Colonization is a process in which imperial power systems dominate a region and its components. It features, among other things, cultural domination, political subjugation, religious assimilation and economic exploitations. The colonists used these measures as tools of winning control of the helpless people. Colonization has a close link to massive exploitation and assimilations of new cultures and it further involves actual or threat of use of force. The colonizers were formidable icons and commanded loyalty through aggression. In light of colonialism, established cultures disintegrated. On the case of Britain emperialism,Tarique noted that, “as one of its legacieshas been a post colonial world of interconnected spatialities, cultures and ‘hybrid’ subjectives, imprecise cultures borders and ‘spaces of global culture (60).” For instance, in London colonization altered spatial composition, including its design. Post-colonial literature helps the contemporary reader to have a glimpse of the troubling concerns at the time, to assert one's culture and revisit history as it was at the time. Post-colonial writers have ascertainable features that include the appropriation of colonial language and similar themes. The discourse on ‘things fall apart,’ novel by Chinua Achebe will be an important one to understand how post-colonial literature relates to historical concepts such as colonization, decolonization, and humanism.
Historical Context
The book was published in 1958 some few years before Nigerian’s independence, which was under the colony of Britain. The book focuses on the pre-colonial Africa. Chinua intended to portray his compatriots as they were before the resentful colonial and its attaching atrocities. The setting of the novel is in Umuofu, a small village where his Igbo community could practice its customs unhindered. The Igbo community worshiped gods, and each person had a god (chi) for guiding one’s actions and the society used to pity a person with a weak Chi. A man maintained a separate room for keeping the symbols of his gods. The community thrived on hunting and gathering, although vegetables and yams were important means of survival. At the low level, the community was organized into families and the oldest person possessed more power than the rest. Assemblies were an important component of the society. It was where the adult men in the society would discuss problems such as insecurity in the community. Post-colonial writers sought to defend the richness of these customs. For instance, Achebe wanted the book to be read by the external audience as a way of asserting the identity of Africans.
Asserting Cultural Identity
The post-colonial literature is perceived as recriminating and vengeful. Its authors were often descendants of colonial slaves or remorseful followers of colonial masters in resentment of dehumanizing events at the time. The bigger fraction portrays the negative consequences of the practice. Chinua Achebe’s novel is a way of negotiating the conflicting cultures to acquire a sense of personal identity. The book depicts a deep sense of optimism for personal identity and many others in the post-colonial era expressed this optimism. Besides being a forum for authors’ personal inquiry, they further served as a platform for fostering an exchange of ideas and inform personal identity. By reading literature on the tribulations and experiences of the authors, the reader gets inspired to search own identity. A feature with many of these writers is the ability to dialogue with histories in which they are set. For instance, the Chinua Achebe novel, things fall apart is set in the colonization of Nigeria and one can resonate with the voice of desperate objection to colonial injustices.
In a situation of increased whiteness, the culture of imagination serves as the counterculture. As one struggles through this literature, one gets the view a hybrid culture that has no connection with past subjugations and alien cultures. They offer a renewed form of identity-based on free will. However, the use of alien language stands out as a great betrayal of one’s previous culture. Tarique (62) noted that, “As well as these quite obvious echoes of colonialism, postcolonialism cities also reveal a more subttle colonial spatial language and geography.” Taken objectively, it can be used to demonstrate it as a new way of asserting African culture as having survived the whites’ translations, a new way of culture transplant. Achebe has defended this position in his later writings asserting that although an alien language has to be in communion and manifest of the features of African settings including its traditions and customs. These literatures begin from a point of acknowledging their mistake of admitting the whites. Statements such as, “The white man is very clever. He came quietly and peaceably with his religion. We were amused at his foolishness and allowed him to stay. Now he has won our brothers, and our clan can no longer act like one (Achebe 30). He has put a knife on the things that held us together and we have fallen apart,” evidences this fact, but serves as a reminder of the forgotten, but congenial culture.
Concerns
Crude English Bureaucrats
Before the arrival of the colonizers, the African communities had well established societal structures in all aspects of their lives. Many African communities maintained masculine and hierarchical structures that the colonizers chose to discredit by imposing their systems. An important area of resentment from the Africans is an outright disregard of African leaders and replacing them with their clones to propel whites’ agenda. The situation was much the same in Nigeria. European colonizers could hear and determine Africans disputes, contrary to the initial procedure that allowed the villagers to deal with local affairs as they pleased. In the novel, in the new structure, the district commissioner made use of court messengers whose function involved among other reporting and delivering those who broke the Whiteman’s bindings. The new order completely ignored the role of tribesmen. In cases of violence resulting in the death of a missionary or a British agent, the authorities would slaughter an entire village, without investigation to find culpable individuals. Such atrocities marked the height of colonizers atrocities, an issue the colonized not only loathed, but also demonstrated through constant rebellions. The acts utterly dehumanized the people and post-colonialist authors have used their literature to contrast with the rich African culture that could never allow such animosity. These were emotional experiences and inevitably inspiring talented authors such Thiong’o and Chinua to cover.
Religious Domination and Culture Clash
Missionaries began to arrive in the Horn of African after the 1800s after years of conscription of Africans for slavery. At the time of missionary activities, crucial colonizers had begun to outlaw slave trade due to its dehumanizing effects on individuals. The colonizers needed to pacify rigid customs. The religion was a concealed way of pacifying these customs and eventually allow the religious domination of the colonized (Adogame, Roswith and Klaus 47). The move was met with much distrust. The Nigerians were first mistrustful and could reap the benefits of an education without converting. In Umuofia, individuals that lacked authority under the previous order gave themselves to missionaries and later important tribesmen followed suit. In the book the sentiment, “mighty tree branches broke away under them, and the whole country became the brown-earth color of the vast, hungry swarm” connotes the effect of colonization (Achebe 45). As the white drove their agenda, the tribe became divided, and the conflicts rocketed. Notably, the richness of a tribe’s culture stems devoted religious observance, and this was clearly a concern. The colonizers were privy to this and capitalized on it to brainwash and disintegrate the Africa cultures.
The bigger fraction of the novel focuses on unraveling the cultural clash by representing the attitude of whites on the stereotyped black and that of the whites. The clash is evident in the contradicting stereotypes between the missionaries and the Africans. In one part, Reverend Smith thought of the tribesmen as heathens, while Africans thought of whites as foolish. The statement, “He had already chosen the title of the book, after much thought: The Pacification of the Primitive Tribes of the Lower Niger,” illustrates the whites’ attitudes (Achebe 82). Such mis-perceptions are rooted in cultural variations and manifested the impossibility of reconciling the two without one having to debunk his or her own. However, inflexibility was as dangerous as the differences themselves. The colonizers were relentless and determined to engage undue influence to dominate Africans.
Revisiting History and Politics
In virtually all the post-colonial literature, the author’s position is necessarily the political stand whether they intended to be involved in politics or not. The readers mark them as rights’ activists and the voice of the people. However, this direction is only evident from the themes the literature addresses. However, it is never the intention of the authors to make political stances, but it is clear, the colonizers did not just choose a totalitarian approach for the colonies, but this was their design in all parts of the world. A common feature among the post-colonial writers is the fact of resentment of dictatorial leadership. Their writing focuses on expounding how irresponsible and protected leaders clinched to power.
The whites waddled in misconceptions that the colonized lacked a culture of themselves before the new ‘enlightenment.’ However, with such perceptions, which were lethal and crude, they deemed the African as the ultimate beneficiary from their rather stagnated lives, which they used as an easy way of justifying their rule. Post-colonial writers resent the version that purports to cast the colonizers as having delivered everyone from ignorance. In Things Fall Apart, the sentiment, “If you don't like my story, write your own,” has such overtones (Achebe 75). Therefore, they focus was on showing how terrible and dehumanizing it was in those days. The ultimate effect of this is that it imputes controversies and infuses a notion that history is a matter of perspective.
Conclusion
Except two states in Africa, the whites colonized the rest of the states. Colonization featured many resentful atrocities and dehumanizing activities on the colonized. Before this, Africans had well-established cultures and social structures of leadership. Slavery, economic exploitation, and custom domination mark the areas of contention. Rebellions and violation of white rule were met with serious repercussions such as capital punishment. Post-colonial writers focus on retelling the African story from a colonized perspective on the experiences of the time and clarify their customs before colonization. The major focus of these writings is about inspiring the colonized and supply ideas of rebuilding their hybrid culture, as a new way of culture transplant.
Works Cited
Adogame, Afe, Roswith Gerloff, and Klaus Hock, eds. Christianity in Africa and the
African Diaspora: The appropriation of a scattered heritage. A&C Black, 2008. Print.
Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. New York, Anchor Press, 1994. Print,
Tarique, Jazeel. “Post colonial spaces and identities.” Geographical Association, vol. 97,
No.2( summer 2012), pp. 60-67.
