He notes that "anticolonialist critics have sought to "demystify the national myths" of empire and to write an alternative history of the colonial encounter" by focusing on "the politics of the early modern English-Native American encounter" with an eye towards "moments of textual rupture and contradiction in early modern texts such as The Tempest" (Cefalu 85). One may identify the scene of Prospero's accusation as one such moment, and indeed Cefalu examines Caliban extensively, albeit in relation to his economic status as a colonized individual, rather than his racial or ethnic status. According to Cefalu, Caliban "learns not one, but two languages in the play […]: the language taught to him by Miranda is the language of a natural economy and precapitalist values; the language he internalizes by the end of the play (one that he teaches himself) approximates the language of instrumental labor and capital" (Cefalu 106). Cefalu still sees Caliban as the locus of colonial discourse in The Tempest, but focuses on the economic colonization represented via Caliban's character rather than the racial or ethnic tensions which are embodied by Prospero's colonialist bigotry.
Cefalu's interpretation is important because it offers some context for the consideration of Caliban and Prospero offered here. Bigotry and racism is rarely an end in itself, but is rather is most often deployed as a means of justifying the atrocities committed in the name of an ulterior ideology, and in this case (and much of colonial history) the particular ideology served by bigotry is capitalism. Thus, Cefalu's analysis does not contradict the assertion that Caliban and Prospero's relationship is predicated on ethnic hostility and colonialist stereotypes, but rather points out that their combative relationship ultimately serves capitalism's purpose.
In contrast to Cefalu's interpretation of The Tempest, Patricia Geesey's analysis of Season of Migration to the North challenges this essay's consideration of Mustafa Sa'eed, describing him as "a cultural hybrid, the resulting offspring from the colonial union of Great Britain and the Arab-African nation of the Sudan" who struggles with integrating either cultural identity into his psyche, rather than a strictly vengeful character embodying the colonial fears of Great Britain (Geesey 129). In her essay "Cultural hybridity and contamination in Tayeb Salih's Mawsim al-hijra ila al-Shamal (Season of Migration to the North)," Geesey notes that "for many scholars, Mustafa Sa'eed's own self-comparisons to Othello have made it difficult not to see in his character a man who exacts vengeance upon British colonizers of the Sudan through his sexual exploits with women in London," but proposes that "it is a mistake to assume that the confrontation between Sa'eed and the English women is indicative of the colonial confrontation played out between Africa and Europe," because "to view Sa'eed's sexual conquests as a colonized person's vendetta is to fall into the trap of cultural stereotyping that is at once Sa'eed's weapon of seduction against the women and ultimately his own downfall" (Geesey 129).
Though Geesey admits that the "multilayered historical, cultural, literary, and economic relationships at play between the Arab/African world and Western Europe" represented in the novel support a number of readings, she does not consider the aforementioned interpretation of Sa'eed as valid. The problem with this claim, however, is that in her brief critique of the "vengeful colonized person" interpretation, Geesey fails to distinguish between Sa'eed and the novel itself. As mentioned before (and as mentioned by Geesey!), Sa'eed enacts cultural stereotypes specifically to deploy them as "weapons of seduction," so one cannot consider Sa'eed's character without acknowledging how these stereotypes define Sa'eed. Thus, viewing "Sa'eed's sexual conquests as a colonized person's vendetta" does not force one to "fall into the trap of cultural stereotyping," but rather allows one to consider how Sa'eed, by himself falling into the trap of cultural stereotyping, allows the novel as a whole to actually challenge those stereotypes.
As the...
Colonialism & Resistance There is a scene in the documentary film Jane Goodall's Path in which an elder living on Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota is interviewed. Looking directly at the camera, the elder tells how he lost his sixteen-year-old son to suicide. His bewilderment apparent, he tells how many other young people living in Pine Ridge have killed themselves, too. He reveals that the rate of alcoholism is 90%.
Moreover, some, like the former Italian Somaliland, are written off as failed states where terrorism flourishes (Johnson pp). Uganda and Kenya, that were once considered paradises are now increasingly poor and dangerous (Johnson pp). Black majority rule has failed virtually everywhere, and rapid population growth, indebtedness, and diseases such as AIDS, have brought additional misery, however, the main failure has been political (Johnson pp). Many of these countries, such as
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Colonialism to Globalization Colonialism is a relationship of domination between indigenous, or forcibly imported majority, and a minority of foreign invaders, in which the fundamental decisions affecting the lives of the colonized people are made and implemented by the colonial rulers (Colonialism pp). Globalization is the intensification of economic, political, social and cultural relations across borders (Colonialism pp). Third World countries, often colonies, are economically underdeveloped countries of Asia, Africa, Oceania,
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