· 2019· Book chapter
3. Of Mimicry and Man: The Ambivalence of Colonial Discourse
- 1,218citations
- 2019year
Short summary
Colonial discourse, particularly from post-Enlightenment England, is characterized by a "forked tongue" that simultaneously asserts authority and undermines itself through mimicry. This inherent ambivalence is evident in influential texts that attempt to reform colonial subjects.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Key points
- Colonial discourse employs mimicry, creating a "forked tongue" that is neither entirely true nor false.
- This mimicry profoundly and disturbingly affects the authority of colonial discourse.
- Texts like Grant's 'Observations' and Macaulay's 'Minute' exemplify this ambivalent approach to governing Indian subjects.
- The concept of a "reformed" colonial subject highlights the inherent contradictions within colonial ideology.
AI-generated from the title and abstract; the full text is not read.
Abstract
Mimicry reveals something in so far as it is distinct from what might be called an itself that is behind. The discourse of post-Enlightenment English colonialism often speaks in a tongue that is forked, not false. If colonialism takes power in the name of history, it repeatedly exercises its authority through the figures of farce. The effect of mimicry on the authority of colonial discourse is profound and disturbing. A classic text of such partiality is Charles Grant’s ‘Observations on the state of society among the Asiatic subjects of Great Britain’ which was only superseded by James Mills’s History of India as the most influential early nineteenth-century account of Indian manners and morals. The absurd extravagance of Macaulay’s ‘Minute’ (1835) – deeply influenced by Charles Grant’s ‘Observations’ – makes a mockery of Oriental learning until faced with the challenge of conceiving of a ‘reformed’ colonial subject.
The authors' abstract, as published at the source., 2019 · DOI ↗
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Field: History and Philosophy of Science
History and Philosophy of ScienceArts and Humanities