Post-Colonial Poetry and Political Propaganda

1. Post-Colonial Poetry and Political Propaganda

2. Post-Colonialism • Post-colonialism addresses the matters of post-colonial identity (cultural, national, ethnic), gender, race, and racism, and their interactions in the development of a post-colonial society, and of a post-colonial national identity; of how a colonized people’s (cultural) knowledge was used against them, in service of the colonizer’s interests; and of how knowledge about the world is generated under specific socio-economic relations, between the powerful and the powerless.

3. Postcolonial Symptoms • A postcolonial nation has no individual identity; their former identity has been either stolen by or muddled with the colonial values forced upon them. • Individual people also lack an identity; they have been told by the prevailing powers that be that the way that they live their lives is wrong, much like Okonkno and the African Missionaries. Their lives suddenly become meaningless.

4. Postcolonial literature reflects a nation’s and an individual’s search for an accepted cultural identity. • Postcolonial literature can be loaded with such things as “self-loathing” and the author may spend much time questioning decisions made in the past, and actions completed in the past, in a search for meaning. • It’s all about a search for meaning, both personal and national.

5. Colonialism • Colonialism is the establishment, exploitation, maintenance, acquisition and expansion of colonies in one territory by people from another territory. It is a process whereby the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony, and the social structure, government, and economics of the colony are changed by colonizers from the metropole. Colonialism is a set of unequal relationships between the metropole and the colony and between the colonists and the indigenous population.

6. Colonialist Values Historians often distinguish between two overlapping forms of colonialism: • Settler colonialism involves large-scale immigration, often motivated by religious, political, or economic reasons. • Exploitation colonialism involves fewer colonists and focuses on access to resources for export, typically to the metropole. This category includes trading posts as well as larger colonies where colonists would constitute much of the political and economic administration, but would rely on indigenous resources for labour and material. Prior to the end of the slave trade and widespread abolition, when indigenous labor was unavailable, slaves were often imported to the Americas, first by the Spanish Empire, and later by the Dutch, French and British.

7. Imperialism • the creation and/or maintenance of an unequal economic, cultural, and territorial relationship, usually between states and often in the form of an empire, based on domination and subordination. • The US is considered worldwide to be a Imperialist power, a superpower that determines the economics, social structure, and cultural values within a country it has “taken over” or a country that has US businesses within its borders.

8. Imperialist Effects/Values • Some writers, such as Edward Said, use the term more broadly to describe any system of domination and subordination organized with an imperial center and a periphery. According to the Marxist historian, Walter Rodney, imperialism meant capitalist expansion. • The USA is the largest Imperial power in the world, since the collapse of the Communist Bloc in the 1980’s. Many other countries can colonize another, but the USA is the only super-power left that still does this, and it does it often (Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti, Cuba, etc.). • It's generally accepted that modern day colonialism is an expression of imperialism and cannot exist without the latter.

9. Imperialism Vs. Colonialism • The term 'imperialism' should not be confused with ‘colonialism’ as it often is. Robert Young writes that imperialism operates from the center, it is a state policy, and is developed for ideological as well as financial reasons whereas colonialism is nothing more than development for settlement or commercial intentions.

10. Major Players • Latin America: Most of the countries in Latin America were colonized by the Spanish and the French who massacred the Inca, Maya, Quechua, and many other local Native American Tribes, killing entire cultures and languages. Since the early 1700’s, Latin Americans have resorted to Guerrilla Warfare as the only option they have left to free their countries from Colonial/Imperialist tyranny. Revolutions spring up all the time and are killed all the time. Cuba has the longest lasting and most famous Guerilla led Revolution. We will read Pablo Neruda, César Vallejo, and Federico Lorca.

11. Africa: The entirety of Africa, for the last 2000 years, has been taken over and over by various countries like England, Belgium, France, Germany, and even the United States, amongst many others. It seems as if the Africans, until very recently (1960’s-70’s), have never been allowed to rule their selves. The colonial powers killed millions of Africans and thousands of cultures and languages, all for money. The colonial powers also left the countries they took over worse off than they were before, causing more problems in the future, for example, in Rwanda. Now, just as then, Guerilla Warfare, holocausts, and ethnic cleansings are rampant and growing. Africans and the Northern African Muslims have also used Guerilla Warfare in an attempt to free their countries from tyranny. You will read Syl Cheney-Coker and MbellaSonneDipoko.

12. China: China has a very long history of being both a post-colonial culture and a colonial powerhouse as well. Mao re-conquered China through Guerilla Warfare under a red Communist flag, becoming a dictator over his own country, where he acted like an Imperialist power. You will read Li Po. • Ireland: The Irish Catholics, 99% of regular Ireland, were neglected and flat-out abused for centuries by the predominately Protestant England and Northern Ireland. England may have introduced a disease into the potato crops, causing over 2 million Irish to die a slow death of starvation. Women drank poison or smothered their babies at birth so that their babies would not suffer. Guerilla Warfare seemed to be the only option for the Irish. Peaceful protests do not work under colonial/imperial powers. You will read a couple poems by William Butler Yeats.

14. World Leaders: Imperialists, Colonialists, Poets, and Guerilla Commanders