228 CHAPTER 11
long after the political structures of colonialism have been removed. A major thrust of postcolonial theory has been to establish the legitimacy of non-Western and sometimes anti-Western political ideas. Postcolonialism has therefore sought to give the developing world a distinctive political voice separate from the universalist pretensions of liberalism and socialism. (In an educational context, such thinking provides the basis for growing calls to ‘decolonize the curriculum’ (see p. 12).)
KEY CONCEPT COLONIALISM
As typically practised in Africa and Southeast Asia, colonial government was exercised by a settler community from a ‘mother country’. In contrast, neo-colonialism is essentially an economic phenomenon based on the export of capital from an advanced country to a less developed one (for example, so-called US ‘dollar imperialism’ in Latin America).
Colonialism is the theory or practice of establishing control over a foreign territory and turning it into a ‘colony’. Colonialism is thus a particular form of imperialism. Colonialism is usually distinguished by settlement, dispossession and economic domination.
In one of the most influential works of postcolonial theory, Edward Said, developed the notion of ‘ Orientalism ’ to highlight the extent to which Western cultural and political hegemony over the rest the world, but over the Orient in particular, has been maintained through elaborate stereotypical fictions that belittle and demean non-Western people and cultures. Examples of such stereotypes include ideas such as the ‘mysterious East’, ‘lustful Turks’ and ‘Asian inscrutability’. In this way, Said delineated the structures of the discourse of Orientalism, treating Orientalism as a manifestation of the wider phenomenon of Eurocentrism .
KEY FIGURE
EDWARD SAID (1935–2003) A Jerusalem-born US academic and literary critic, Said was a prominent advocate of the Palestinian cause and a founding figure of postcolonial theory. He developed, from the 1970s onwards, a humanist critique of the Western Enlightenment that uncovered its link to colonialism and highlighted ‘narratives of oppression’, cultural and ideological biases that disempower colonized peoples. He thereby condemned Eurocentrism’s attempt to remake the world in its own image. Said’s key works include Orientalism (1978) and Culture and Imperialism (1993). Black nationalism in the USA and elsewhere was one of the early offshoots of postcolonialism. Aimed at promoting black consciousness, black nationalism dates back to the early twentieth century and the rise of the ‘back to Africa’ movement inspired by figures such as Marcus Garvey (see p. 136). Black politics nevertheless gained greater prominence in the 1960s with an upsurge in both the reformist and revolutionary wings of the movement. In its reformist guise, the movement took the form of a struggle for civil rights that reached national prominence in the USA under the leadership of Martin Luther King (1929–68). The strategy of non-violent civil disobedience was nevertheless rejected by the Black Power movement.
Bettmann/Getty Images
Orientalism: Stereotypical depictions of ‘the Orient’ or Eastern culture generally which are based on distorted and invariably demeaning Western assumptions. Eurocentrism: The application of values and theories drawn from European culture to other groups and peoples, implying a biased or distorted world-view.
Powered by FlippingBook