Decolonization : The Wretched Of The Earth 250 )

Fanon also discusses the psychological effects that force can have on one in this process of colonization. Fanon finds that the labeling of people as the colonizer and the colonized can result in the dehumanization of the latter, as they are being relegated as “the other” (3). This notion relates to Weil’s definition of force as man is being turned into a “thing,” stripped of his identity (Weil, 6). Furthermore, it is stated in the piece that “the very same people who had [force] constantly drummed into them that the only language they understood was that of force, now decide to express themselves with force” (42). This excerpt assists in illustrating how the concept of force acts within a cycle of sorts, as one needs to use force in order to escape force. This notion relates back to the film The Battle of Algiers as the Algerian people, more specifically those of the National Liberation Front (FLN), had to use force in order to prevent colonization and further force from the French government. Fanon directly touches on the Battle of Algiers in his piece, stating that “mental illness and the rampant development of specific pathological conditions” were an outcome for many Algerians due to the war (216). These pathological conditions caused by colonization also relate to Weil’s definition of force as both Weil and Fanon are contending

“Decolonization is Not a Metaphor” is an article by Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang. Through the article, the attempt to explain that the widely used term, “decolonization” is not applied as the term itself specifies. According to Eve and Wayne Yang, the term “decolonization” is now used in social justice rethoric such as enhancing the quality of societies and education and schools (Tuck & Yang, pg 3). The authors argue that decolonization must not lose its initial sense and meaning because any use other than what decolonization insinuates, turns the terms into a metaphor.

1) According to Frantz Fanon decolonization is a violent event. Explain what this claim means along with why Fanon supports it.

“We cannot be held responsible that in this war psychiatric phenomena entailing disorders affecting behavior and thought have taken on importance where those who carry out the “pacification” are concerned, or that these same disorders are notable among the “pacified” population. The truth is that colonialism in its essence was already taking on the aspect of a fertile purveyor for psychiatric hospitals.” – claims Fanon. He highlights that people on the both sides (both the colonizers and the colonized) suffer from the situation, so, reasons Fanon, the problem is rooted in the situation but not in people. When you see many people with psychological and psychosomatic problems from both sides, you start noticing the pattern. After observing it for a while, you conclude that these people are victims of the colonial

Decolonization is the undoing of colonialism, where a nation establishes and maintains its domination over dependent territories. In the words of Fanon, in the reading The Wretched of the Earth, “National liberation, national reawakening, restoration of the na­tion to the people or Commonwealth, whatever the name used, whatever the latest expression, decolonization is always a violent event.” (Fanon, 1). Frantz Fanon was one of many authors who supported decolonization struggles occurring after World War II. He breaks down decolonization into two senses: one being the physical act of freeing a territory from external control of a colonizer, and the other being the psychological act of freeing the consciousness of the native from the alienation caused by colonization. Fanon particularly advocated that violence was justified by overthrowing colonial oppression. In his reading, The Wretched of the Earth, Fanon wrote on why and how colonialism must be stopped. Fanon argued that the colonial infrastructure must be destroyed. “Decolonization, which sets out to change the order of the world, is clearly an agenda for total disorder. But it cannot be accomplished by the wave of a magic wand, a natural cataclysm, or a gentleman’s agreement. Decolonization, we know, is an historical process: In other words, it can only be understood, it can only find its significance and become self coherent insofar as we can discern the history-making movement which gives it form and substance,”

Capitalism and colonialism’s links as pillars of white supremacy contribute to the racial exclusion and exploitation of certain racial groups, such as Native Americans and Black people. This can be seen through the timeline of North American history, but also farther back in the history of European settler colonialism throughout Europe and into other nearby continents. The methods of decolonization employed by various racial groups affected by colonialism interact with one another in various ways, as each group was affected differently, yet they were affected by the same instigating group of white settlers. It is important when these groups make the move to decolonize themselves to consider other groups outside their own, as interactions

During the 17th century, Europeans traveled throughout the world with colonialism on the mind. Many questioned why did they do this? What gave them this right? Why did they believe they were the superior beings while everyone else was inferior? The Europeans

Various nationalist groups propelled the decolonization process, which in turn impacted the institutions that were built for, said nations (Branch, Glassman, Straker). Moreover, many nations found that they upheld the same colonial structures that oppressed them in the first place (Shepard). In another contrast and comparison, British and French decolonization processes differed; although both France and Britain recognized that “…they were no longer world powers in the way that they had been and that they needed to adjust to this situation,” the French were very personally involved with their colonies of Morocco and Algeria which ultimately led to bloody wars, where as the British practiced a more “indirect rule” and indirect involvement in the decolonization process (Chafer, 2002, p. 11). The ways in which the colonial states were shaped had a direct relationship to how the nation state developed; and nationalism is the ideological response to what colonialism

Central to Fanon’s philosophy concerning the process of Decolonization rests the mutual understanding among both groups that their positions are the result of specific historic processes. Yet, under the oppression of the colonizers, the colonized fail to empower themselves because the colonist, “continues to fabricate the colonized subject.” (Fanon 826). This fabrication manifests in the colonizer’s use of institutional mechanisms such as education, incarceration and economic opportunity to promulgate a collective identity in which the identity of the colonized remains that of a people born less-than their oppressors. Adopting this false identity, the colonized community becomes, “a sector of niggers, a sector of towelheads,” whose, “dreams of possession,” (Fanon 827) remain dreams until those colonized peoples are able to empower themselves and overthrow the colonizer’s systems of control. Like Marx, Fanon seeks to deliberate the exact modes and methods by which the colonial system retains power over the colonized peoples, their lands, and the resources which abound throughout them. Unlike Marx, Fanon credits the direct subjectgation of countless peoples from countless nations, tribes and languages to “what race one belongs to.” (Fanon 827) The presupposition that the colonizer forever remains, “first and foremost the outsider” (Fanon 827) further supports the philosopher's absolute means of societal upheaval in that Marxist economic theories of oppression pertaining to the bankers, customs house, and elsewhere fails to account for the sociological justifications which the colonial system propagates

Aime Cesaire was a French poet, author, and politician from Martinique. In Aime Cesaire’s work titled “Discourse on Colonialism” he exposes the hypocrisy and brutality that goes along with forging empires in regards to the old European powers, which directly relates to the United States empire that the world knows so well of today. Cesaire argues that colonialism itself has never been and will not be a positive movement in which those who are colonizing had the goal of improving the lives of the colonized cultures themselves, but rather it was in the best interests of the colonists' for purely self-centered reasons such as economic

The coursework also demonstrates that the motivation for acting under the colonialist mindset can range from benevolence to arrogance to-out-and-out hatred, but the lingering effects

Decolonization is a process where in the ideal understanding of the term would be ending the exploitive relationship between the colonized and the colonizers with the intention of being s self-sufficient of the newly independent state. The romanticizing that the process of decolonization can be looked at as a significant accomplishment for the colonized is misleading, or at least it is heavily contested by scholars like Fanon who argues that the process of decolonization is one that is an inherently violent one. This Violence may be long or short term, and my manifest itself in the social, economic, ideological and political development of the state- or rather its underdevelopment, violence that Fanon offers up a solution to. Although Fanon argues for the understanding of the irrational, rational response to decolonization that is inherently violent, this essay will also look at the works of other scholars and authors like Thiong’o and Conrad in addition to other critical analysis of their work and the process of decolonization which would be essential to understanding the complex meaning of the concept of violence as it is used by Fanon. This essay will also present arguments supporting the validity of Fanon’s argument that decolonization is a violent process, and that the process of decolonization is a process that allows for the transitioning from colonialism to neo-colonialism where the colonialist become imperialist and retain their position of strength politically,

Frantz Fanon argued that during the Cold War the U.S. and Soviet Union were interested in decolonizing countries because they wanted to practice neo-colonialism, whereby they maintain power and influence in a decolonized country so they could continue its exploitation. Fanon argues that the U.S. and Soviet fleet continuously invaded Third World countries like Cuba and Laos promising them independence from the colonizers, but in turn these Cold War powers exploited these countries. For example, in the movie Burn, the English agent William Walker supported the slave Jose Dolores in a slave revolt to gain independence against the Portuguese colonizers on the island of Queimada because the English just wanted to get rid of the Portuguese, so the English could establish a more profitable and tax-free exploitation of the islands sugar plantation. This example of the English supporting decolonization shows that they just supported decolonization because they wanted to have full control of the colonized area to exploit the sugar plantations. Fanon explains that new nations became economically dependent on these Cold War powers in order to build urban transportation and infrastructure to modernize their country and escape the constant poverty and hunger they faced. Neocolonialism during the Cold War created a dependency in postcolonial countries because they relied on aid and financial credit from the U.S. or the Soviet Union. However, Fanon argues that when the colonized sought to

Colonist ideology states that the world and its occupants are either the colonizers or the colonized. From this perspective, it is evident that everything is either black or white, with ideally no room for any gray areas. One example of this division is the colonial practice of “othering.” In Using Critical Theory, Lois Tyson explains that “one of the clearest symptoms of colonist ideology is the practice of othering: judging those who are different as inferior” (248). Here, the European colonizers become the “self” and the colonized natives become the “other.” The other is seen as “unintelligent,” “savage,” and “primitive,” or everything the civilized colonists are not (Tyson 248). As a result, colonial subjects are placed on the bottom rung of social hierarchy and regarded as such.

Understanding that the rewards of decolonization far outweigh the problems it may bring is essential. The desire for decolonization began once countries realized that the colonizing countries were not invincible. Weaknesses were shown during World War II especially. Some of these weakness were the lack of attention and lack of control these colonizing countries had. The colonized people’s thirst for independence on top of this vulnerability presented a perfect opportunity to begin independence movements.