Is Decolonization of the Mind Possible? (blog #3)
A reflection from reading Fanon
In the opening chapter of Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth, “On Violence”, Fanon writes about colonial violence as experienced, on a psychological level, by the colonized. For the colonized subject, Fanon writes, the technologies of colonialism operate on two grounds, the material through military, political institutions and physical violence, and the psycho-existential through the deprivation of human dignity. Fanon’s idea of the colonized psyche poses an important question, namely, if colonialism conditions its subject to feel inferior on an existential level, how do we decolonize the psyche? Is decolonization of the mind possible?
To contextualize his text, Fanon wrote amid the Algerian War in French Algeria, the North African country with the most brutal and enduring colonial experience. The 8-year-long war took the lives of three hundred thousand Algerians. The only brutality comparable was the first thirty years of French rule which effectively reduced half of the population by military repression and deprivation of land. Violence then, for Fanon, is a daily experience in the colony. It is the only language that the colonizers speak. It is the only thing that the colonized know. And it is in this context Fanon writes famously that for the colonized, “violence is a cleansing force. It rids the colonized of their inferiority complex.”
The independence wars of North African countries were fought and won. Today, Fanon’s medicine might be anachronistic, but his diagnose remains highly relevant. The best high schools in Tunis, Casablanca and Rabat are still French. They continue to produce local elites, educated in the French system, that control the country. Morocco and Tunisia remain economically intertwined with France. Colonial Resident-Generals still enjoy rosy legacies, especially Lyautey in Morocco. Post-colonial can refer to temporally, the end of the colonial era, but it also signifies the continuous struggle against colonial structures, be it economic, political, or psychological. Returning to Fanon’s question, is it possible, on the psycho-existential level, to overcome the structures of colonialism? This question is getting increasingly hard to answer, not because we cannot quantify the colonized mind, but because globalization has brought new forms of cultural imperialism that promotes Western hegemony. Clearly, we are still in the post-colonial struggle. But if violence is not a viable course of action, and we cannot redo our history nor political institutions, how do we locate the possibilities of decolonization?
My Moroccan friend told me she and her friends stopped speaking French in Morocco. Another friend of mine is currently working on a novel on an Amazigh (the self-identification of Berbers) woman’s experience in nationalist struggle. Within the narrow parameters of culture, these women seek to undermine unquestioned rules and rewrite stories of their people. I admire them with all my heart.
On the other hand, I believe it unjust to place the burden solely on the colonized. Until today, France has yet to admit the atrocious crimes it committed in Algeria. Nor has France publicly apologized to Morocco or Tunisia for robbing their natural resources. Recent news of France cutting number of visas granted to Moroccan, Algerian and Tunisian demonstrates that France does not believe it bears responsibility to its former colonies. When France left Morocco in 1955, 90% of the population was illiterate. Most land was controlled by a handful of rural elites. There was no condition for democracy. Is France not partly liable for the subsequent political failure that created widespread poverty? When France gave in to Algerians in 1962, the common Algerian had literally nothing but the suffering endured from 130 years of colonialism. Is France not responsible for the well-beings of the people it has exploited and victimized?
Until the way we view colonialism shift fundamentally, from a glorified fate to an appalling crime, we cannot alleviate the mental weight felt and continue to be felt by the colonized. The former colonial power remains an obstacle to the difficult task of the decolonization of the psyche.
