Imperialism: the Perils of Globalism

Abstract

With epic simplicity, Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart depicts traditional Nigerian customs and values — both peaceful and warlike — yielding to the superior ‘fetish’ of Western religion and brute power. A chain of violent events leads inexorably to white domination. It starts with the proud warrior Okonkwo — a wealthy farmer with three wives — awakening in the night to the sound of the town-crier calling for a meeting next day.

Before the white man came, he had the Bible and we had the land. After the white man came, we had the Bible and he had the land. Kenyatta, anthropologist, first President of Kenya

[H]ow can we treat the cultural, historical phenomenon of Orientalism as a kind of willed human work … in all its historical complexity, detail and worth without at the same time losing sight of the alliance between cultural work, political tendencies, the state, and the specific realities of domination?

Edward Said, Orientalism