Thursday, August 29, 2019

Prejudice and the Colonial Condition in Post-Colonial Caribbean Essay

Prejudice and the Colonial Condition in Post-Colonial Caribbean Literature - Essay Example This approach has also built strong prejudices towards a certain community. The stereotype about certain people, culture and community inclines towards hatred, atrocity among different community. In the research paper the racial prejudice has been discussed thoroughly in context to colonialism. For the study, the three major literary works have been taken for discussion. They are â€Å"Small Island,† by Andrea Levy, â€Å"In the Castle of My Skin,† by George Lammings and a memoir of Jamaica Kindcaid called â€Å"A Small Place.† The three novels focus on the stereotypical view and bigotry among the colonizers and colonized people. Various characters from these books are the representatives of the contemporary human psyche. It’s a struggle between masters and slaves, between hatred and helplessness, between colonizers and colonized. The writers want to focus that the colonialism is a psyche and it will take a long time to disappear it from the minds of the c olonized. Colonization suppressed self-respect, self-identity, and local religion of the native people of the colonies. With the help of other references, the paper throws the light on the racism, prejudices of both colonizers and colonized, and the colonial and post-colonial situation in the Caribbean Islands. Racial prejudice has been a sinister social disease, spread all over the world for centuries. So called advanced White people still are backward in their views, intolerant and narrow minded towards the people from other race. The racial prejudice is the consequence of the differences in hair colour, eye colour, facial structure, size of limb and most important the skin colour. Racial prejudice takes place when people are judged on the basis of their superficial character and outward appearance. In American history the racial prejudice resulted into the exploitation of black people. During Second World War, Hitler had an extreme hatred towards Jew community. It resulted into relentless atrocities towards black people and Jews. To remove this social stigma, the modern societies have drafted and enacted various laws and statute to ensure that all the people from different races should get respect and should be considered equal. The racism has become one of the hot topics for debate espe cially after the Second World War. Caribbean islands had previously been the one of the major colonies of British Empire. Much has been written on colonial condition and racial prejudice in Caribbean literature. The authors like Laura Niesen De Aruna have written about racist and imperialist current in Caribbean literature. Frances A. Della Cava and Madeline H. Engel also have given examples of racial prejudice against Blacks, Jews, and Women in their fiction. After World War II people from Caribbean island were migrating to England. The impression about England was very noble among its colonies. They called England as â€Å"Mother Country,† but when they came on the land they found that they had no value in Britain and they were been treated as aliens. Our study throws light upon the post colonial racism and racial prejudices. The stigma of racial discrimination has been reflected in post colonial Caribbean Literature. The problems of immigration, the insecure feeling, uncer tainty and biased, bigotry approach of English community towards the migrants had been the major issues depicted by the authors like Andrea Levy, George Lammings, Jamaica Kindcald and other writers. Keywords: Caribbean literature, racial prejudice, colonial conditions, bigotry, immigration During the World War II, the British colonies had no choice but to hold up with their masters, their British Empire. The colonized, for British people

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