The Wretched Of The Earth Analysis

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The idea of decolonisation of a country is a result of the precipitation of violence and oppression that are woven through the history of that country’s colonisation. It introduces in the people the notions of repair and hope after their years of being subjugated by those who considered themselves racially superior to them. Frantz Fanon, a Martinique-born philosopher, explores the context of the power structure that exists in a colonised society both during and after the colonialist is physically present. He develops through his book The Wretched of the Earth the argument that true decolonisation can never take place because the scars of violence on both the nation and the people’s bodies are too deep to simply heal with the remedies of infrastructural…show more content…
The discrimination against the colonised is effected through the emphasis on skin colour and additionally through the reduction of the colonised to the image of animals or savages (1). This reduction is created by the colonialist to further the idea that the “natives” cannot be taught the values of a civil society, but at the same time, it does not explain the existence of a set of intellectuals who gain considerable power and the favour of the white people under colonial rule. The title of “savages” is not given to those intellectuals as they come close to imitating the ways of the colonialist regarding their behaviour, education and way of communication. These intellectuals ironically treat the rural masses, which are considered the hindrances for development during the decolonising period (2), as the “savages”, essentially replacing the colonialists with the colonised themselves, in their attitude towards the rural people. The portraiture of the savage is also beautifully drawn in Martinique playwright Aimé Césaire’s A Tempest where the “native”, Caliban, laments that he is termed “Caliban the animal, Caliban the slave” (Act II Scene II). This dehumanising portrayal of the colonised people is a key point in how the colonised were oppressed by the colonialist, as the colonised were
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    Frantz Fanon’s book The Wretched of the Earth discuss the effects of colonization on the conquered, and their attempts to overthrow them. Fanon’s book is seen to be critical in the overall discussion of the colonization of Africa and the theorizing of racial and national oppression. Themes such as politics, psychology, liberation, cycle of violence, history and race are all seen throughout the book. Topics such as the psychological effects of men and women in the conquered countries and the way that

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