Post-colonialism is an intellectual movement which is to ask the legacies left by colonialism and to establish a new national identity. Today post-colonialism is facing complex challenges. That is, overcoming of the past colonialism having left spirit...
Post-colonialism is an intellectual movement which is to ask the legacies left by colonialism and to establish a new national identity. Today post-colonialism is facing complex challenges. That is, overcoming of the past colonialism having left spiritual legacies, resisting the invisible, cultural and economic subordinate relationship (so called ‘cultural imperialism' today), and seeking the future ’beyond the nationality’ in post-national time that the boundaries of the nation-state are vanishing. The question of this study is whether the cultural texts produced in post-colonial countries can suggest what is ‘beyond’ the confrontation while contemplating the past history of colonization. The purpose of this study is to examine the post-colonial thinking and strategy by analyzing three cultural texts representing colonial time, and to investigate what future of post-nationalism the texts prospect for.
Analysis texts are Things fall apart(1958) by Chinua Achebe, the Korean film <Geology>(1978) based on the novel The Clan Records written by Kajiyama Toshiyuki, and another Korean film <YMCA Baseball Team>(2002). I carry out the analysis throwing the following questions: (1) How does the text represent the colonial period? (2) How does the text represent the colonial discourse? (3) Is there a hybrid identity arising from ‘Contact Zone’? (4) What is the strategy of the text to resist colonialism?
Approaching methodology is the theory of Edward Said and Homi Bhabha, both of whom are well known as postcolonial theorists. From Said, I gain such a clear, analytical viewpoint concerning imperial ideology. Bhabha helps me to pay attention to the 'interaction' between colonizer and colonized which Said overlooked, and thus to read the colonial history with a balanced perspective. Bhabha's cultural hybridity means that no identity (even colonizer’s) is not robust, and that any identity does not remains pure. Accordingly, the theory of Bhabha helps us to discover ‘familiarity’ between colonizer and colonized. Moreover, it has significant meaning not only for the colonial space, but for the postcolonial space that today's global cultural identity under the post-national time is being relocated.
Each text has different features depending on its historical background, author’s or director's historical and aesthetic sense. Achebe’s postcolonial strategy in Things fall apart is to objectively reconstruct the African history of the colonial time. He achieved two ironical goals by exposing all the defects and virtues of the traditional society. One is to overthrow the dominant discourse in which Africa was defined as 'empty space without history', and to prove that in Africa there used to be a live culture and history. The other is to show repentance that the African traditional society could not avoid the responsibility of colonization.
Especially the way to resist colonialism is in 'the plot'. Achebe switches the omniscient viewpoint to the imperialist one at the ending part, which shows "insensitive schematization" of Africa done by the Western imperialist, and so dramatically reveals a process of castrating African soul and personality. In other words, this strategy is to represent imperial mentality and ideology as an allegory form in literature work, as Edward Said reveals in Orientalism(1978) 20 years later. Therefore, the postcolonial strategy of the text is letting the Western imperialists look back themselves through the eyes of "the voyage in", rather than 'blaming' them directly. That is, the cultural resistance of this text is to make the Western ‘center’ realize their own historical responsibility.
In the <Genealogy>, the colonial subjects to resist colonialism are 'Seol Jinyoung', a Korean and ‘Dani’, a Japanese. This text has two different ‘signifier’ concerning counter colonial discourse. One is somehow excessive nationalism highlighting a strong national sentiment by representing the death of Seol Jinyoung as a heroic death. The other one is Dani’s colonial hybrid which is to say as a signifier of post-nationalism. ‘Dani’ is an unexpected voice arising from ‘Contact Zone’ where two contrasting cultures encounter. Born in colony, Dani has an identity of ‘in-between’ which does not wholly belong to either Korea or Japan, and shows detachment of ‘center.’ In his hybrid identity the relationship of colonizer/colonized (‘mater/slave’) evolves into ‘interdependent relationship.’ He perceives clearly the ‘ambivalence’ in the colonizer’s mentality, which can be said as Bhabha’s words, "being the father and the oppressor at the same time, being just and unjust, and being moderate and rapacious”, resisting inhumane colonialism.
This 'impure' hybrid identity present us the possibility to rethink the colonial experience from the viewpoint of post-nationalism. Firstly, there are not always narratives such as confrontation and retaliation in colonial history. Secondly, colonial time can be described with reality by cultural hybrid without a sharply acute angle of a nativism or anti-colonial nationalism. Thirdly, we can discard the old national hostility to have a more tolerant outlook for the future by approaching the colonial time with 'inter-penetration.'
If ‘Dani’ is a colonizer hybrid, Min Jeonglim in <YMCA Baseball Team> is a marginal colonized hybrid who experiences the Western center. Mixed with the experience of the West and the indigenous, she seems to be stimulated by the Western culture rather than the traditional. For her the West is regarded as the absolute good, the superior, and the truth. At some point, however, the film shows the trajectory that she disbands the ‘center' for herself. For the subaltern woman, the moment of 'decentering' is a unique point of post-colonial thinking in this film.
The film has a bird's-eye view of the colonial time dealing with not only national conflict but also internal conflicts related to generation/class/gender. The text does not follow the polarity logic that is often chronically reproduced in anti-Japanese narratives. Its anachronistic strategy is to resurrect colonized motherland with a sign of 'Mapae' and 'Amhangeosa'(secret royal inspector), and guides the audience into another emotion of patriotism. That is, you should not see the colonial history as bloody, and not interpret the colonial times with defensive attitude out of victim mentality. Furthermore, Hochang's anachronistic smile tells us tolerance beyond consolation. His enigmatic smile buffets the hierarchy system which classifies colonizer and colonized, atomizing the dichotomy and difference between center and periphery.
If Dani in <Genealogy> suggests the possibility to rethink the colonial experience from the viewpoint of post-nationalism, the marginal subalterns in <YMCA Baseball Team> shake the polarities of Self/Other, center/periphery, and colonizer/colonized. The film changes skillfully the position of the victim and the victor, telling paradox of history that the colonized were not simply victims. With a desire of post-nationalism the vision of the text are as follows: don’t regard the old colonial history only as ethnic conflict, don’t be necessarily armour-plated against other identities preparing for the 'coexistence', and always keep in mind that our identity be relocated and created afresh.
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