Chapter 11: Postcolonial and African American Criticism

What Tyson has revealed thus far is that in literature, whether it be a novel, a play, a short story a poem, or academic writing, emanates from the perspective and the biases of its author. The author's biases are the product of his/her cultural and social environments. The written word often serves as a mirror of the cultural and social mindset of the author's "civilization". “Postcolonial criticism seeks to understand the operations – politically, socially, culturally, and psychologically - of colonist and anti-colonist ideologies (p. 365). The term post-colonialism is something of a misnomer because it implies that colonialism is over when in reality, many countries that have been invaded or controlled by outsiders in the past are still controlled today. That is, those countries that have bee colonized as part of the British or Spanish empire have systematically supplanted indigenous cultures and replaced local languages with English or Spanish, temples have been destroyed to be replaced with Catholic churches but more insidious is the spreading of religious doctrine in order to control the heart and minds of the conquered people. In time, indigenous reality is erased and pushed into the margins by economic conditions and indoctrination of the values and beliefs of the dominant master culture.

To this end, postcolonialism begins its critical process by defying the idea that Western Civilization's literature is universal, transcending time and place. Postcolonial criticism argues that Western Civilization's standard of "universality" is a grievous wrong to non-western cultures. In fact, the universality is limited to the borders of Western Civilization, and its "norms" are, therefore, not applicable to indigenous cultures. When the literature of indigenous cultures is judged by Eurocentric standards, it is relegated to a position of inferiority, thereby dismissed and subordinated to western experiences and outlooks. While colonialism is no longer practiced as it once was between the fifteen and mid-twentieth centure, the current form is now called neo-colonialism. This form of colonialism seeks to exploit cheep labor in developing countries at the expense of their own struggling business and cultural traditions. As Tyson explains “neo-colonialist corporate enterprise is supported, when the need arises, by puppet regimes (local rules paid by a corporation to support its interest) and by covert military intervention (sometimes I the form of financing troops loyal to corporate political interests, sometimes in the form of enlisting military aid from the Western power most closely aligned with the corporations concerns). In other words, just as in case of old-style European colonialism, there is big money to be made in this game, and the major players are too powerful to be bound by any rules of fair play” (p. 372).

Consequently, we are engaged in what some believe to be a fourth World War, the cold war being the third, where cultural imperialism seeks to establish a global economy. In the process of takeover of another culture the food, clothing, customers, recreation, and values of the economically dominant culture increasingly replace those of the economical vulnerable culture until the latter appears to be a kind of imitation of the former. American culture imperialism has been on of the most pervasive forms of this phenomenon, as we see American fashions, movies, music, supports, fast food, and consumerism squeeze out indigenous cultures all of the world (p. 372-373). These economic forces demand integration, uniformity, mesmerizing the world with fast music, fast computers, and fast food—with MTV, Macintosh, and McDonald's, pressing nations into one commercially homogenous global network: one McWorld tied together by technology, ecology, communications, and commerce.

In African American Criticism today, the focus appears on a number of themes that include surviving the horrors of slavery and segregation struggling for freedom and equality. As these themes suggest, the political content of African American literature includes correcting stereotypes and misrepresentation of African Americans by celebrating African American culture, experience and achievement and exploring racial issues which include institutionalized and internalized racism. The problem with this, as I see it, we are using the master tools to create a reality that can never be defined outside the box that has already been created by western colonialism. We can describe what has happened, we can use the master’s language to mimic the master, but as we see, the ability to live and think differently have already been wiped away.