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< | -- TemiAdeniji - 17 Apr 2010
I just realized that I was not clear in that this is nowhere near done. Temi, I am sorry. I will get to this before this class's "final" day on May 13th. | | | Post-Colonial? Post-Nothing. | |
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> | In the Theory of the Leisure Class, Veblen discusses conspicuous consump¬tion, leisure, and waste, as the ultimate expression of the pecuniary culture. Veblen asserts that the predatory powers, which were highly revered in less developed cultures, manifests itself in today’s society in the concentration of high incomes among few members of the society. The large incomes, however, are useless if they cannot be projected, so we have created for ourselves various mechanisms to permit them to be displayed. Conspicuous consumption, that is the ostentatious extravagance with the articles we purchase, is a means of flaunting these predatory abilities. Our clothes, cars, homes, etc. give a clear indication of our predatory order. Thus, we have produced in our society an operative method of distinguishing between the ‘haves’ and ‘have nots.’ | | | | |
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< | Today, predatory powers manifest themselves in high incomes and wealth acquisition. As Veblen argues in Theory of the Leisure Class , acquisition is useful primarily for its signaling power to others. The operative measure of distinguishing between the owners and non-owners in our society are the articles of conspicuous consumption that Veblen calls waste.
Aime Cesaire's writings capture the frustration and agitation felt by the human beings raw commodoties of consumption. and its consequences quickly became the powerful narrative force in the negritude movement. Cesaire's poetic musings are useful for describing the state of human commodities.
“Between colonizer and colonized there is room only for forced labor, intimidation, pressure, the police, taxation, theft, rape, compulsory crops, contempt, mistrust, arrogance, self-complacency, swinishness, brainless elites, degraded masses. No human contact, but relations of domination and submission which turn the colonizing man into a class-room monitor, an army sergeant, a prison guard, a slave driver, and the indigenous man into an instrument of production. My turn to state an equation: colonization = ‘thing-ification.’ ”
Cesaire’s theory of ‘thingification’ centers on the commodification of the colonized. In other words, the colonizers transformed the oppressed into objects functioning solely to satiate the needs of the colonizer.
Veblen's model is a useful framework through which to understand Imperialism. The Scramble For Africa was merely one element of the acquisition indicative of conspicuous consumption as it appeals to Western sensibility. Africans were kidnapped from their homes, Africa's resources and minerals were pillaged, and the country was cut into territories based only on the nature of its captors. Africa's initial contact with the West was as victim to this abhorrent race for waste.
Veblen's analysis of economic development is a useful framework for understanding why Colonialism was the natural avenue for a country to take in its bid for world power.
The “thingification” that Cesaire speaks of is related to the thingification that Veblen speaks of conceptually. In Veblen’s work, the leisure class commodifies items whereas the colonizers did so with the African people.
Genuine decolonization depends on the outcome of this inquiry on “thingification.” For decolonization to really occur we need to resolve conspicuous consumption's relationship to capitalism.
How do we fight against “thingification”? To this effect, Cesaire calls for the decolonization of the mind as opposed to simply cursory and superficial political independence. He exhorts: “The relationship between consciousness and reality are extremely complex. . . . It is equally necessary to decolonize our minds, our inner life, at the same time that we decolonize society.” I touched briefly on the failures of the post-colonial Nigerian state in my previous essay, but my analysis of decolonization was limited to the political dominion. As a Nigerian young adult with a name that means African queen, a bright mind and (perhaps now Eben-shattered) idealism, you have written about the political problems facing Nigeria and how you might contribute to a solution. However, Cesaire posits that African independence and rejection of colonialism is not just a political question. It is one that touches on the deepest parts of the African psyche, both communally and individually. | >
> | This dichotomy between the leisure class and everybody else provides a certain useful framework for discussing the perils of imperialism. The Scramble for Africa led to the creation of an analogous juxtaposition between the colonizing West (the ‘haves’) and the colonized Africans (the ‘have nots’). Turn to Aime Cesaire’s Discourse on Colonialism. Written over half a century ago at the peak of the negritude movement amidst the slew of colonized people agitating for independence, it remains as relevant today as it was then. Cesaire wrote: “Between colonizer and colonized there is room only for forced labor, intimidation, pressure, the police, taxation, theft, rape, compulsory crops, contempt, mistrust, arrogance, self-complacency, swinishness, brainless elites, degraded masses. No human contact, but relations of domination and submission which turn the colonizing man into a class-room monitor, an army sergeant, a prison guard, a slave driver, and the indigenous man into an instrument of production. My turn to state an equation: colonization = ‘thing-ification.’ ” Cesaire’s theory of ‘thingification’ centers on the commodification of the colonized. In other words, the colonizers transformed the oppressed into objects functioning solely to satiate the needs of the colonizer. The “thingification” that Cesaire speaks of is related to the thingification that Veblen speaks of conceptually. In Veblen’s work, the leisure class commodifies items whereas the colonizers did so with the African people. But while Veblen is unwilling to take a position as to the resolution of this culture of conspicuous consumption and the end result of capitalism and private property (and he need not), genuine decolonization depends on the outcome of this inquiry on “thingification.” | | | | |
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< | In Cesaire’s probe, he is more interested in the lingering effects of colonization on the African psyche. An invocation of Frantz Fanon is quite apt in parsing out this subject.
“There is a fact: White men consider themselves superior to black men. // There is another fact: Black men want to prove to white men, at all costs, the richness of their thought, the equal value of their intellect. // How do we extricate ourselves?”
Herein lies the root of the post-colonial identity crisis: whether wrestling off the shackles of colonialism require that Africans to completely denounce everything the West imposed upon us. Does maintaining Western structures implicitly mean that we are emulating the West and trying to prove our worth to them? | >
> | How do we fight against “thingification”? To this effect, Cesaire calls for the decolonization of the mind as opposed to simply cursory and superficial political independence. He exhorts: “The relationship between consciousness and reality are extremely complex. . . . It is equally necessary to decolonize our minds, our inner life, at the same time that we decolonize society.” I touched briefly on the failures of the post-colonial Nigerian state in my previous essay, but my analysis of decolonization was limited to the political dominion. In Cesaire’s probe, he is more interested in the lingering effects of colonization on the African psyche. An invocation of Frantz Fanon is quite apt in parsing out this subject. “There is a fact: White men consider themselves superior to black men. // There is another fact: Black men want to prove to white men, at all costs, the richness of their thought, the equal value of their intellect. // How do we extricate ourselves?” Herein lies the root of the post-colonial identity crisis: whether wrestling off the shackles of colonialism require that Africans to completely denounce everything the West imposed upon us. Does maintaining Western structures implicitly mean that we are emulating the West and trying to prove our worth to them? | | | | |
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< | The problem with de-colonialization is that there are two key tensions: (1) we are still trapped by caring about how the colonizer's view our intellect and abilities, and (2) the forces giving value to the specific types of intellect and ability to which we are aspiring are white-people imposed values in the first place. These tensions mirror the tensions inherent in de-colonization: (1) the desire to make my country a stronger and better place whose richness will impress the West/other countries (2) the reality that this specific nation-state model we are trying to make successful was imposed on us the West in the first place. | >
> | Perhaps combating “thingification” requires a disbandment of all social institutions created by the colonizers. Perhaps not. While it may be easy for the outsider to contemplate the dissolution of the nation-state in the African context because after all they are not intrinsically ‘African’ and are remnants of the colonial artifact, it is not so easy for me to accept this proposition. To ask this is to ask Africans to accomplish a feat that even the mighty United States as we know was unable to do. After all, independence in 1776 certainly was not followed by an extrication of everything British. Case in point: the legal system in the United States, albeit markedly different, is not completely devoid of English common law. Nor does it need to be. In my opinion, declaring that the nation-state is in it of itself incompatible with Africans is just as nonsensical as claims that democracy cannot work in Africa. If the people decide they want dissolution, so be it. But Westerners have no place in forcing dissolution down our throats as they forced the artifice itself upon us. One may retort that we have been trying for over fifty years now to make the system work to no avail, but such a proposition would necessitate accepting the assumption that independence was truly commensurate to ‘decolonization.’ In fact, it was not. Many African nations, Nigeria included, are de jure decolonized but still de facto colonized. We have yet to decolonize our minds, as Cesaire advised. But this process will take time, lest we forget the youth of African nations in comparison with the old age and wisdom of the enlightened West. | | | | |
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< | Perhaps combating “thingification” requires a disbandment of all social institutions created by the colonizers. Perhaps not. While it may be easy for the outsider to contemplate the dissolution of the nation-state in the African context because after all they are not intrinsically ‘African’ and are remnants of the colonial artifact, it is not so easy for me to accept this proposition. | >
> | Veblen’s reluctance to provide any cathartic solution for the reader can be reduced to his failure to quench the reader’s desire for a climax and denouement, leaving a feeling of uneasiness. Decolonization is much the same. We sit in a state of flux, “pontificating” if you will, about what will become of the African state. To conclude, one another reference to Cesaire: “The truth is that I have said something very different: to wit, that the great historical tragedy of Africa has been not so much that it was too late in making contact with the rest of the world, as the manner in which that contact was brought about.” So it could be that the edifices themselves are not problematic; rather, the pattern of imposition is what created and continues to perpetuate the dilemma. | | | | |
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< | What Eben said about Nigeria really bothers me, and he is not right that Nigeria should be dissolved because it is a colonial artifact. | | | | |
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< | To ask this is to ask Africans to accomplish a feat that even the mighty United States as we know was unable to do. After all, independence in 1776 certainly was not followed by an extrication of everything British. Case in point: the legal system in the United States, albeit markedly different, is not completely devoid of English common law. Nor does it need to be. An example of why the dissolution proposition is flawed is the United States' founding. In throwing off the yoke of British rule in 1776, they didn't get rid of everything. Case in point: Armory v. Delamirie. | | | | |
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< | In my opinion, declaring that the nation-state is in it of itself incompatible with Africans is just as nonsensical as claims that democracy cannot work in Africa. If the people decide they want dissolution, so be it. But Westerners have no place in forcing dissolution down our throats as they forced the artifice itself upon us. | >
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Nona's work in progress | | | | |
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< | It is total bullshit for Westerners to say that we should be dissolved because we are a product of colonialism, when Westerners were the ones who perpetrated the practice in the first place. One may retort that we have been trying for over fifty years now to make the system work to no avail, but such a proposition would necessitate accepting the assumption that independence was truly commensurate to ‘decolonization.’ In fact, it was not. Many African nations, Nigeria included, are de jure decolonized but still de facto colonized. We have yet to decolonize our minds, as Cesaire advised. But this process will take time, lest we forget the youth of African nations in comparison with the old age and wisdom of the enlightened West. | >
> | I touched briefly on the failures of the post-colonial Nigerian state in my previous essay, but my analysis of decolonization was limited to the political dominion. In a conversation that followed, Eben made the comment that Nigeria won't exist in 2060, insofar as the country’s starkly different ethnic groups are incompatible with the nation-state model. Declaring that the nation-state is in it of itself incompatible with Africans is just as nonsensical as the claim that democracy cannot work in Africa. While it may be easy for the outsider to contemplate the dissolution of the African nation-state because it is a remnant of the colonial artifact, it is not easy for me to accept this proposition. | | | | |
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< | The argument that our system is failing is flawed, because though we were technically independent, we never actually were decolonized. We still aren't a unitary system. African nations are younger than the wise and enlightened Western ones that perpetrated this atrocity on my people. | >
> | To propose that Africans create a system of governance without any remnants of colonialism is to propose that we accomplish a feat that even the mighty United States as we know it was incapable of. After all, Independence in 1776 certainly was not followed by the extrication of everything British. Westerners have no place in forcing dissolution down our throats as they forced the nation-state artifice itself upon us. | | | | |
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< | Veblen’s reluctance to provide any cathartic solution for the reader can be reduced to his failure to quench the reader’s desire for a climax and denouement, leaving a feeling of uneasiness. | >
> | In Theory of the Leisure Class, Veblen argues that the operative measure of distinguishing between the owners and non-owners in our society are the things of conspicuous consumption that Veblen calls waste—during Colonialism, these things were people. “Between colonizer and colonized there is room only for forced labor, intimidation, pressure, the police, taxation, theft, rape, compulsory crops, contempt, mistrust, arrogance, self-complacency, swinishness, brainless elites, degraded masses. No human contact, but relations of domination and submission which turn the colonizing man into a class-room monitor, an army sergeant, a prison guard, a slave driver, and the indigenous man into an instrument of production. My turn to state an equation: colonization = ‘thing-ification.’ ” | | | | |
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< | we did only read chapters 1-5. Decolonization is much the same. We sit in a state of flux, “pontificating” if you will, about what will become of the African state. | >
> | The Scramble For Africa is historical example of the acquisition indicative of conspicuous consumption as it appeals to Western sensibility. Africans were kidnapped from their homes, Africa's resources and minerals were pillaged, and the country was cut into territories based only on the nature of its captors. Africa's initial contact with the West was as victim to this abhorrent race for waste. “The truth is that I have said something very different: to wit, that the great historical tragedy of Africa has been not so much that it was too late in making contact with the rest of the world, as the manner in which that contact was brought about.” So it could be that the edifices themselves are not problematic; rather, the pattern of imposition is what created and continues to perpetuate the dilemma. | | | | |
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< | We have no clue what is going to happen to Africa. | >
> | The problem with the nation-state model is not the model, but the way it was implemented. The argument that our system is failing is flawed, because Africa has technically been independent for over fifty years, we never actually were decolonized. | | | | |
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< | To conclude, one another reference to Cesaire: “The truth is that I have said something very different: to wit, that the great historical tragedy of Africa has been not so much that it was too late in making contact with the rest of the world, as the manner in which that contact was brought about.” So it could be that the edifices themselves are not problematic; rather, the pattern of imposition is what created and continues to perpetuate the dilemma.
Cesaire says that what happened wasn't about Africa's failings with respect to the western world, but the other way around. I am not sure what your closing sentence means. | >
> | One may retort that we have been trying for over fifty years now to make the system work to no avail, but such a proposition would necessitate accepting the assumption that independence was truly commensurate to decolonization. In fact, it was not. Aime Cesaire posits that African independence is not just a political question, but one that touches on the deepest parts of the African psyche, both communally and individually. “It is equally necessary to decolonize our minds, our inner life, at the same time that we decolonize society” In Cesaire’s probe, he is more interested in the lingering effects of colonization on the African psyche than on political African “independence.” Many African nations, Nigeria included, have yet to decolonize our minds as Cesaire advised. But this process will take time, lest we forget the youth of African nations in comparison with the old age and wisdom of the enlightened West. | | | | |
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< | Notes from Temi: Some context to explain what I was initially trying to end with. Eben was trying to say that the nation state model is probably incompatible with Nigeria, insofar as the country is made up of so many starkly different ethnic groups (and that if the nation state had been formed organically, it would not have formed along the same boundaries that were drawn by imperial powers.) That's what he was trying to say when he made the comment that Nigeria won't exist in 2060 (perhaps as it does now). I do respect what he's trying to say, but Nigeria did endure a civil war between 1967 and 1970, in which the Igbos tried to secede and were suppressed and systematically killed/starved/other terrible things. There remain tensions between Igbos and Yorubas/Hausas, but we have managed to move past that (marginally). I totally understand that things are not perfect, but it's not like there's no antagonism between different people in any country. I guess I see no reason why it has to be a fatalistic element in the context of Nigeria. Perhaps I'm just being too positive. | >
> | For decolonization to really occur we need to resolve humanity’s relationship to conspicuous consumption. Genuine decolonization depends on the outcome of this inquiry on “thingification.” The tensions of inherent in de-colonization mirror the tension in veblen’s presentation of waste: (1) the desire to make my country a stronger and better place whose richness will impress the West/other countries (2) the reality that this specific nation-state model we are trying to make successful was imposed on us the West in the first place. Herein lies the root of the post-colonial identity crisis: whether wrestling off the shackles of colonialism require that Africans to completely denounce everything the West imposed upon us. Does maintaining Western structures implicitly mean that we are emulating the West and trying to prove our worth to them? | | | | |
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< | The edifice that I spoke of in my concluding sentence was the nation-state, and my point was that it could be that the nation-state is not inherently inconsistent with the plurality of Nigerian identities but rather that the nation-state as it was imposed upon us is the problem. So in some ways, Eben and I agree to the extent that Nigeria may look differently in 2060, but it also might not. We might be able to work our differences out. I don't think the nation-state must necessarily dissolved. I'm not sure I can conceive of any other way to exist outside the nation-state model if we are to interact with the rest of the world. Hope this makes sense | | | \ No newline at end of file | |
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> | An invocation of Frantz Fanon is quite apt in parsing out the problem. : “There is a fact: White men consider themselves superior to black men. // There is another fact: Black men want to prove to white men, at all costs, the richness of their thought, the equal value of their intellect. // How do we extricate ourselves?” |
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