Product Description

This innovative and lively book is quite unlike any other introduction to postcolonialism. Robert Young examines the political, social, and cultural after-effects of decolonization by presenting situations, experiences, and testimony rather than going through the theory at an abstract level. He situates the debate in a wide cultural context, discussing its importance as an historical condition, with examples such as the status of aboriginal people, of those dispossessed from their land, Algerian raï music, postcolonial feminism, and global social and ecological movements. Above all, Young argues, postcolonialism offers a political philosophy of activism that contests the current situation of global inequality, and so in a new way continues the anti-colonial struggles of the past.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #37534 in Books
• Published on: 2003-06-26
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 200 pages

Customer Reviews

An amazing book--it could change your life
If you don't want to have any of your views challenged or at least put in question, then don't read this book. You can learn something new from this book: it tells you about different worlds, which are probably not your own. If you just want someone to tell you about the world you already know, and confirm what you already think, then there are many many other books around that do that. This book takes you on a journey of discovery around the earth, showing you what it looks like, how it feels, when the third world comes first, not last. It will be different, it may make you feel uncomfortable, you may feel that it is turning your world upside down, but its an amazing, positive and heartening human experience you will never forget.

A pamphlet of the crudest sort
Entirely useless for those who need a quick, encyclopedia-like idea of what this multivalent word actually means. For a reader looking for what the series promises - an introduction - it appears as a confusing hodge-podge of quotes from works of fiction, information about Algerian rai music which the author raves about like a teenager, all-too-familiar diatribes about pet causes of Attac and their ilk (evil western companies exploiting hapless Africans etc.). It drips with political correctness of a mind-numbingly simplistic sort, embraces the rallying cries of postcolonialism (as a political movement) without the slightest hint of distance or criticism or, indeed, without even as much as discussing the merits of the claims in question. This book is a pamphlet of the crudest sort, by no means a work of scholarship. For a solid and readable overview, I recommend Postcolonial Studies: The Key Concepts (Routledge Key Guides)