Culture and Imperialism

Presented by

Muhammad Faisal bin Abdullah

Submitted to
Dr. Md. Mahmudul Hasan
International Islamic University Malaysia
2020
 Edward Said
• born November 1st in Jerusalem to Palestinian Christian
1935 parents.

• his family moved to Cairo, Egypt. He attended English

1947 schools until age of 16

• his family moved to the state of Massachusetts

1951
 Edward Said
• Earn a bachelor of arts degree at Princeton University
1957

• Earn a master of arts degree at Harvard

1960

• Said joined the faculty at Columbia University as a

1963 Professor of Comparative Literature.

• Earn a Ph.D. in English literature at Harvard

1964
 Edward Said
• Due to his Palestinian background, Said supported the idea of a
Palestinian state
• He did not contest the Israeli rights, but he opposes nationalistic
powers, such as the United States, that pushed particular agendas.
• Said argued for an agreement that would benefited both the
Palestinians and Israelis, without the interference of neo-colonizer
such as the United States
• He was diagnosed with leukemia in 1991 and passed away in New
York City on September 25, 2003.
 Culture and Imperialism
• Written 15 years after “Orientalism”, this book is not a sequel of
Orientalism but Said states that it has different aims
• Culture Imperialism is Said’s attempt to describe a more general
pattern of relationship between the Modern West and its overseas
territories.
• The discussion within Orientalism is limited to the Middle East,
whereas the discussion in Culture and Imperialism is more
widespread; spanning from Africa to Australia and from India to the
Carribean.
 Definition
CULTURE IMPERIALISM
• A concept that includes refining • Said defines imperialism as
and elevating elements; each "thinking about, settling on,
societies best attributes. controlling land that you do not
• Aggressive, protectionist attitude possess."
of viewing culture as sources of
identity that differentiate
between US vs THEM – leading
us to combat the influence of
any foreign culture
 INTRODUCTION
• Said perceives that literary texts are a part of the imperialist effort to
colonize the world.
• This is often done through the depiction of other lands as mysterious
lands.
• The purpose of this book is to trace the relationship between culture
(literature) and historical experience – a guide to scaffold further
discussion on Imperialism.
• This book focuses on three main Imperial powers; British, French and
American.
• Said concludes his introduction by stating ”this book is about past and
present, about us and them.”
 CONTRAPUNTAL APPROACH
• Said introduces contrapuntal approach towards the reading of literature In
order to avoid polarization.
• This kind of research looks at the perspective of both the colonizers and the
colonized to present the reality of conflicting tensions.
• Said discusses two texts from the 1820s:
• Jean-Baptiste-Joseph Fourier's Description de l'Égypte (Description of Egypt)
• The Marvelous Compositions of Biographies and Events by the Egyptian scholar
'Abd al-Rahman al-Jabarti.
• Fourier's text represents the rationalization for Napoleon's invasion of Egypt
in 1798, while al-Jabarti’s work writes about the sufferrings of the Egyptian
due to the conquest.
 CONTRAPUNTAL APPROACH
• Said concludes with a three-part agenda.
1. The canon of literary texts needs to be reviewed and reinterpreted.
The canon must take into account the phenomenon of imperialism
and the treatment of this subject by writers such as Conrad and
Kipling.
2. Theoretical work must focus more searchingly on the relationships
between empire and culture.
3. There needs to be a more urgent emphasis on the interdependence
of present and past.
 Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
• Said talks about how Dickens portray Pip’s relationship with Abel
Magwitch.
• In the novel, Pip actually became rich with the assistance from
Magwitch.
• Magwitch became rich after his transportation or deportation to
Australia, where Great Britain has set up the penal colonies for
criminals.
• The novel has failed to address the colonial problem in Australia and
is also responsible in conjuring negative perceptions towards Australia
 Two Visions in Joseph Conrad’s Heart of
Darkness
• In this section, Said discusses Joseph Conrad's short novel entitled Heart of Darkness.
• Said expresses his opinion that as a Polish exile who settled in England, Joseph Conrad
held a unique position in English literary history. According to Said, Conrad was thoroughly
sceptical about the workings of empire, and yet he also served the imperial system.
• Two possible arguments, or visions, may be derived from Conrad's narrative and the post-
colonial world that came afterward.
• In the first vision, he perceives that colonialism may be doomed to decline, but the
imperialist rationale has not disappeared altogether. One reason is that Western nations
remain active economically in their former colonial possessions.
• In the second vision, he perceives a more optimistic vision, where Conrad's ambivalence
about imperialistic activities is duly recognized and his work is evaluated as a product of
its time.
 Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
• Through this novel, Said offers a contrapuntal analysis based on what is
depicted in Austen novel, in comparison to what is depicted in Conrad's
Nostromo (1904) and in Forster's Howards End (1910).
• In Austen’s novel, Mansfield Park is owned by Sir Thomas Bertram,
portrayed as a noble gentleman.
• What Austen has failed to address is the fact that Sir Thomas Bertram is also
the owner of a slave-operated sugar plantation on the Caribbean island of
Antigua.
• Therefore, Said demonstrates here the importance of acknowledging
historical facts that are evident in other literary texts as well and not just
fully accepting a depiction of just one text.
 Kim by Rudyard Kipling
• Said discusses a “notable ambiguity on the subject of empire”
through the novel Kim.
• The protagonist, Kim enrolled himself in the British Secret Service to
play a part in the "Great Game” which was a name for the political
and diplomatic struggle between India and Russia for influence and
control in Afghanistan and surrounding regions in Central Asia.
• Said sum up that Kipling's novel shows that "natives accept colonial
rule so long as it is the right kind.” Therefore, not all aspect of colonial
rulings are definitely bad and had to be viewed objectively.
 Conclusion
• Said concludes with one of his major themes in Culture and
Imperialism: the idea of hybridity.
• He states that "The history of all cultures, is the history of cultural
borrowings."
• He provides the examples of Western science's borrowings from the
Arabs and also the Arabs' borrowings from Greece and India.
Interdependence is actually a "universal norm" of any culture.
• He asserts that "No one today is purely one thing," and "Labels ... are
not more than starting-points."