THE COLONIZER AND THE COLONIZED

1. THE COLONIZER AND THE COLONIZED BY Albert Memmi

2. The Colonizer and the Colonized

3. Albert Memmi(1920-)

4. About the author :- • Born on December 15,1920 in Tunisia. • Also a writer, educator and sociologist apart from being a novelist. • ‘The pillar of Salt’ and ‘Strangers’ – considered to be his best fiction works till date.

5. The Colonizer and The Colonized • Memmi’s most influential and most controversial non-fiction work. • First published in French in 1957 and later translated into English in 1965. • Autobiographical work- focuses on his first hand experiences as a Jew growing up in a Muslim predominant Tunisia.

6. The book focuses on Racism and African Colonialism. • He wrote this specifically in response to the Decolonization of North Africa in 1956. • The dynamics he illuminates here are similar to any colonial system. • Memmi describes this work as “portraits of the two protagonists of the colonial drama and the relationship that binds them”

7. Albert Memmi’s Tunisia • 1881 – Tunisia became a colony of the frenchIt was home to French colonizers, Italians, Tunisian Muslims and to a minority of Jews. • Of the four groups:-French – the obvious profiteers andMuslims – the most oppressed. • The Jews were more willing to try and assilmilate to the French.

8. The Jews even supported the French during the Independence uprising. • But Tunisia gained independence from France in 1956. • Democratic Constitutional Assembly (an Islamic fundamental organization) came into power. • As a result of this many Jews left Tunisia.Even Albert Memmi also left for Paris with his wife.

9. Preface • The Preface of the text was written by Memmi himself. • In the preface he recollects about Tunisia and the oppressions he had to face there. • He wrote this work to identify his place in society. • Realized it to be an universal experience.

10. His main aim :- to define the colonial relationship between the colonizer and the colonized. • The colonial privilege is not solely economic. • The Jewish population identified themselves with the colonizers as with the colonized.

11. He says “ I was a sort of half-breed of colonization, understanding everyone because I belonged completely to no one.“ • Memmi is also unconditionally oppossed to all forms of oppression. He says “Oppression is the greatest calamity of humanity.”

12. Introduction • The introduction to the work ‘ The Colonizer and the Colonized’ was written by Jean Paul Sartre. • He was a French existentialist philosopher, playwright, novelist, screen writer, political activist, biographer and a literary critic.

13. Jean Paul Sartre(1905-1980)

14. Highlights:- • Three factors typify the colonizer:-Profit , privilege and usurpation • “Colonizer who refuses” and “colonizer who accepts” • The colonizer questions the validity of his own identity.

15. Presence of Nero complex. • Memmi describes Colonialism as ‘ one variety of fascism’. • Its key tools are racism and terror. • The colonial system also favours population growth.

16. The colonized becomes “divorced from reality”. • The colonized are denied of all their human rights. They are treated like animals. • But Memmi believes that the colonial system is fundamentally unstable and will lead to its own destruction, due to mere rigidity of the system.

17. The text has two parts:- • Part One:Portrait of the Colonizer • Part Two:Portrait of the Colonized

18. Part One

19. Part Two

20. Conclusion • The colonized have ultimately three answers to the colonial system:- • Assimilation. • Revolt. • Revolution.

21. THANK YOU