Speaker 1: Welcome to it can happen here. I am Andrew of
Speaker 1: Thetube channel Andrewism, and today I like to take some
Speaker 1: time to discuss nations, clonalism, and the people that constitute them.
Speaker 1: That is of course quite broad, but in the end
Speaker 1: I hope that folks are able to come away with
Speaker 1: a sense of at least my version of the anarchist
Speaker 1: position on nations, the impact of colonization and the psyches
Speaker 1: of individuals within nations, and the role of national liberation
Speaker 1: in social revolution. Today I'm joined by me Mia.
Speaker 2: Who oh boy, A great topic. Interesting topic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, indeed, indeed, indeed, I think part of what makes
Speaker 1: the topic so interesting is because of how for lack
Speaker 1: of a better term, how wiggly some of these terms are,
Speaker 1: how hard to pin down some of these definitions are.
Speaker 1: It's very important to be clear at the outset what
Speaker 1: you mean by a nation, what you mean by national liberation,
Speaker 1: that sort of thing. So what is a nation? What
Speaker 1: comes to mind for you? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Oh god, yeah, I knows, have pre prepped an answer
Speaker 2: to this. I have a very difficult time conceiving of
Speaker 2: a nation as something that's separated from a state, which
Speaker 2: I know is something a lot of people try to do.
Speaker 2: For me, it's just been sort of permanently welded to
Speaker 2: the nation state in a way that makes it hard
Speaker 2: to sort of think about without conjoining the two.
Speaker 1: That's fair. That's fair. I think that that really is
Speaker 1: part of what we're going to end up discussing, because
Speaker 1: for one, you know, as we'll see, a lot of
Speaker 1: nations were formed through the process of colonization and through
Speaker 1: the process of incorporation into the global you know, superstructure,
Speaker 1: global system. And secondly, it is seen to be the
Speaker 1: ultimate aim of a nation, the greatest accomplishment of a nation,
Speaker 1: to eventually establish their own state, to have a state
Speaker 1: of their own. We call nations that don't have their
Speaker 1: own state state less nations, the Kurds being one of
Speaker 1: the most notable examples. But it really is commonly seen
Speaker 1: that the ultimate accomplishment is for the libration of your people,
Speaker 1: is that you establish a state to rule that people
Speaker 1: for themselves. Of course, what for themselves actually means becomes
Speaker 1: quite clear, as in many cases foreign rulers and the
Speaker 1: practices of foreign rulers just take on a local face.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a there's a Curtis joke that goes roughly,
Speaker 2: getting your own nation state means that you speak, your
Speaker 2: police torture you in your own language.
Speaker 1: Oh that's fantastic, that is I like that. I like that.
Speaker 1: And language really is one of the aspects of what
Speaker 1: it is to be a nation, and it is not
Speaker 1: it's not necessarily the only aspect or primary aspect, but
Speaker 1: it is one aspect. For example, what is considered the
Speaker 1: Basque nation, uh, those in northern Spain and part of
Speaker 1: southern southwestern France. I believe their identity is not entirely,
Speaker 1: but quite significantly tied to their language, because it is
Speaker 1: a language that is completely distinct from any other language
Speaker 1: found in Europe or really anywhere else in the world.
Speaker 1: The language is just one aspect the nation. A nation
Speaker 1: I mean not in the sense of a state or
Speaker 1: a country or political constitution, but in the sense of
Speaker 1: an imagined community of people. An imagined community of people.
Speaker 1: I think that imagined aspect of it is quite important
Speaker 1: as well. Student see, but an imagine the community of
Speaker 1: people formed on the basis of a common language, history, ancestry, society,
Speaker 1: or culture, who are conscious of their autonomy. So it's
Speaker 1: not enough that a group of people merely share a language,
Speaker 1: or share history, or share ancestry, or share society, or
Speaker 1: share culture. It's important that firms we defined as a nation,
Speaker 1: that they are conscious of the fact that they share
Speaker 1: those things in common, and that they use that consciousness
Speaker 1: to develop some sense of an imagine shared identity, imagined community,
Speaker 1: whether or not each individual in that community knows all
Speaker 1: the other individuals in that community. Nations are not necessarily
Speaker 1: geographically bound, like you know certain conceptions of nation maybe,
Speaker 1: but rather often diasporic, and some nations even united under
Speaker 1: a banner of nations, such as in the case of
Speaker 1: Pan Africanism, which is a form of nation movement or
Speaker 1: pan nation movement that seeks to unite the thousands of
Speaker 1: ethnic groups and also the diaspora of the consonants of
Speaker 1: Africa in response to the exploitation of outsiders. In fact,
Speaker 1: the Pan Affic nation is really a quintessential example of
Speaker 1: how colonism creates nations while exploiting them. And although Native
Speaker 1: America and populations retained slightly more of their heritage than
Speaker 1: the placed African population in North America, though this is
Speaker 1: not to deny what was lost their force displacement also
Speaker 1: created something of a shared ethnic identity, which is where
Speaker 1: you see movements like Red Power popping up during the
Speaker 1: heightened Soviets era. Prior to the process of colonization, they
Speaker 1: were distinct in their cultural groupings. This group would be blackfoot,
Speaker 1: this group would be Cree, this group would be Sioue
Speaker 1: or something right, this group would be Sue. But then
Speaker 1: as they had the shared experience of colonization, they can
Speaker 1: to develop a sense of shared identity against those that
Speaker 1: were colonizing them, a sense of solidarity that transcended their
Speaker 1: previous cultural distinctions and designations. Not that those designations don't
Speaker 1: still exist, but many have adopted a sort of of
Speaker 1: panor nation above that as a vehicle through which they
Speaker 1: can undertake their struggle. However, mere opposition between a colonized
Speaker 1: group and a colonizing force is not the only way
Speaker 1: that clonism creates new nations. Also through social stratification, through hybridization,
Speaker 1: through the imposition of new religions, through new education systems,
Speaker 1: new languages, and new administrative boundaries. All of those are
Speaker 1: ways in which cluonism can develop unations. For example, the
Speaker 1: case of the meets, a cultural intermingling and intermarriage between
Speaker 1: two radically different groups ended up with the birth of
Speaker 1: the new nation of the meets in the unique colonial
Speaker 1: history of Canada and as we've see in nations or
Speaker 1: often the targets of subpraction and of subjugation and Eurasia,
Speaker 1: African peoples were stolen from the constant and thoroughly stripped
Speaker 1: of their languages, histories, and cultures, and continues to be
Speaker 1: oppressed throughout much of the so called New World. In
Speaker 1: the United States, African Americans faced centuries of systemic racism.
Speaker 1: In Brazil, the afric Brazilian population also faced similar historical discrimination,
Speaker 1: similarly in Colombia and so on and so on. Indigenous
Speaker 1: nations across the world also continue to be denied their
Speaker 1: autonomy as minorities within a domineerian state. Palestinians and Israel
Speaker 1: have faced a long standing conflict due to the raisia
Speaker 1: of their self determination. Colds and Released, as I've mentioned,
Speaker 1: spread across several countries and do not have a country
Speaker 1: of their own, so they have historically sought independence or
Speaker 1: at least autonomy. Aboriginal Australians have faced struggles related to
Speaker 1: land rights, cultural preservation, and self governance, and although New
Speaker 1: Zealand has made progress in recognizing the rights of the
Speaker 1: delicious Mari people. Marian New Zealand have also dealt with
Speaker 1: issues related to land ownership and cultural preservation, whether be
Speaker 1: the Armenians under the Ottoman Empire in the past, or
Speaker 1: the current subjugation of Hawaiian in Puerto Rico under the US,
Speaker 1: or the Tibetan population still under the firm of the
Speaker 1: Chinese state. Really could go on and on. I really
Speaker 1: could go on and on. Across the world, struggles have
Speaker 1: been an arbi and fought by nations for the liberation
Speaker 1: and much of the suffering a struggle is thanks to
Speaker 1: the process of colonization. Our present national borders and demographics
Speaker 1: were largely shaped and dictated by the colonization and conquest
Speaker 1: of a few nations from Europe. But what is colonialism Exactly?
Speaker 1: As one anthropologist, Chris quote Right put it, colonialism is
Speaker 1: the establishment and control of a territory for an extended
Speaker 1: period of time by a sovereign power over a subordinate
Speaker 1: and other people which are segregated and separated from the
Speaker 1: rule and power. He goes on to say that features
Speaker 1: the colonal situation and include political and legal domination over
Speaker 1: the other society, relations of economic and political dependence, and
Speaker 1: institutionalized racial and cultural inequalities to impose their dominant physical
Speaker 1: force through raids, expropriation of labor and resources, Imprisonment and
Speaker 1: objective murders. Enslavement of both the indigenous people and their
Speaker 1: land is the primary objective colonization. Through colonization, theseive cultures
Speaker 1: must be destroyed either strict crushed, emptied, subsumed, cooperated, or dismantled.
Speaker 1: And since colonism relies on a dichotomy of superiority and inferiority,
Speaker 1: the colonialists must impose their own culture over the native population,
Speaker 1: from language to dressed daily practice, that culture, which, by
Speaker 1: the way, becomes native through that process of colonization. And
Speaker 1: that already gets into the whole discussion of what makes
Speaker 1: something native, what makes a people native. There are two
Speaker 1: definitions that I balance or try and dance between, one
Speaker 1: being indigenity through land relationship and the other being indignity
Speaker 1: through colonial relationship. And so I'm referring to the indignacy
Speaker 1: through colonial relationship when I say that a culture or
Speaker 1: people becomes native through that process of colonization, because prior
Speaker 1: to colonial inclusions, there was no non native to define
Speaker 1: themselves against. They just will. You'll need to define yourself
Speaker 1: as native to a place when an outsider or an
Speaker 1: invasive force is pushing you out of that place or
Speaker 1: trying to dominate you within that place. The old forms
Speaker 1: of colonization are largely over, but the spirit of colonization
Speaker 1: still linkers. It is a specter in the spheres of
Speaker 1: culture and politics and economics. The colonial complex created the
Speaker 1: world we see today and left quite the impression psychologically
Speaker 1: on both the colonized and the colonizer. French Tunisian writer
Speaker 1: Albert Mami wrote but against it to be a very
Speaker 1: essential work on the relationship between the colonizer and the colonized.
Speaker 1: That work, that book is called The Colonized and the Colonized.
Speaker 1: It was published in nineteen fifty seven, and it was
Speaker 1: written and of course in a very important time, in
Speaker 1: a time when many national liberation movements were quite active.
Speaker 1: And so this work is often held up with other
Speaker 1: important words in that anti colonial milieu, including France phen Noons,
Speaker 1: the Direction of the Earth, Black Skin, White Masks, and
Speaker 1: A's discourse on clonialism. In the book The Colonized and
Speaker 1: the Colonized, now mean he spent some time discussing the
Speaker 1: psychology of both, and he splits the condition psychological conditions,
Speaker 1: the colonizing the colonized into four parts, the colonizer who accepts,
Speaker 1: the colonizer who refuses, the colonized who accepts, and the
Speaker 1: colonized who refuses. So first there's the colonizer who accepts.
Speaker 1: I've called that colonizer Christopher for obvious reasons, that being Columbus.
Speaker 1: And so the Christopher accepts his role as a colonizer,
Speaker 1: he becomes a colonist. That means he has to accept
Speaker 1: the fact that his position of privilege is non legitimate.
Speaker 1: So the any way he could really enjoy his position
Speaker 1: would be to absolve himself of the conditions, of the guilt,
Speaker 1: of the conditions under which he was attained. That's why
Speaker 1: Christopher forcifies history, creates racist mythology, rewrites laws, and attempts
Speaker 1: to whitewash his legacy. That's why he emphasizes his superiority
Speaker 1: while castness, persions and the colonized. He has to do
Speaker 1: whatever it takes to justify his evils, to uplift himself
Speaker 1: to the skies while grinding those below him underground. Deep down,
Speaker 1: Christopher knows all this semester, but he can't admit that
Speaker 1: to himself. He has to keep degrading the colonized, and
Speaker 1: so just as the colonal situation manufactures the colonized, Christopher
Speaker 1: the colonialist is also transformed. Now he chairs on torture, discrimination,
Speaker 1: and massacre. He becomes a reactionary, a conservative, and a fascist,
Speaker 1: But the condemnation that he carries in his heart can
Speaker 1: ever truly be raised. It pisses him off that he
Speaker 1: relies on the colonize to maintain the colony, even though
Speaker 1: he came looking for profit and already has a homeland.
Speaker 1: But he has to direct his anger somewhere, so it
Speaker 1: becomes a racist, and not just any racism, a racism
Speaker 1: so fundamentally ingrained in his personality. Racism built on three
Speaker 1: major components. One there exists some major gulf between him
Speaker 1: and the colonized. Two that he can exploit these differences
Speaker 1: to his benefit, and three that these differences are absolute
Speaker 1: and cannot be changed. Therefore, he's able to remain separate
Speaker 1: from the community the colonized by holding any social mobility,
Speaker 1: and he's able to continue to justify superiority because honestly
Speaker 1: circular logic. Right, these people are inferior because they aren't
Speaker 1: at my level, and they answered my level because I
Speaker 1: keep them in it, because I keep them in their
Speaker 1: inferior position, and on and on and on. Added bonus,
Speaker 1: of course, he gets to feel good about himself. While
Speaker 1: doing so, he becomes a humanitarian. Surely the colonize needed
Speaker 1: him to bring the light of civilization. Look at them,
Speaker 1: so stupid and servile. All this is natural and e tonal,
Speaker 1: So he has nothing to worry about. It is divine
Speaker 1: grace that has brought him to this place. It is
Speaker 1: a manifest destiny that he continues this tradition. And I
Speaker 1: mean if he enjoys a couple of perks in his
Speaker 1: quest to civilize them, well, surely is just justice. Colonized
Speaker 1: should be grateful Christopher benevolent master of the natural order,
Speaker 1: no question. And really, this is why missus there was
Speaker 1: right to say. The colonization dehumanizes even the most civilized man.
Speaker 1: It inevitably tends to change him who undertakes it that
Speaker 1: the colonizer, who, in order to ease his conscience, gets
Speaker 1: into the habit of seeing the other man as an animal,
Speaker 1: accustoms himself to treating him like an animal, and tends
Speaker 1: objectively to transform himself into an animal. No offense to animals,
Speaker 1: of course, I'm just Cootins. There. On the flip side
Speaker 1: of the coin is the colonizer who refuses John. You see,
Speaker 1: not every colonizer becomes a colingless. John tries to resist
Speaker 1: the role, but he is still a colonizer. He tries
Speaker 1: to ignore his position of privilege, but he kind of
Speaker 1: escaped mentally from a concrete situation. He kind of refused
Speaker 1: the ideology of crinalism while continuing to live with actual relationships,
Speaker 1: while continuing to benefit from the privileges he half heartedly denounces. See.
Speaker 1: Colonial relations can't be boiled down to individual feelings, so
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter much materially if John accepts or rejects it.
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter if he feels guilty or not. His
Speaker 1: identity is fundamentally defined in relation to colonization. He's still
Speaker 1: part of the oppressant group. He shares in their good
Speaker 1: fortune and will likely share their faith. Makes it clear
Speaker 1: that the truth is between colonizer and colonized. There is
Speaker 1: only room for forced labor, intimidation, pressure, police, taxation, theft, rape,
Speaker 1: compulsory crops, contempt, mistrust, arrogance, self complacency, swinishness, brainless elites,
Speaker 1: degraded masses, no human contact, but relations of domination and
Speaker 1: submission or shin the colonizing man into a classroom monitor,
Speaker 1: an army sergeant, a prison guard, a slave driver, and
Speaker 1: the indigenous man into an instrument of production. Even if
Speaker 1: John is a leftist, a progressive trying his best to
Speaker 1: assist the national liberation, to colonize people's he's still in
Speaker 1: a rough situation. Of course, not many colonizers have actually
Speaker 1: been you know about it like that. But even if
Speaker 1: John was to create a world or colonization, it maybe
Speaker 1: hard for him to picture his situation change in all
Speaker 1: that much. He's accustomed to privilege, and so equality is
Speaker 1: probably going to feel like oppression. You can't imagine not
Speaker 1: being who he is with the comfortable domination of his
Speaker 1: culture and language. He's never had to accommodate others before.
Speaker 1: He's never had to think, oh wait, maybe I should
Speaker 1: try and learn their language, try and incorporate elements of
Speaker 1: their cultural mores. He still holds the subtle vessiges of
Speaker 1: the racist ideology that his country was built on, and
Speaker 1: he will have to fight his own class interests and
Speaker 1: his own fellow colonizers. Revolution would require the decimation of
Speaker 1: his current identity and the rebooth of another. And that decision,
Speaker 1: that gargantuan task maybe too challenging for some people to undertake.
Speaker 1: So Mia, what do you think of the position of
Speaker 1: the colonizer who accepts and the colonizer who refuses.
Speaker 2: One of the things that I think is interesting about
Speaker 2: this is that the original concept of privilege was something
Speaker 2: that came out of like this specific kind of analysis
Speaker 2: was about like like it was it was it was
Speaker 2: about French settlers in Algeria, and you know, it was,
Speaker 2: it was, it was, it was. It was originally something
Speaker 2: along basically along these similar lines where it's like it
Speaker 2: doesn't really matter what your ideological beliefs are if you're
Speaker 2: sort of like a French settler in Algeria, like you
Speaker 2: just automatically have privilege that like other people didn't. And
Speaker 2: this has been sort of like I don't know, I like,
Speaker 2: the original sort of context of what this analysis was
Speaker 2: has been sort of worn down. But I think I
Speaker 2: don't know, Like I think I think it is colonizers,
Speaker 2: like this is this is a structural position, right, like
Speaker 2: you know, the sort of you can't sort of individualism,
Speaker 2: you're way out of a structural condition. Yeah, And I
Speaker 2: think that's something people sort of have this incredible capacity
Speaker 2: to sort of believe about themselves and it's just not
Speaker 2: really true. And that's something that's very difficult to sort
Speaker 2: of like actually substantively confronts. But I think it's why
Speaker 2: this analysis of stuff.
Speaker 1: Is useful exactly exactly. It's not enough to just say, oh, well,
Speaker 1: I don't think this is right, I think this is wrong.
Speaker 1: That hasn't changed any thing materially. It's when you act
Speaker 1: to challenge, to dismantle, to confront, and to act in
Speaker 1: solidarity with those facing these challenges in a material way
Speaker 1: that any of it really matters. I think it was
Speaker 1: particularly Poltin, and of course Mami is writing this, and
Speaker 1: Cesaire wrote in a time when colonization is really at
Speaker 1: or rather the confrontation against colonizations really added zenith. And
Speaker 1: so for those of us in the twenty first century
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty three now who are looking back, were saying,
Speaker 1: we might think, oh, well, surely this is a data analysis,
Speaker 1: a dated way of looking at these relationships. But upon
Speaker 1: further inspection it really continues to be quite topical when
Speaker 1: you look at, for example, self proclaimed allies. Looking at
Speaker 1: how Mami discusses the colonizer who refuses really gives you
Speaker 1: a sense of I think, at least how far you
Speaker 1: need to be willing to go in your allyship versus
Speaker 1: how far most people have reached even today. We can
Speaker 1: ask ourselves and those who maybe see themselves a bit
Speaker 1: in the colonizer who refuses, Ask yourself how far I
Speaker 1: mean you may recognize your privileges even while still you know,
Speaker 1: enjoying them, But how far might you be willing to
Speaker 1: go to see an end to this system? We speak
Speaker 1: about how the loss of privilege can make equality feel
Speaker 1: like oppression, but truly grappling with that, what would it
Speaker 1: mean for, for example, English to no longer be the
Speaker 1: dominant language, you know, what would it mean for us
Speaker 1: to get used to will in which we might have
Speaker 1: to learn another language? And then I've been thinking about recently,
Speaker 1: even while occupying the position of a colonized subject, I
Speaker 1: speak English, and that is a privilege. I speak English natively,
Speaker 1: and I mean I'm trying to learn another language. I'm
Speaker 1: trying to learn Spanish, which is another colonized language.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's of one of the other things is like,
Speaker 2: you know, for me, it's like, okay, you have English,
Speaker 2: it's this colonial language.
Speaker 1: You have Chinese, which.
Speaker 2: Is like also colonial language, and I learned some Spanish.
Speaker 2: It's like, well all right, and that's a third colonial
Speaker 2: language that struct the towers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. And this will we get into this sort
Speaker 1: of discussion about like actually postclualism and anti colonial struggle
Speaker 1: and how you go about anti clualism, right, because there
Speaker 1: is one of their different approaches. One could take different paths.
Speaker 1: I suppose we could follow. There's an anticlonal approach where
Speaker 1: we could say, you know what, let's just try and
Speaker 1: recreate pre colonial society. Right, so everybody tries to learn
Speaker 1: the languages that they feel as though they might have
Speaker 1: spoken if not under clonal system, if not, if clual's
Speaker 1: history had not happened. And then we try to re
Speaker 1: implement those languages and reimpose those languages and mantle certain
Speaker 1: institutions and structures and whatever the case may be, try
Speaker 1: to basically erase the impact of colonization from history. And
Speaker 1: then there's another path where we recognize, well, maybe we
Speaker 1: cannot undo colonization, and truthfully we can't write. But going forward,
Speaker 1: how do we intend to dismantle and to rework and
Speaker 1: to create a new you know, taking from the past
Speaker 1: to build the future, but not being bound to that past.
Speaker 1: How do we, for example, let go of certain binds
Speaker 1: on language, or certain ways of communicating, or certain ways
Speaker 1: we organize systems, or certain customs and roles and obligations.
Speaker 1: And I'm varying a bit from the intended topic of
Speaker 1: psychology of colonization, but I do want us to think
Speaker 1: about whether what role we regardless of what role we
Speaker 1: see ourselves in this discussion, how do we pursue an
Speaker 1: anti colonial future? What does that look like? What path
Speaker 1: should we be taken? And how might that path chafe
Speaker 1: against our current identity? How amight that path chafe against
Speaker 1: our current privileges, our current comforts. Yes, we are, as
Speaker 1: workers all oppressed and exploited, but at the same time,
Speaker 1: as we recognize there are certain privileges that some have
Speaker 1: over others, whether it be in the realm of race
Speaker 1: or gender, or ability or language. And if we are
Speaker 1: going to be pursuing artechulan, so we have to ask ourselves,
Speaker 1: how might those privileges be affected? And have we truly
Speaker 1: confronted our comfort level with those privileges being affected. I
Speaker 1: think that's part of the broader effort of decolonizing the mind.
Speaker 1: And when I speak about in my video and why
Speaker 1: Revolutionary's therapy, the idea of like really truly breaking down
Speaker 1: a lot of these ideas that we have about ourselves
Speaker 1: and about the world and questioning all of it, deconstructing,
Speaker 1: reconstructing all of it. But then when I get too far,
Speaker 1: of course, sincere called the colonization thingification. So let's turn
Speaker 1: our attention now to those things. Let's discuss this situation
Speaker 1: of the colonized in this case, and and that defined
Speaker 1: by the images and myths that surround them and tell
Speaker 1: them who they are. The colonized have no way out
Speaker 1: of their condition within the colonial order. They aren't free
Speaker 1: to choose between being colonized or not being colonized. They
Speaker 1: just are colonized. And so Candice understands this in her
Speaker 1: whole life, She's had to grapple with the negative portraits
Speaker 1: of herself. They were created by the colonizer, all the
Speaker 1: images that were used to support the clonal situation that
Speaker 1: raised the colonizer and humbled the colonized, That justified the
Speaker 1: colonizer's privilege, that painted the colonized as inerate and the
Speaker 1: colonizer as active. That made it seem as though the colonizer,
Speaker 1: as the colonizer, was doing the colonized a fever, that
Speaker 1: their labor was actually and the employment was actually necessary,
Speaker 1: that it was charity that the colonizer was bringing to
Speaker 1: their otherwise lazy masses. Being exposed to that kind of
Speaker 1: message and from a young age, really does a number
Speaker 1: on people, not just in the realm of colonization, but
Speaker 1: in other spheres as well. We see that with patriarchy,
Speaker 1: of course, how messages from an early age affect how
Speaker 1: boys and girls and others perceive themselves and perceive the
Speaker 1: world around them and perceive others. In the clear context,
Speaker 1: this means that some who are colonized end up internalizing
Speaker 1: and accepting wholesale the messages that they're receiving. So kind
Speaker 1: of thinks to herself, perhaps the colonizer's right. Perhaps we
Speaker 1: are lazy, perhaps we are shifted, perhaps we are timid
Speaker 1: and week, and this degrading portrait ends up being accepted.
Speaker 1: It's usually one of the final steps of colonization, the
Speaker 1: colonization of the mind. Once the colonize begins to tolerate
Speaker 1: rather than resist colonization, all they can really look to
Speaker 1: do is attempt to assimilate, which is impossible by a
Speaker 1: design does mean that Candice won't try. She sheds the
Speaker 1: memories of her ancestors and the practices and institutions of
Speaker 1: her culture. She embraces the colonizers will and all these
Speaker 1: institutions is right and just. The colonizers salve, and the
Speaker 1: colonizers whip the colonizes God and the Colonizers' school. Her
Speaker 1: children are sent to these schools built by the colonizer
Speaker 1: to erase and replace a people's history, traditions, and language.
Speaker 1: She and her kin are imbued with double consciousness. She's
Speaker 1: trapped in the sun, in place, performing for the colonizer,
Speaker 1: in a home country that don't feels foreign. Double consciousness
Speaker 1: is a particularly useful concept, first coined by WB. Du
Speaker 1: Bois in the Souls of Black Folk in nineteen oh three.
Speaker 1: He was speaking specifically about African Americans, but the concept
Speaker 1: does apply in other contexts as well. Double consciousness is
Speaker 1: the dual self perception experienced by subordinate peoples in an
Speaker 1: oppressive society. It is looking at yourself through your own
Speaker 1: eyes and simultaneously looking at yourself through the eyes of
Speaker 1: a racist society, looking at who you are, and also
Speaker 1: looking at what the dominant society sees and thinks of
Speaker 1: who you are. Of course, the voice concept was further
Speaker 1: built upon, and you know, people speak about her things
Speaker 1: such as triple consciousness, and in some ways the idea
Speaker 1: of double consciousness can't be tied with the conversation of intersectionality.
Speaker 1: But they are those who experience that double consciousness, and
Speaker 1: rather than reasserting their view of themselves and their people,
Speaker 1: they accept the negative view held by the dominant society.
Speaker 1: They surround themselves the language of that dominant society. Candace's
Speaker 1: world from the street signs, the documents to the courts,
Speaker 1: the bureaucracy, needy industry, or use the colonizing language. While
Speaker 1: her mother tongue, the one used tenderly by her ancestors,
Speaker 1: the one that sustains in a most feelings, emotions and dreams,
Speaker 1: is he valued and degraded. Candace loses far more than
Speaker 1: she gains by history a culture future she rejects herself,
Speaker 1: self love, and liberation itself. She rejects herself, self love
Speaker 1: and liberation itself, a tending to model herself after the colonizer,
Speaker 1: or rather crush herself into conformity. She gains self hate, shame,
Speaker 1: and alienation. She sees her own people through the eyes
Speaker 1: the coldinations and accusations of the colonizer. She's atomized, estranged
Speaker 1: from her people, and rejected by the colonizer, utterly defeated.
Speaker 1: But then he offers another path, an alternative mindset in
Speaker 1: the colonized who refuses. You see, like Candace, not knows
Speaker 1: that there will never be emancipation within the colonial relationship.
Speaker 1: But unlike Candace, they know that there is no liberty
Speaker 1: in a similation. Revolt is the only way out. An
Speaker 1: absolute condition requires an absolute solution, and there can be
Speaker 1: no compromise. Deliberation is a process of self recovery and
Speaker 1: autonomous dignity. They must shake off the force images and
Speaker 1: boldly attack the institutions of oppression. But even in their
Speaker 1: resistance that still bears the traces of colonization. They still
Speaker 1: share some of the values, techniques, and methods of the colonizer.
Speaker 1: They still speak the language the colonizer can understand to
Speaker 1: be truly emancipated, that must work to rebuild a new,
Speaker 1: authentic and self assured identity for themselves and the other people,
Speaker 1: that must reclaim and transform that which the colonizers consider negative,
Speaker 1: must take pride in all their wrinkles and moods, never
Speaker 1: shying away from their colonization, but accepting it as a
Speaker 1: fact of their experience and their history, and yet overcoming
Speaker 1: that colonization is the risk of continuing to define yourself
Speaker 1: in relation to protest, in relation to revolt, and in
Speaker 1: relation to colonization. At some point, maybe not now, but
Speaker 1: at some point that we'll need to move beyond that
Speaker 1: means of definition. What that future looks like is anyone's
Speaker 1: guess and also up to everyone to help build. I
Speaker 1: hope you appreciated this. Sometimes be under and dive into
Speaker 1: the minds of the colonizer and the colonized. The fight
Speaker 1: is not over. The psychological, political, and economic consequences of
Speaker 1: colonization are still fell to this day. The mentalities and
Speaker 1: conditions that discussed still exist in very extents today. Hopefully
Speaker 1: this helps us to better understand colonization's impact on us,
Speaker 1: so that we can deconstruct that LEVI them together to
Speaker 1: create a FREEO and motevos and what humane world. Next time,
Speaker 1: I'll be discussing the rule of national liberation in the
Speaker 1: struggle for freedom and what precisely that would enter you
Speaker 1: as I didn't have time to get into it in
Speaker 1: this part.
Speaker 2: It Could Happen Here as a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
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Speaker 2: You can find sources for It Could Happen Here, updated
Speaker 2: monthly at coolzonemedia dot com slash sources.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening.