The Literary Theory Known as Post-Colonialism

The study of British colonialism is a rather new field with much to discuss and a lot more to debate. The recent recognition of new nation-states that were once under the control of Britain was a growing phenomenon and one that continues to play a large role in today’s global politics. Since the rather recent period of these new nations, new study’s have been done into the history of a) the peoples that inhabited the land before Britain, b) the way Britain occupied and control and land, and now c) post-Britain. This is a growing topic in the historical field because seventy-five years ago there was no thought that Britain would relieve control of India or Nigeria. That is why post-British colonialism is important to today, because it is a

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. (

　　　　In American Colonies, Alan Taylor argues that the story of American colonization has been overly exclusive and biased.[ Taylor,

It therefore becomes difficult to integrate a country’s ‘independence’ and post-colonialism. On one hand post-colonialism is used to refer to the following periods after independence gained by the colonized nation and on the other hand post-colonialism is associated with opposing and resistance moves against colonial rule by the colonized nation. In this case, independence is only used to refer to the setup of a free government by the local people without the influence of the imperial power. It is however argued that even though the period of obtaining independence for a country is considered as a post-colonialism historic movement, it does not necessarily imply full independence from the influence of colonial rule (Ashcroft et al.,116). This takes into consideration that currently some countries even after obtaining independence in terms of the time period, they still rely on their colonial masters mainly for financial aid.

Postcolonial critiques of literary works are often accomplished by reading and interpreting the work with a specific theme in mind or a ‘lens’. By allowing oneself to use a ‘lens’ when reading specific works, it allows the reader to interpret the effects of the themes and the changes throughout the writings. The goal of the critical lens is to seek to understand the behavior of characters or the society ("Post Colonialism," 2016). A few of the most popular themes used to view literary works are identity, oppression and power; applying this ‘lens’ can give the reader a different perspective and experience while reading the writings.

In the late 1800s, third world countries, primarily Africa, were infiltrated by European colonizers. In Things Fall Apart, Heart of Darkness, and “Shooting an Elephant”, we see the direct impact of the colonizers on the beliefs of the natives. Post-colonial literature centres mainly around how beliefs are questioned and eventually altered; a transformation that can manifest in numerous ways as it is not fixed. In each of the stories, a different form of colonization is elucidated. In Things Fall Apart, the curiosity of the natives with regards to the culture of the europeans leads to colonization. The oppression of the natives exerted by the europeans in Heart of Darkness leads to colonization as well. Finally, in “Shooting an Elephant”, the roles of the colonizers and the colonized are reversed as it is the natives who take on the position of the oppressors.

In many works of literature, especially those coming in Africa, Indian, Middle East, we meet characters who are struggling with their identities, culture, religions, submission of other people or country. As we can imagine when you analyze the novels from these countries as we cites the problem of characters are the same as: economic, political, cultural, and emotional effects that colonizer brought and left behind, these are called emotional trauma for the people of these nations cited. The literature asks the readers to enter a text through the post-colonial lens; the chart will help how the approach can be analyzed in reading of a text, the reader would look for the effects of colonialism and how the characters they addressed through of

Postcolonial scholars examine and ultimately seek to undo the historical structures that originally created, maintained and continue to reproduces the oppression of the colonial experience. Otherness, the term introduced by Edward Said, pointed out that non-western cultures are seen as object for study. Seeing from the submissive cultures, power dynamic of imperialism is dominant. Western looks and explains things in western way. However, another essential theme in post-colonialism is hybridity which is the space between two cultures.

If postcolonial literature is the “process of dialogue and necessary correction,” of misconceptions concerning colonialism, then a comparative study of colonial and postcolonial works is essential for attaining a full understanding of the far-reaching effects of European imperialism (Groden and Kreiswirth 582). Reading colonial literature in dialogue with postcolonial literature engenders a more complete interpretation of the effects of imperialism by creating a point of reference from which to begin the revelation and the healing of cultural wounds resultant from European colonialism. Postcolonial literature reveals the lie of imperialism by suggesting that colonization was unsolicited by and unjustly administered to

Postcolonial literature is comprised of the literary canon that addresses the problems and consequences of decolonization through the lens of a colonizer/colonized experience. As former colonies, including those of Latin America, gained independence from European powers, it became necessary for the citizens of these territories to examine both their culture and their relation to the world.

In literature, post colonialism is the study of post-colonial theories that ask the reader to notice the effects of colonization on people or the extension power into other nations. In post-colonial theories, the term subaltern is the nickname to populations which are far cry from the power of the colony that has hegemonic on social, political and geographical prevalence. The present research aims at analyzing Spivak's essay "Can the Subaltern Speak?" in the light of her question whether or not the possibility exists for any recovery of a subaltern

In The Empire Writes Back (Ashcroft, et al.), the term ‘post-colonial’ is defined as covering “all the culture affected by the imperial process from the moment of colonization to the present day”. Post-colonial theory, then, provides an insight into the complicated power dynamic that occurs between the coloniser and the colonised, and, at its simplest, responds to colonialism with emphasis on the effects, both positive and negative, on the coloniser and the colonised. Having read Jones’s Mister Pip with a post-colonial lens, it becomes clear that Mr Watts and Matilda are a metaphor for the coloniser and the colonised. Within this metaphor, they each take on unbalanced roles in different relationships, and are represented in different ways, though Mr

Famous orientalist, Edward Said, explained in his book ‘Orientalism’ that through European colonization, the Europeans established orientalism, the study of Orientals, as a way to define themselves as the superior race compared to Orientals and justify their colonization. As the study of Orientals expanded, Westerners generalized attributes of Easterners and started forming their own knowledge about Easterners. Hence, Orientalism can now be defined as Western stereotypes about Eastern people.

“...Orientalism is not so innocent a form of knowledge as this. Instead, he redefines Orientalism as the ubiquity of a sense of the division of the world into two spheres in aesthetic production, popular culture, and scholarly, sociological, and historical texts. In other words, he is suggesting that the concept of difference between east and west is a geopolitical difference which is written up throughout the texts of western culture whether through travel writing, political texts, paintings, or in academic discussions” (Sharp 2009, 31).

The postcolonial era presents various issues for the decolonized nations, like the reconstruction of a government and the maintenance of an economy. In addition to that, the individual identity of the colonized people is a complex issue that they must cope with as well, and it is an issue that is still present today. Compared to the other issues of postcolonialism, the construction of one’s identity might appear trivial; however, there are many problems of postcolonial identity, including the obligation of one to perceive themselves as people do from the outside through stereotypes, and the difficulty of unifying two conflicting identities: one that is created by outside sources, and one that is created through personal experiences.