Colonialism In Waiting For The Barbarians

In The Colonizer and the Colonized, Albert Memmi presents his arguments on the benefits and problems of assimilation of the colonized. According to Memmi, bilingualism of the colonized is a benefit and a problem for the colonized. In addition, he illustrates how self-rejection, self-hate, and shame are problems of assimilation by the colonized. After providing evidence of Memmi’s arguments, I will analyze whether the arguments he provides on the answer of assimilation in his book still hold up in modern society. Although Memmi provides pros and cons to assimilation being the answer to colonization, there really is no benefit if it means that suffering is the root cause of one choosing to assimilate to the oppressors.

In The Colonizer and the Colonized, Albert Memmi’s essential argument is that the collapse of colonialism is inevitable. According to Memmi, there are only two answers for the colonized to disrupt the system of oppression. The two possible “solutions” are assimilation and revolt. In response to the marginalization of the colonized, both answers carry a high price. In Memmi’s eyes, neither will work in the end. The first of two answers on the road to collapsing colonization is assimilation. Imitation and compromise are not the answer to decolonizing, for neither the colonized nor the colonizer.

Prolonged cruel or unjust treatment or control produces oppression.Oppression is at the foundation of many of the most serious engagements in the world today. The negative aspects that steam from oppression are unbearable to fathom. Oppression is a situation where an individual, group, society, culture or state, have supremacy, be it economic, military or political; and exercise that influence to detriment, and or suppress those who do not. In fewer words the process is total control. Oppression focuses directly on the command that gives an entity the influence to discriminate against another. The mere perception of another group's existence can produce discrimination; in this case Hitler’s reign of Holocaust, which included the horrors of Nazis during World War II. Night by Elie Wiesel is his own private interpretation of his experiences in Nazi controlled reign including the unpleasant life in concentration camps. The account begins towards the end of 1941 and registers his experiences of the unimaginable terrors committed by the Nazi’s during World War II. For instance, Peter Longerich so plainly puts it as, “The Nazi view was that the harmony of the national community to which they aspired would permit the resolution of virtually all the major problems of their age, whether they were aspects of foreign or domestic policy, social, economic, or cultural in nature. It was not possible to establish such a racially homogeneous community because it was based on erroneous

Classical Colonialism occurs when metropolitan nations fuse new territories or peoples through means which are virtually involuntary such as war, conquest, capture, and additional forms of enforcement and control. (Biauner 1987,150) Classical colonialism is distinguished by economic exploitation, forced entry, and cultural imperialism through the establishment of new institutions and methods of thought. (

The Age of Imperialism was an age of colonization for European countries. It began in the mid-1800s and ended in the early twentieth century. The most powerful countries of Europe raced to conquer and change the government, economic system, and social ways of Asian and African territories. But imperialism wasn 't wonderful, especially for the colonies. Innocent people were enslaved, forced to work all day long under no other options. Resources were exploited, stolen from people who couldn 't defend themselves from powerful new European weapons. Valuable cultures diminished as foreign lands took over and changed intriguing and unique languages and religions. Sickness spread to natives who hadn 't built up the immunity to deadly diseases.

When a central power comes in and dominates the surrounding land and people it is referred to as colonization. In some cases it can lead to a positive outcome but more so than not it has a negative repercussion. In “Heart of Darkness,” “The Powwow at the End of the World,” and “Heritage,” both the colonizer and the colonized experience negative consequences that force them to change their views on the world.

Blauner states that Colonialism occurs when metropolitan nations fuse new territories or peoples through means which are involuntary, such as; war, conquest, capture, and additional forms of enforcement and control (cited by Stevenson,1999). Economic exploitation, as well as, forced entry, and cultural imperialism through the establishment of new institutions and methods of thought, are what distinguishes Colonialism. (Stevenson,1999). More specifically Settler Colonialism is a perpetual social and political structure in which colonizers come to a place, claim it as their own, and do whatever it takes to vanish the Indigenous people who already reside there (Arvin, Tuck & Morrill, 2013). This presentation will discuss the ways in which the European people overtook Canada and colonized the Indigenous women of Canada. This presentation shows that the indigenous women have not been submissive throughout the process of colonization, and the presentation will explore their acts of resistance (Stevenson, 1999). It will also exhibit how social systems have continued to perpetuate a state of colonization on the indigenous women of today. The social systems that perpetuate the colonization of the indigenous women are; heteropatriarchy, racism, and sexism (Stevenson, 1999). Lastly, the presentation will demonstrate how these systems intersect to form oppression of the indigenous women, while creating power for the European colonizers of Canada.

“Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed” (Wiesel 43). Dehumanization made the holocaust possible and even evil things on a daily basis are made possible by this. This process affected guards in “A Pirandellian Prison” as well as the prisoners, the guards and prisoners in “Night”, and people around the world today who are bullied. People who victimize others can do this because doing so increases their self concept and decreases how they feel about harassing “subhumans”. The guards in “A Pirandellian Prison” were also victims of dehumanization.

Humans have adapted to different belief systems that allow them to express their religions in cultures in different ways. Over historical colonialism, Christianity and Catholic religions have arisen as the “dominant” religions, and indigenous people have suffered from trying to be converted to these religions and becoming Europeanized. Natives, however, have had an entirely different mindset and belief of how life and the world work. Their culture and religion believe that The Great Spirit has created this universe, which they seem to acknowledge as being very powerful and something that is invisible. This belief system is much different than the things that are taught in Catholicism and practiced in European countries.

When people reflect on New Imperialism—the era when Europe colonized Europe—they recall the horrors perpetrated by France, England, and Belgium, and they are slow to forget the torture and the cruel injustice those countries labeled “progress.” However, no one seems quick to remembe rremember generous settlers who, like Mary Slessor , saved many childrens’children’s lives, and easily dismissed are the soldiers who prevented widowed women from being burned alive. Even though it may have had a large negative effect on much of Africa, New Imperialism also presented a positive impact as well; it welcomed an entire continent to international culture, put an end to the natives’ cruelty toward their own people, and, most importantly, furthered the work of the Lord.

It is a common thing: an innocent, kind, humane person joins the military, goes to war, and comes back as a psychological disaster. They either become paranoid, depressed, anything to this nature. However, there are also individuals who go to war with prior psychological conditions. In J.M. Coetzee’s novel “Waiting for the Barbarians”, is reflective of these two situations. In the novel, war breaks out between an Empire and a group of nomads, the barbarians. In between all of this, is the protagonist, the magistrate, a man with a position of power in the military, who opposes the war. Much like actual war, there is an array of different psychological disorders portrayed through the characters, with some characters having disorders before

“negotiate not only the imbalances of their relations with their own men but also the baroque and violent array of hierarchal rules and restrictions that structured their relations with imperial men and women” Clintock p.6). Exploitation is the colonizers logo and women in this novel are being manipulated for the benefit of the patriarchal society in the same manner the colonizer deploys the colonized for his own means.

If prompted with the question what is colonization and or how did Europe and America colonize different countries and peoples the answer might be as simple as: it was the process of taking land from other countries and pushing to change the peoples of those countries towards western ways. This answer is to simple, a lot of people do not know the motives behind colonizing another country. Even though the motives behind colonizing another country depend on the time and location of the colonizing, Europe and America have always set above every other country around the world. They title themselves as being superior to all others. Thus, a lot of countries bought into the western ways and believe Westerners to be “demigod”. In Michael Adas essay, Contested Hegemony: The Great War and the Afro-Asian Assault on the Civilizing-Mission, even though the focus is on the ups and downs of colonization in Asia and Africa. The essay looks at the motives behind colonizing these peoples, why some bought into the idea and how World War One changed everything for Europe, Asia and Africa in terms of colonization.

In the Season of Migration to the North, Tayeb Saih portrays the heavy issues of sexism and colonialism through the role of women. The book not only informs its readers of the stereotypical gender roles, but it also illustrates the truth behind colonialism as a conquest of a people often enslaving them mentally and leaving them empty. According to this lens, the gender roles of men like Mustafa Sa’eed and Wad Rayyes represent the colonizers who ravish the colonized (personified by the female characters). Salih’s men are primarily sexual beings who see women as theirs to conquer while the women are meant to be subservient to sexual conquest.

Colonialism is the act of gaining political control of another country and occupying it with settlers. Communal disintegration is the tendency for society to decline over time due to the lapse of traditional social support systems (“Colonialism”). The disintegration of a community can happen because of many different kinds of reasons including colonialism. Colonialism can be seen as a cause of communal disintegration in both Wole Soyinka’s Death and the King’s Horseman and Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart.