Heart of Darkness Imperialism, Hegemony, and Othering

Narrative of Thought I remember when I first read Heart of Darkness. I was a sophomore in high school when I had been required to read it. I remember when I got it. I thought to myself that it might be a cool book. I read the first five pages and wanted to throw it the window. It was confusing, frustrating and a little weird. Eventually I did read it. The more I read the more it made sense. When I finished it, I was still a little confused, but I understood it better. I would not say that the exact word imperialism came to my mind when I thought about Heart of Darkness. Granted back then I did not really understand the word imperialism. I did know that I was repulsed by what the Europeans were really doing in the Congo. I just did not†¦show more content†¦Besides that, they had given them [Africans] every week three pieces of brass wire, each about nine inches long†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (178). Marlow then talks about how useless it was; unless they planned to actually eat the wire or bend it into fishhooks, they would have no food. He later ponders why, the cannibals, do not attack. After all, they threw the hippo meat overboard because of greed and selfishness. Indeed, the cannibals were in some ways more civil than the pilgrims. They could have killed the pilgrims anytime they wanted. However, they seemed to have a secret humanity in them. Perhaps it was because they were not corrupted by greed or power. This says a lot about the Europeans. T hrough out the novel, the European’s attitude constantly reminds us that if there is something for them to gain from, then they do not care who they trample on to get to it. Another example for imperialism is â€Å"Shooting an Elephant†, but there is also evidence that there is othering and hegemony. However, the story mostly centers on hegemony. In â€Å"Shooting an Elephant†, the narrator was pressured to shoot the elephant in order to be accepted by the natives. Orwell did not want to shoot the elephant but felt pressured to in order to maintain his rank of power and respect. Orwell ends up shooting the elephant because he does not want to lose even more respect and look idiotic. If he had not killed the elephant, but simply walked away, he wouldShow MoreRelatedAnalysis Of S Americanah Through A Post Colonial Prism4297 Words   |  18 Pagesnationally allegorical (69), an assertion spectacularly assailed by Aijaz Ahmad (77-82). But it is possible to close our eyes to Ahmad’s very valid misgivings and take a bird’s eye view of Jameson’s assertion: read in reaction to the phenomenon of imperialism, perhaps the literature of dominated peoples is the literature of self-assertion, however blind to Jameson’s national allegorical (or anticolonial) imperative, and however â€Å"hybrid†. That last expression might as well be a fair summation of post-colonialismRead MoreThe White Man s Burden By Rudyard Kipling10612 Words   |  43 Pagesattached to analyse the text. Having an eye on these approaches, this section offers a critical thinking about the nature of the relationship between the British and the Indians. 2.1 The Indian Landscape and the Sense of Displacement As in Heart of Darkness, the Indian landscape appears very hostile to the colonisers as if it conspires and plots against them. It depicts their socio-psychological dilemma in the foreign land and the traumatic influences of their colonial system. It resists and fightsRead MoreA Passage Of India And The Relations Of Power10531 Words   |  43 Pagesduring the tension between the Indians and the British during the British Occupation of Indi. It underlines the problematic relationship of the British colonial context and the colonised Indians. The relationship between the two nations is that of hegemony and power. India, as Ahmad Abu Baker believes in his â€Å"Rethinking Identity: The Coloniser in E. M. Forster’s A Passage to India†, is very ‘hostile to the colonisers, fighting them and intensifying their feelings of alienation and exile’ (Abu Baker