It's a hard struggle and it takes a lot of know-how to embrace the future.

As with most, if not all, presentations I've given, yesterday's quick oral presentation was a bit panic inducing. Not sure why I can't get past that, but I sure am glad that I didn't have to speak in front of the Kennewick Arts Commission as a part of a final for another class. I did not envy those folks. I think my heart would have exploded. Enough with my aversion to public speaking -

Joke-tastic title: Imperialism, Colonization, and Globalization - What's the big idea?

The means of colonization and imperialism can be violent, destructive, and destabilizing. However, these forces, while associated with negativity, are ultimately forces that cause people, culture, and society to adapt and morph into a somewhat homogenized entity that has more in common than not with the colonizing force. This is not to suggest that the acts carried out in the name of colonialism or imperialism are good, nor is the subjugation and/or eradication of cultures and societies good. However, this process of adaptation is ultimately beneficial to creating a global community that presents everyone with the potential to engage in regular exchange with people from other areas or cultures. This situation comes about because this system of adaptation is not a one sided event. Both sides of the conquered/conqueror equation affect each other and this forces adaptation by both parties.

The idea above is supported by examples in several of the novels read and discussed in class. Exploring situations in the texts will help illustrate how these processes take place and how they are received. By looking at and dissecting certain scenes, we can also see the results of these cyclic adaptations and what happens when adaptation is actively resisted. These examples are then connected to the real world through related, but different, situations discussed in journal articles, news articles, and other similar documents.

End of the Pier

In my final I’m going to explore the interactions and concepts (businesses, philosophies, products, popular media, etc) that are components of imperialism, and ultimately globalization. However, this influence this isn’t a one-way street; there isn’t an uncompromising imposition of one's ideas on the other. It's a process of (mutual) adaptation that melds everything (imperial/colonial force, colonized, opposing forces, etc) into an entity that is more akin to the colonizing force than not.

Throughout the semester we've read stories about exchanges and conflict. Ultimately this leads to strengthened resistance or capitulation on one side. Regardless of the path, this results in adaptation. Either the "invading" force learns from this situation and adapts or the "invaded" party begins a process of adaptation. This system is less obvious than violent conflict, but it can be argued that cultural influence and adaptation is more effective in establishing imperialism/colonization and globalization. Through successive waves of adaptation, not "Wave of Mutilation [youtube.com]," interconnected global communities and identities take shape.

Works Cited

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. Ed. Frances Abiola Irele. New York: Norton, 2009.Print.

Jin, Ha. "After Cowboy Chicken Came to Town." The Bridegroom. New York: Pantheon Books, 2000. Print.

Naipaul, V. The Mimic Men. New York: Vintage International, 2001. Print.

Kraidy, Marwan. "Hybridity in Cultural Globalization." Communication Theory. 12.3 (2002): 316-39. Web. 4 Dec. 2009.
This article touches on several topics outside the scope of my argument, but it does touch on how Western culture influence other cultures and those non-Western cultures influence Western Culture

Power, Carla, et al. "Not the Queen's ENGLISH. (cover story)." Newsweek (Atlantic Edition) 145.10 (2005): 62. MasterFILE Premier. EBSCO. Web. 4 Dec. 2009.
This article explores how English is seen as a necessity for success; however, there are more non-native English speakers than native and the non-native speakers are having an influence on the evolution (adaptation) of the English Language. Adoption of English and eventual influence on original force.

Diamond Age side-note

I figured that I'd mention something that I neglected to bring up in class when we were comparing current tech to tech in the book. Another thing we can add to that list is augmented reality (HUDs) in some car windshields and smartphones (Android phones and iPhones). However, that’s not really what I wanted to address.

Kindle was mentioned and I had an interesting set of trivia related to the development of Kindle. I may or may not have worked on the pre-launch/internal tech support team for Kindle. I’m not positive, but I don’t think I can get in into trouble for this… Anyway, it’s not material information, the products have been released, and you can find most of this information via Google or by looking at URLs for Amazon.com hosted Kindle images and whatnot.  So, many of the internal code names for Kindle hardware and software are/were based on characters from Diamond Age. I didn’t know this at the time, but after reading Diamond Age the influence is obvious. Fiona was the internal name for Kindle v1 hardware platform (the angular one that lots of people liked but complained about) and Nell is the Kindle 2 hw platform (people like it, unless they just bought the first gen Kindle, and still complain about). I don’t recall exactly, but I’m pretty sure that Hackworth was the codename for a firmware build on Kindle 1.

Chuck Woolery

James Joyce is no Chuck Woolery in the love connection department or maybe he is. According to the infallible Wikipedia, "Of the roughly 22,000 couples who met on the show, twenty nine were eventually married and eight became engaged."

Why did I just bring up an '80s dating show? I just saw an advertisement for it while I was flipping through TV channels. No, I don't own a time traveling DeLorean; it was on GSN. I felt it would be a good idea to include a bizarre opening in this blog post, so mistake or not, I'm running with it. The other option was LL Cool J's song "Mama Said Knock You Out." Seems like a win-win situation to me, but I determined that Chuck Woolery needed some attention in this blog post.

Let's get the Love Connection connection out of the way first. I thought the fact that works from the two authors we recently looked at use similar themes of isolation and broken relationships to get their points across was noteworthy. "Araby," "Eveline," "A Painful Case," and "The Dead" all seem to end in disappointment and isolation for the main characters who are trying to find a connection. Joyce presents a scenario in each of these stories where the main character seems to be detached for one reason or another and they try to establish a connection with another, but they wind up alone and dejected. We also see Lahiri's "A Temporary Matter" and "Interpreter of Maladies" end on similar notes. This repeated striking out more or less mirrors the tv show's success rate. I didn't enjoy Joyce's stories as much as Lahiri's primarily due to my preference for the writing style, but I found Joyce's stories to be just as interesting as Lahiri's.

With talk about Love Connection out of the way, I think I'll move on to other stuff I noticed. I was kind of unsure what to make of "Araby" before I read the essay about it. Some of the Orientalism stuff in the story stuck out, but I didn't completely get how critical Orientalism was to Irish identity at the time and some of the references Joyce makes to writers, thinkers, and personalities of the time were missed. However, the story and essay effectively demonstrate attitudes of the Irish toward British colonization/imperialism.

I thought "The Dead" was an intriguing story about the dinner party guests and ultimately about the conflicts in Irish society. Isolation and the search for control or identity are very apparent in this story. There's a lot going on in the story so I'm just going to make quick note of three things I noticed in the story.

Gabriel feels above, yet subordinate to the party hosts and other guests. He doesn't really seem comfortable with anyone from the moment he steps in the door and interacts with the servant Lily while she takes his coat and boots. When dealing with his peers he seems out of place. He's not sure to define the audience for his speech and he's also called a traitor against Ireland because he writes harmless book reviews for a pro-British newspaper. This scene where he's basically called a traitor also exposes his affinity for continental Europe over his homeland. All this adds up to create an image of a man who doesn't feel like he has a place in Ireland that really suits him.

On page 179, Gabriel's aunts try to track down Mr. Browne so he can come in from the cold. I thought the first two lines of dialog spoken about Mr. Browne by Mary Jane and Aunt Kate reflect a cautious acceptance of certain people in the community. The women essentially say, "Brown is out there. He's everywhere." Considering the fact that most, if not all, of the other party guests are Catholic, this not only demonstrates that he's always around the house, but Protestants in general are everywhere in Irish Catholic communities and it's impossible to get away from them. English influence is seeping into all corners of Irish society.

In addition to expressing dissatisfaction with English presence in Irish life, Aunt Kate complains about the Catholic church's faults. On page 169, Joyce writes a scene in which Aunt Kate questions the wisdom of the Catholic church and the Pope after the Pope banned women from singing in church choirs. This can be seen as one woman complaining about the fact she can't sing in church anymore, but I see it more as a reflection of Irish society at large and how unpopular decisions made by Irish Catholic authorities, or any authority figure, can result in discontent in the most enthusiastic supporters.

Bibi's Baby?

It seems that everyone in the Bloomsbury Court group at least had positive reactions to Lahiri's stories in Interpreter of Maladies. I also enjoyed the stories in this collection for the subject matter and Lahiri's writing style. Anyhow, on to the bulk of this blog post.

I wasn't exactly sure how I wanted to approach this, but I settled on looking for the most common story/stories mentioned in Bloomsbury Court's posts and examining everyone's comments about that/them. Besides, I occasionally get a bit wordy and the various posts may be a good cover for my wordiness. So, it looks like a majority of people commented on "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar," which I found to be a troubling story on several levels: from Bibi's mistreatment by her own family to the community's shortsightedness.

Brad comments on the idea of marriage in "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar" and Indian society in general, "In the Indian culture it is so important to get married especially for a woman. [...] In an Indian culture if a woman doesn’t have things to take care then they basically have nothing else to do with their lives." I both agree and disagree with this assertion. Marriage is important in Indian culture, but the ultimate purpose of marriage is not to give women something to do with their time and lives. The responsibilities of a wife in Indian culture may occupy a woman's days. However if this is the sole reason for marriage, what do we say about widowed women who do not have children and do not remarry? They're no longer married and they no longer have a husband to care for. Does this mean that their usefulness in the society is non-existent? Do they become the responsibility of the husband's family and assist them? I'm not familiar enough with Indian culture to give a definitive answer, but Bibi, who was unmarried, childless, and suffered from a neurological disorder, is an example of woman in Indian culture productively filling her time. Granted, Bibi works for a family member, not satisfied with her situation, and on the fringes of society, but she doesn't NEED a marriage in order to have something to do with her life. Instead of a means to fill time, marriage in Indian culture is more about social castes, growing familial power/strength, allowing some degree of social mobility, creating social connections, etc.

The institute of marriage in India has more to do with what Greg touches on in his blog post. He writes, "She didn't need a husband she needed someone to love her." I'm not on the "love conquers all" bandwagon, but I agree with Greg's sentiment. I think that marriage in Indian society is more about alleviating a degree of stress by providing people with a support system or sense of attachment in a community (belonging). As noted in Lahiri's other stories, specifically "The Third and Final Continent," Indian marriages are often arranged, so the quality of a spouse's love and support is questionable, but that support and sense of community can be found in a spouse, the larger family, or the wider community of other (discontent) married people. In the context of this story, marriage is seen as a way to give Bibi a connection to something besides her illness and the isolated tin shed. Although Lahiri does not explicitly state this, Bibi seems to be completely alone when she suffers these seizures even though people surround her. In the two instances where Bibi has an episode, no one notices her condition until she has collapsed and begins convulsing (161,167). The fact that she is alone when she falls may point to the need for some sort of support or connection beyond the superficial support from her cousin and neighbors. Maybe the doctor suggests marriage because he is out of ideas or maybe marriage is a way to address the isolation and lack of consistent support that caused or aggravated her condition.

Now we face the question of whether the idea of connection or support mentioned above actually solves anything for Bibi. Although she was always ill, Bibi was supposedly more satisfied when her father, who genuinely cared for her, was still alive (166). Unfortunately, we don't have any information to tell us if her condition was worse or significantly better than the few instances in the story. However, we do know that she was not doing particularly well without her father and Katie suggests that Bibi was ultimately healed or cured of her ailment after she has a baby (at the end of the story). I don't know that Bibi was cured of her seizures by the end of the story. The narrator in "The Treatment of Bibi Haldar" does state, "She was, to the best of our knowledge, cured," but this doesn't necessarily mean that she was fine (172). Rather, this furthers the idea that she was still isolated and possibly still suffering from the same condition, but no one saw further episodes. If we look at the lead up to the birth of the child, we see that no one knew Bibi well enough to know she was pregnant and she didn't know or trust anyone enough to reveal the identity of the child's father. After the birth of the child, it doesn't seem she was truly brought into the community. She received help with her child and she gained business, but there is no evidence that she ever developed attachments beyond these fleeting interactions. While Bibi gains a child, which she presumably wanted, she also leapfrogs the whole marriage process that could have given her the necessary support to make her "normal" within Indian culture and give her the ability to cope with or cure her mysterious illness. She now has a son and material wealth, of some degree, but she doesn't have the cure she desperately wants.

Sabotaged Chicken Alive in Darkness

Jin's stories feature situations that cause the reader to question not just Communism or Capitalism, but authority in general. However, he does this in a non-obvious way that ends in the characters continuing to rely on Communism or rejecting Capitalist ideas. No one in the stories explicitly question the authority, responsibility, or response of the state. Jin presents these stories in such a way that someone indoctrinated in the Maoist ideology could think, "Well yeah, he was a bad citizen," "I'm glad to see that the Party helped that poor man," or "I hate that Capitalist!" While a fair percentage of the population may reach conclusions like those I just noted, another sizeable group is going to reach another conclusion that may have a destabilizing effect.

"Saboteur" is blatant in its condemnation of the Party's behavior. In his description of the events that led to Chiu's arrest, Jin clearly shows how unfair and arbitrary the behavior of the police is. He also demonstrates the unwillingness to acknowledge reason and that the Party ultimately creates dissension where none existed before. However, I can totally see the story going over the heads of certain readers rather than getting Jin's point across. Now, I could be 100% wrong here, but I have always been under the impression that the self-criticism letter that Mr. Chiu had to sign was a standard part of Communist re-education or rehabilitation. Due to this, it was a widely understood thing in pre- and post-cultural revolution China (and U.S.S.R.). I never really asked anybody about this while I was in China, but I thought that the personal stories of going into a re-education or rehabilitation facility for counter-revolutionary behavior (less than complete obedience), which is what Mr. Chiu was essentially accused of, was part of the machine that kept everyone in line. If that's the case, I can see how someone would read this as a story detailing the fate of a counter-revolutionary and why the authority of the Party (police) should be respected. It can readily be argued that Chiu's intentional infection of the town represents the Party's failure, but there's a chance that this section could reinforce an interpretation that Mr. Chiu was an anti-social element who was and should be condemned to die from the diseases ravaging his counter-revolutionary innards - That subversive dog!

In "Alive" we see a man who was presumed dead, but eventually returned to his former life. While the state did assist Guhan's family in his absence, the restitution for his death, which came in the process of performing his job for the state run cannery, was rather insignificant. The cannery and state didn't really spend anything to compensate his family for the loss of life and income. They simply shifted resources around by hiring his into a position that provided a smaller income than he originally had. Upon his return they were unwilling to send away the man they imported to fill the vice director position he was set to fill, they refused to demote the man who filled his original position, and they were unwilling to create a new position for him. He indirectly gave his life for the survival of the cannery, but the cannery management and employees, who all seemed to respect him greatly, continued to live as if he never existed. In addition, the director of the cannery may have misled Guhan about the financial state of the cannery. Guhan reappeared around the New Year, yet the cannery seemed to be running just fine without him or the money he was sent to collect. Considering the total destruction of Taifu, I find it hard to believe that the cannery received the money it was owed. I suppose the government could have paid the debt after Taifu's destruction, but who knows. Whether we consider that the cannery director was lying or not, the cannery still had a hand in Guhan's "death." Based upon the Party's promoted ethos, it was more than reasonable to assume he would be re-incorporated into the organization, but the Party simply tossed him aside with a pension, which he should have received eventually anyway, and Guhan accepted this as a reasonable solution to his predicament. Clearly, a story like this could rattle one's faith in their dear leader's party.

I was going to have a longer paragraph about "After Cowboy Chicken Came to Town" right here, but this is getting a tad too long. However, I concluded that this was ultimately a story exposing the faults of both political systems (Communism and Capitalism), but one holds a greater promise of prosperity. While there's an imbalance in Capitalism, as demonstrated in Peter's power and wealth, there is opportunity in the system. As expressed through the narrator's mother and father, Communism can provide stability, but what good is stability if it's outweighed by misery and disappointment? And segue into Conrad talk.

I'm not incredibly familiar with Eastern European history, but I know that the Bolshevik Revolution took place in the early 1920s. So, the late 1800s and early 1900s would have been a time of anti-czarist/anti-imperialist activity and changes in modern political thought (Communism) or revolution. Considering the incredible change sweeping throughout the Russian Empire and nearby areas, I think Heart of Darkness would have been lost in the torrent of competing ideas at the time. There's a slight chance that HoD would have been seized by the anti-Imperialists and used to highlight the errors of imperialism and colonialism. However, there are various comments in Heart of Darkness that would weaken its use as an effective piece of propaganda, which further reduces its appeal in that regard. This isn't to say that changes weren't occurring in England, but there was certainly more stability that would allow for more careful consideration of the text. When examining these factors, it's clear that postcolonial literature would be significantly different because Conrad's voice would be totally absent from the conversation.

Who Are You? Who, who? Who, who?

(Quick note: Ridiculous title, I’m sorry. And now I’ve got the opening of CSI (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WseRJMQf1U) stuck in my head. Anyway, this is a completely revised version of my original post. I suppose the original post was fine, but it felt lacking in some regard. I got kind of long winded on this version. If you don’t want to read it, just assume that I wrote Antoinette is a mad, beastly woman and she got what she deserved. You can comment accordingly.)

I hate you blog post five. Well, not really hate, but you certainly made me rethink how to approach this more often than I had anticipated. Spivak, curse you as well. Anyhow, with my outbursts against a block of text and the author of an essay out of the way, let’s move on to the details.

I suppose I should explain what caused some second and third (?) guessing with this week’s post. It’s not so much that I had trouble wrapping my head around things, more that there is so much to touch on that I wasn’t sure where to go and I kept wanting to go back and look at other things mentioned in the essay. Looking at the phrase “other things” and how I ended up approaching this, I suppose one could take that to mean things about the other because I got somewhat fixated on the idea of the other and identity in this instance. This isn’t to say that previous blog posts haven’t been about the other or identity because they all have to some degree. (Isn’t what part of what this class has been about? Who’s who? In what context are we defined and who’s the one coming up with that definition? How does one interact with another to change things?) However, the combination of Spivak’s essay and WSS more obviously laid out the conflict with identity more than any of the other stories we’ve read so far. So this is going to be an amalgamation of Spivak’s points, but they all seem to involve Antoinette’s identity.

I’ll start with things on the third page of Spivak’s essay (242) and kind of jump around from there. Here Spivak explores Antoinette’s sanity, which I agree is intact, and that leads into a discussion about Antoinette’s identity and her belonging in both England and the West Indies. Not only does Antoinette represent the other, but she also represents the other’s other. So, she also kind of represents the self in that regard. In this context I don’t feel that the broader question of whether she was insane or not is the most crucial, but questions regarding what the “insane” outburst might have said about Antoinette, and ultimately the lasting impact colonization has on the colonized population, are important.

As Spivak notes, Antoinette’s attack on Mason was not one of an insane person, but rather one of a competent, yet possibly irrational, person (242). It is not as if Antoinette leapt at Mason as soon as she saw him or immediately after he began speaking. In her recollection of the scene, Grace implies that the conversation carried on for some indeterminate amount of time before Mason said, “I cannot interfere legally” and Antoinette’s subsequent attack (150). This reflects some level of composure, control, or sanity and not unrestrained madness on Antoinette’s part. Spivak and Rhys also note that the attack coincided with Mason’s mention of the term “legally.” Now, this could have been nothing more than a marker word used to show when Mason was interrupted. However, if we continue along Spivak’s line of thought and examine why the phrase “legally” might have set off Antoinette, the argument that this brief episode marked the point at which the repressed part of Antoinette’s psyche was rekindled can be made. Again, not in an unbridled mad manner, but simply that the non-English other that was a critical part of Antoinette finally reached a saturation point (in terms of dismissal and abandonment) and struck out at the idea of English control that Mason represented at that moment. Not only was the imposition of English law preventing her salvation, but she was being abandoned and left to wither in the hands of English (Rochester) control, much like foreign lands/people colonized before. Following the attack we find Antoinette is largely unaware of what transpired. We’ll say she blacked out or something, but that blackout episode further reflects the repression of the other and Antoinette’s forced adoption of Englishness. An interesting aspect of this part of Spivak’s essay is that she is consistently referring to Antoinette in England as Bertha, just like Rochester does in WSS and Jayne Eyre, in order to demonstrate the new identity that Antoinette was coping with. I suppose it also demonstrates the end of Rhys’ original narrative and the interweaving with Bronte’s. However, if this is considered further, it becomes apparent that this blackout episode was less about a blinding rage and more about a situation where there was a fleeting repression of Bertha, which allowed a for a small rebellion against the colonizer and, indirectly, the English self that stood idly by.

Overgrowth

I found the description of the once manicured, but now overgrown estate garden kind of interesting. The paragraph on pages 10 and 11 mentions how the garden was once “large and beautiful as that garden in the Bible,” but now it is “overgrown [with] a smell of dead flowers mixed with the fresh living smell.” Rhys also writes about the orchids that were so alluring, but unapproachable. At this point in the story it seems like the garden is much like the island itself. The old order is withering, but there’s also a swarm of chaotic energy accompanied by a terrifying allure now that the master is gone. In the moment it seems like it’s something you could interact with and enjoy, but there’s also a sense that it could immediately overwhelm and overpower the senses. It’s a very weird place to find one’s self; in the middle of this transformation and not sure where to go. If we look at Antoinette, she’s got these choices to make because the middle isn’t where it’s at. The middle ground seems to be filled with abandonment, isolation, and alienation.

As a result, we start to see her finding comfort in extremes as the chapter progresses.  For her, those extremes tend to be on the European side. After losing her friend and her mother finds a new husband, Antoinette starts to withdraw from the world outside the estate walls and we start to see her gravitating towards Mason’s unparalleled Englishness. She eats an English dinner with her family even though she typically eats traditional island food alone; she adores a picture of a “lovely English girl with brown curls and blue eyes,” and finds comfort/safety in Mason’s English self-confidence. This move to one extreme and the moment of safety that came with it is immediately thrown into upheaval, but once that passes and some other events transpire she finds herself in another situation where she feels “safe.” This happens when Antoinette enters the convent. The island ways she was used to are replaced by customs of the European church. With the end of the first part of the book, it looks like that her sense of safety is going to be disrupted again.

What's the Difference?

In today’s class discussion there was much talk surrounding the attitudes displayed by Mr. Brown and Rev. Smith. Due to poor planning on my part I hadn't completed “Things Fall Apart” before class so some of the context of the discussion was lost on me. However, I was able to establish some opinions about the two that seemed to hold up after I finished the last few chapters. A lot of what was discussed focused on who was the nicer guy, but the more I heard the more it seemed  that it wasn’t so much a matter of one being nice and the other being mean, it was just a case of differing philosophies. They shared the same ultimate goal and were both equally detrimental to the continued existence of the tribe as a unit. The ideas of good and bad are relative and when I compared these two characters in the context of their mission, neither seemed particularly good to me. Was Mr. Brown as aggressive and immediately destructive as Rev. Smith? No. However, in the long run, I think that Mr. Brown’s tack was more shrewd and insidious.

Rev. Smith was concerned about establishing a tradition of strength in the congregation. As a result, he considered driving the less faithful from the church, took an aggressive stance toward the villagers, and let the zealots among his group run unchecked. While this approach did allow him to strengthen the faith of the church in Umuofia, it also resulted in increased hostility with the villagers. As we can see in chapter 24 of “Things Fall Apart,” this approach wasn’t going to be sustainable without serious conflict and, likely, notable losses for both parties. While brute force can pay off in the long run, the run is much longer and more painful than the “good cop” approach Mr. Brown employed.

Mr. Brown was interested in ensuring that the church appealed to as many tribesmen as possible. He seemed to do this by learning about the native culture, without adopting these concepts himself, and looking for ways to make the church an integral, and ultimately dominant, part of the community. (As an aside, this scenario, as lopsided as it is, seems to go toward the concept of exchange to be covered in our first essay.) Mr. Brown’s process of examination can be seen on pages 101 and 102, Achebe writes that Mr. Brown even took the time to learn about the clan’s beliefs and looked for ways to “attack” those ideas.  Ideally, establishing mass appeal would lead to a situation where everyone would have a close friend/family member who was in the church and that would ultimately bring the rest of the tribe along.

To answer the question presented in the title of this post, I don't think there's a difference. In the end the two men could have been swapped out for anybody or any personality as long as they had the same goal in mind. While I'd prefer a Mr. Brown style regime, Mr. Brown seems like a more dangerous influence, in regard to the local culture, than Rev. Smith. Mr. Brown displayed a gentleness and understanding that made him appear non-threatening. This lulled the people of Umuofia into a false sense of security and before they knew it their community was being pulled apart by Mr. Brown's involvement in their lives. At least those who were loyal to Umuofia’s traditions could readily see the cultural/societal threat posed by Rev. Smith and try to do something to change things.

Read Or Bury Our Traditional Stories?

Is the title nonsense? Yeah. I just wanted my title to create the acronym ROBOTS. I previously had a line rationalizing the title, but it seemed pointless. This doesn't seem any more fruitful. So...

I think avoiding controversial texts, like “Heart of Darkness,” does nothing to serve individual growth or growth as a society/community. Without reading a book like “Heart of Darkness” and considering, internal and external, reactions to it we risk a reaching a point where we continue to operate in the same ideological framework and don’t move past certain ideas. Now, I suppose one could argue that teaching the same text each generation can lead to the same sort of stagnation, but I’d say that risk is almost negligible because the context in which HoD is read and the way it is read change over the years. As a result, HoD continues to inform people, but brings them to different conclusions. For example, HoD was read for 50+ years before an opinion like Achebe’s was developed and published. Achebe rails against the text and Conrad for the evils he observed, but without reading HoD Achebe might not have been compelled to respond when and how he did and we may not be considering the question of Hillis Miller’s essay “Should We Read ‘Heart of Darkness’?”

As can be deduced from my comments above, I agree with Hillis Miller’s general opinion that “’Heart of Darkness’ should be read, ought to be read” (HoD 474). However, I kind of disagree with Hillis Miller's opinion that it should only be read a certain way. HoD is a work of fiction, so to assume everything in the book is completely accurate isn’t very reasonable. However, I think there’s value in HoD, or most any book, regardless of how it’s read.  Is reading “Heart of Darkness” without some sort of discourse, introspection, etc. dangerous? I think dangerous is overstating things, but yes I suppose it could skew or reinforce a reader’s opinions. However, things are open to interpretation and if someone goes into “Heart of Darkness” looking to find examples to reinforce their negative opinions of another race, culture, gender, and so on, that's what they'll likely find. If they don’t read “Heart of Darkness,” they’ll likely find it in another text they come across. I don’t think that the discourse that can come out of reading “Heart of Darkness” should be sacrificed to avoid the risk of causing harm. We shouldn’t avoid things just because they might be taken one way or another, because they present potentially disquieting concepts, or because we can get similar ideas from another text. A set of ideas presented in a specific way will elicit very specific opinions that may not be conceived otherwise.

Furthermore, we, as members of society in general, should also read classic books like HoD because those who came before read them.  We shouldn’t read them out of obligation or to maintain the status quo, but to understand what shaped our forebears’ thought processes, how society has or hasn’t changed, and how we can individually interpret the world in which we live.

I'm Not Sure About This Kidd.

In “Social Progress and the Rivalry of the Races” Benjamin Kidd uses the idea of Social Darwinism to apply Darwin’s theory of evolution to the progression of or competition between races, as the title implies. Kidd asserts that one race will dominate the races that it comes in contact with because certain core attributes (work ethic, altruism, ethical behavior, etc.) of the dominant race are inherently better or more progressive than those of the dominated race. Kidd explains that conflict and ultimately domination appear to be unavoidable forces, but they aren’t always expressed through “fierce and cruel wars of extermination” (230).

I’m sure that our class discussion (09/03/09) was more broad than I recall, but for some reason I came away with the impression that there was a considerable focus on violent domination as opposed to the “silent and painless” (232) domination that Kidd brings up several times. As a result, I’ve decided to try to look at how “Heart of Darkness” may reflect some of Kidd’s ideas, specifically the idea that inherent racial/cultural qualities invariably motivate one race to dominate another and how that domination may subtly occur.

One of the most obvious things in “Heart of Darkness” that demonstrates how thoroughly Africa has been dominated by the west is the map Marlow examines in the trading company’s office. Marlow describes a map of Africa that has been divided into colored sections with each representing a different foreign concern that had control over territory in Africa (10). While Conrad writes that the “map is marked with all the colours of a rainbow” (10) and proceeds to mention how European countries are represented by these colors, there isn’t any mention of unclaimed land. This implies that none of the land actually belongs to the natives; there is no “Africa.” All we see is a group of territories belonging to the westerners who put their flags there first and the African people happen to be there. Obviously this example doesn’t go toward establishing how or why these cultures so thoroughly spread throughout Africa, but it does show a situation where one race has completely pushed the other toward extinction (apparently without a drastic war-like action).

Maybe I’m not recalling a portion of “Heart of Darkness,” but I can’t think of an example from the text that blatantly demonstrates Kidd’s belief regarding the superiority of one race’s attributes over another’s. However, if Kurtz is used as an analog for a dominant race and the natives he ultimately lived with are an analog for a dominated race, I think I can see some of the conflict and "progress" Kidd talks about.

Conrad writes, “Kurtz had been disapproved by her people. He wasn’t rich enough … It was his impatience of comparative poverty that drove him out there“ (75). I think Marlow’s reflection on Kurtz’s situation with his fiancé mirrors what Kidd was conveying about core cultural/racial qualities that lead to competition between races. In this example Conrad reveals a “restless” (233) disposition and an industrious spirit, which are some ideas Kidd associated with the dominant race of the time, the Anglo-Saxons. Once in Africa, Kurtz finds himself stranded without a guarantee of rescue and surrounded by peril. For some reason, aside from Conrad’s need to tell a story, the local indigenous Africans who greatly outnumber Kurtz don’t attack and kill him at the first opportunity. It also doesn’t seem like they attempted to adopt Kurtz and assimilate him into their society. This hesitation may be explained by curiosity, fear, indifference, morality, etc. Whatever the reason, Kurtz exploited what could be considered a display of weakness and was able to subordinate this group of natives with what seemed to be a limited show of force. It appears that Kurtz eventually began introducing and enforcing his own rules and whatnot upon the local native. Soon Kurtz's way became accepted by the local natives and he was able to integrate with, but also dominate that  group. Again, this seems to have some parallels with the Anglo-Saxons. Westerners were exploring in an attempt to find additional resources. They found themselves in a mysterious land, but were able to control much of Africa through the application of attributes and concepts favored by their culture/race.

A quick introduction

My name is Kristopher (or Kris). I'm a junior in the DTC program. I'm a fan of "The Big Lebowski." I don't watch a ton of TV, but I have been watching "The Colony" on Discovery. It's a reality show and feels really staged at times, but the post-disaster scenario is interesting. I also watch hockey and baseball from time to time. I don't have much else to post right now, so I guess that's it.