
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain
To seek another's profit,
And work another's gain.
Take up the White Man's burden--
The savage wars of peace--
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.
(...)
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your gods and you.
Take up the White Man's burden--
Have done with childish days--
The lightly proferred laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years
Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!
This view, although seen by us to be blatantly condescending and insulting to the nations colonized, was very common at the time. Non-european cultures were seen to be in need of civilizing, and their souls in need of saving. European churches sent missions to the far corners of the colonies, setting up school where children were taught the history, language, and cultural values of their colonizers.
(ex: to this day, many congolese believe that Leopold the II did only good in the Congo, teaching them to be civilized!)
Missionaries: (key issue for african PC writers) Usually had no knowledge of local culture, disgusted by practises of polygamy, witchcraft, superstition, opposed to indigenous customs and hierarchies… Redeeming factor: oftentimes whistle blowers for violence against locals.
THE BRITISH COLONIAL EDUCATION
This leads to eurocentrism by the establishment of the primacy of the English language and literature (English literary canon: http://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/literary-canon “I did not know people like me could existe in litterature.” -Chimamanda Adichie) and, by extension, English societal and cultural values ( Cecil Rhodes, along with many others, believed that the British were the “finest race” on earth, and the more of it the occupied, the better for it.)
This british colonial education also leads to the creation of the educational hybrid (Homi K. Bhabha theory), who is detached and alienated both from his own culture, as he has received an English education, and from English society who will not acknowledge him because of his skin color and nation of origin.
In Mr Pip-
After being under German control since 1885, Bougainville was under british protectorate in the 1890’s, then Australian in the 1920’s. As such, colonialism brought British education to the island, mostly via missionaries.
“My mum knew only what the last minister had told her in sermons and conversation. She knew her time tables and the names of some distant capitals. She had heard that a man had been to the moon but was not inclined to believe such stories.”
Matilda attended school until the armed conflicts caused the teachers to flee to Rabau.
“I did not realize what a big impact the school had on my life until it closed. My sense of time was governed by the school year”
The villagers get Mr. Watts to teach the children. The reason behind this choice, is him being the last white man on the island. Although he might not be the most suited for the job, they do not question his knowledge. They do not consider for a moment that they might be better than Tom Christian Watts at educating their children.
>opening paragraph: mother shows enthusiasm her daughter is going to receive an education from the only white man on the island: “She must have enjoyed that moment [...] it cheered her up just to say it.” “glimmer of a smile”
education=promise of a future (eg: scholarship=way to escape island)
He does not refuse, although aware of his shortcomings “I am no teacher, but I will do my best.” “I have no wisdom, none at all. The truest thing I can tell you is that whatever we have between us is all we’ve got. Oh, and of course Mr Dickens.”, propelled towards the schoolhouse by the white man’s “duty to civilize”.
>”For the first time we were hearing the future was uncertain. And because this had come from someone outside our lives we were more ready to listen” p14
He begins the school year by stating “I want this to be a place of light”. This reference the 18th century Philosophers of Enlightenment, in french “philosophes des lumières”, dedicated to democratizing information, knowledge, and teaching all to think for themselves.
Mr.Watts teaches to the class partially through the reading of Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens, introducing them to the concept of being read to in English, and reading in english as the few books they had were in pidgin.
“I had never been read to in english before. Nor had the others.” “Mr. Watts had given us another piece of the world.”p21
“We didn’t have books in our homes, and before the blockade our only books[...]were written in Pidgin.” p17
=Tok Pisin, most spoken local language, one of 21 dialects in Bougainville
English #1 with 20% of pop speaking it
Throughout the novel the children are often faced with terms they cannot understand, such as adjectives concerning the freezing cold, of “rimy morning”.
”Wondering what marshes were; and what were wittles and leg irons?[...] Marshes. I wondered if quicksand was the same.”
=ill adapted/irrelevant education by colonizer?
>>>>>VALUES
>”he invited our mums to come into the classroom and share what they knew of the world”
=oral tradition, handing down ancestral knowledge, culture...
>Mother is wary: “Pop Eye should be teaching you kids proper behavior, [...] I want to know everything that happens in that book. You hear me, Matilda?” p23
“Silence is an indicator of good manners”/”girls, protect your sweet from the boys” british values, christian morals...
=what is “proper behavior”? British attitude? Christian morals? Tribal values?
>”I told her in my own words about Pip having no mum or dad or brothers, and my mum cried out ‘He is lost!’.”
=tribal system influenced by colonial administration: family values remain
Family values are very present in Bougainville: memorising family tree
Indeed, he presents the idea of being a ‘gentleman’ (through the character of Pip and of what he is to become) as:
“‘gentleman’ best described how a man should be in the world”
“He saved his white linen suit for school and that’s how we saw him most of the time, as a gentleman” this also shows that Mr.Watts is himself a gentleman, which leads to a sort of mimicry by the children, who follow his example and will later try to become themselves ‘gentlemen’
“This was new for us, and that we did it without prompting from Mr.Watts says something about the gentlemanly ways we were cultivated under his guidance”
Children are educated differently than their parents=gap, tension between Matilda and Dolores “This was the first time I had been in a position to tell her anything about the world.”
“She couldn’t even pretend to know so it was up to me to colour in that world for her.”
“The shame and fear of looking stupid was never far.”
In the poems-
CHECKING OUT ME HISTORY (John Agard)
The poem speaks out against negative, lasting influences of
colonialism, here through children's educations across ex-
colonies:
-they are taught European history:
-Often-time irrelevant to their island life
-approved by politicians: glorifies colonizing nation, reinforcing
superiority
-Receive no education about their own culture: great loss, ID crisis
-Encourages us to “check out” our own history,
COLONIAL GIRLS SCHOOL (Olive Senior)
-”yoked our minds to declensions in latin and the language of Shakespeare” / “a childhood memorising Latin declensions (For our language - “bad talking” - detentions)”
=disappearance of local dialects + learning latin might not be a priority
-”We had read Vachel Linsday’s vision of the jungle” refering to poem “the congo (A study of the negro race http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/poetry/poems/the_congo.html you have probably heard this poem before: 4mn50s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58Lfx3YG2qw )
=vision of themselves through european eyes, degrading
-”Studying: History Ancient and modern Kings and queens of England Steppes of Russia Wheatfields of Canada There was nothing of our landscape there Nothing about us at all.”
=education ill-adapted to them, irrelevant to their lives.
-british manners, “muffled our laughter lowered our voices let down our hems”
“The white man is very clever. He came quietly and peaceably with his religion. We were amused at his foolishness and allowed him to stay. Now he has won our brothers, and our clan can no longer act like one. He has put a knife on the things that held us together and we have fallen apart.”
areudirty
gummygunk
s-u-f-j-a-n-s-t-e-v-e-n-s
pixelskylines
stormborns
vaporwave
turnnoffyourmind
germansingergirl
