Postcolonial Period & Postcolonialism

What is Colonialism?

Political Domination of Another People No decisions that aren’t agreed upon by

British The Establishment of a Government

Rulers actually selected by Britain Large-Scale Religious Conversion

Christianity acceptable, civilized

Forced Economic Dependence Raw materials sold to Britain (cheap) Final product sold to colonies (exp.)

The Building of an Infrastructure (roads, railroads, hospitals, schools, etc.)

What is Colonialism?

Justifications for Colonialism

Economic Colonialism provided a huge natural

resource base for small European powers

Colonies provided ready markets for finished products

Religious: The need to spread Christianity

Cultural: “The White Man’s Burden” British civilized, correct religion felt the need to save other souls

Justifications for Colonialism

The British Empire in 1914

Colonial Africa

Post Colonial Africa

Postcolonialism (1940’s - ...)• Intellectual discourse to explain the cultural legacies of colonialism and imperialism

•Literature in former colonies + Post-Soviet Countries

•Deals with :• Social&political power to sustain colonies• Social, political&cultural representations of the

colonizer and the colonized• Human relations in exploited countries

To Achieve Postcolonial Perspective First step for the “colonized” is to

reclaim their own past i.e.. History did not begin with the

Europeans Second step is to erode colonialist

ideology that devalued their past

Key Terms•ambivalence: the ambiguous way in which colonizer and colonized regard one another.

•alterity: "the state of being other or different

•diaspora: the voluntary or enforced migration of peoples from their native homelands.

•ethnicity: a fusion of traits that belong to a group

•hegemony: the power of the ruling class to convince other classes that their interests are the interests of all

Key Terms•hybridity: new transcultural forms that arise from cross-cultural exchange

•mimicry: the means by which the colonized adapt the culture

•orientalism: the process by which "the Orient" was constructed as an exotic other by European studies and culture.

•other: the social and/or psychological ways in which one group excludes or marginalizes another group

Key Terms•subaltern: the lower or colonized classes who have little access to their own means of expression

• Eurocentrism / Western Logocentrism ???