Postcolonial Criticism
EH 4301 Literary Criticism
Spring 2006
European Domination
By 19th Century: British Empire emerged as
largest imperial power
By 20th Century: British Empire ruled ¼ of the
earth’s surface
20th Century British Empire
India Significant holdings in:
Australia – Africa
New Zealand – West Indies
– South America
Canada
– Middle East
Ireland – Southeast Asia
COLONIAL
AFRICA
British Empire Domination
Domination continued until the end of WWII
– India gained independence in 1947
– By 1980, Britain had lost all but a few of its colonial
holdings
– Hong Kong in 1997
– Australia in1999
Postcolonial Criticism
Defines formerly colonized peoples as
– “any population that has been subjected to the
political domination of another population.”
Postcolonial Criticism
Analyzes literature produced by cultures that developed in
response to colonial domination, from the first point of colonial
contact to the present.
– Formerly known as “commonwealth literature”
Some literature written by colonizers.
– Rudyard Kipling
– Alan Paton
Much more written by colonized and formerly colonized people.
– Chinua Achebe
– Wole Soyinka
Postcolonial Identity
British intrusion permeated
– government
– education
– cultural values
– daily lives
Postcolonial Identity
Indication of the residual effect of colonial domination on
formerly colonized cultures
– speak English (in addition to the local languages they may
use at home)
– write in English
– use English
• schools and universities
• government
• business
– Examples:
• South Africans
• Australian aboriginals
CULTURAL COLONIZATION
The inculcation of a British system of
government and education, British culture,
and British values that denigrate the
culture, morals, and even physical
appearance of formerly subjugated
peoples.
Postcolonial Identity
Psychological and social interplay between
– native, indigenous, pre-colonial cultures
– what British culture imposed upon that culture
Postcolonial Identity
DECOLONIZATION
– colonizers retreated and left the lands they had
invaded
• often has been confined largely to the removal of British
military forces and government officials
Postcolonial Identity
Ex-colonials were left with…
– a psychological “inheritance” of a negative
self-image
– alienation from their own indigenous cultures,
which had been forbidden or devalued for so
long that much pre-colonial culture has been
lost.
Colonialist Ideology
Believed their own Anglo-European culture was
civilized, sophisticated, or metropolitan.
Based on the colonizers’ assumption of their
own superiority, which they contrasted with the
alleged inferiority of native (indigenous) peoples,
the original inhabitants of the lands they
invaded.
Colonialist Ideology
Native people defined as savage, backward,
underdeveloped.
Colonizers believed their whole culture was
more highly advanced because their technology
was more highly developed.
They ignored or swept aside the religions,
customs, and codes of behavior of the people
they subjugated.
Colonialist Ideology
COLONIZERS: COLONIZED:
“Center of the world” Marginalized
Proper “self” “Other” (different,
therefore, inferior)
“Us” “Them”
Civilized Savages
EUROCENTRISM
The use of European culture as the
standard by which all other cultures are
negatively contrasted.
Eurocentrism
UNIVERSALISM
– Judging literature in terms of its “universality”
– To be considered great, literary text had to have
“universal” characters and themes
– That “universality” depended upon resemblance to
European ideas, ideals, and experiences.
– Who were the judges?
• British, European, and later American cultural standard-
bearers.
Eurocentrism
First World
– Britain, Europe, the United States
Second World
– White populations of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and southern
Africa; former Soviet bloc
Third World
– Developing nations such as India, Africa, Central and South America, and
Southeast Asia
Fourth World
– Indigenous populations subjugated by white settlers and governed by the
majority culture which surrounds them: Native Americans and aboriginal
Australians
Colonialist Ideology
Pervasive force in the British schools established
in the colonies to inculcate British values and
culture in the indigenous people.
Forestalled rebellion (Is difficult to rebel against a
system or a people one has been programmed,
over several generations, to be superior.)
Colonialist Ideology
Resulted in “colonial subjects” (colonized people
who did not resist colonial subjugation because
they believed in British superiority and,
therefore, in their own inferiority.)
Many tried to imitate the colonizers (mimicry)
– Dress - Behavior
– Speech - Lifestyle
Colonialist Ideology
DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS
• A way of perceiving the world that is divided
between two cultures
• Produces an unstable sense of self
• Feeling of being “caught” between cultures
• Leads to UNHOMELINESS
– Not feeling at home in your own home
– “psychological refugees”
De-colonization
Rejection of the colonialist ideology which
defined them as inferior.
Reclaim pre-colonial past.
Can the colonization be totally rejected?
Can the pre-colonial past be reclaimed?
De-colonization
Kenyan writer Ngugi wa Thiong’o
– Writes in own local language
Nigerian writer Chinua Achebe,
– Writes in English
– “For me there is no other choice. I have been given
the language and I intend to use it.”
(Morning Yet on Creation Day 62)
De-colonization
Arguments for Using English:
English provides a common language for the
various indigenous people within Third- and
Fourth-World nations to communicate with one
another.
English facilitates the emergence of those
nations into global politics and economics.
Problems with De-colonization
Desiring to reclaim a pre-colonial past is not that
easy.
Much pre-colonial culture has been lost over
many generations of colonial domination.
Even had there been no colonization, the
ancient culture would have changed by now: no
culture stands still.
Most cultures are changed by cross-cultural
contact, often through military invasion.
– Ancient Celtic culture was changed by Romans who
occupied British Isles
– Anglo-Saxon culture was changed by the many
generations of French rule which followed the
Norman conquest.
NATIVISM or NATIONALISM
– Attempt to eliminate Western influences and
return to an emphasis on indigenous culture
Postcolonial Debates
Focus on INVADER COLONIES
– Colonies established among non-white peoples
through the force of British arms
• India
• Africa
• West Indies
• South America
Postcolonial Debates
General consensus that the United States and
Ireland are not postcolonial nations.
– U.S. has been independent for so long
– Ireland has been integral part of British culture for so
long
Postcolonial Debates
Much debate among postcolonial critics
concerning whether or not the literature of white
settler colonies should be included.
– Canada
– Australia
– New Zealand
– Southern Africa
Postcolonial Debates
Argument is that the white settler cultures share
a tremendous common ground with Britain
– Race
– Language
– Culture
– Treated differently from the non-white colonies
• Self-government
• Granted Dominion status, political autonomy w/in British
Commonwealth
Postcolonial Debates
Postcolonial criticism can be used to interpret
literature in the Western literary canon;
therefore, some theorists are concerned that it
will become just one more way to read the same
canonized authors read for years, rather than a
method that brings the works of 3rd-and 4th-World
writers to the front.
Postcolonial Writers
Nadine Gordimer
(South Africa)
Postcolonial Writers
Wole Soyinka (Nigeria)
Postcolonial Writers
Salman Rushdie (India)
Postcolonial Writers
Jamaica Kincaid (Antigua, West Indies)
Postcolonial Writers
Chinua Achebe (Nigeria)
Postcolonial Writers
Ngugi wa Thiong’o (Kenya)
Postcolonial Writers
Derek Walcott (St. Lucia,
West Indies)
Michael Ondaatjie
(Sri Lanka & Canada)
Lawrence Chua (Malaysia & U.S.)
Postcolonial Writers
– [Link]
[Link]
Themes of Postcolonial Literature
Initial encounter with the colonizer and the
disruption of indigenous culture
Journey of the European outsider through
an unfamiliar wilderness with a native guide
Othering and colonial oppression
Themes of Postcolonial Literature
Mimicry (attempt of colonized to imitate
colonizer)
Exile (experience of being an outsider in
one’s own land)
Post-independence exuberance followed
by disillusionment
Themes of Postcolonial Literature
Struggle for individual and collective cultural
identity and related themes of
– Alienation
– Unhomeliness
– Double consciousness
– Hybridity
Themes of Postcolonial Literature
Need for continuity with a pre-colonial past
Self-definition of the political future
Postcolonial Criticism
Literary text analyzed as
– colonialist
– anti-colonialist
Way in which text reinforces or resists colonialism’s
oppressive ideology.
