Western Cultural Colonialism

“Cultural colonialism, like any other concept, is meaningful with respect to a cluster of concepts. I think that we have to emphasise the importance of a cluster of concepts, rather than a single concept, in creating different systems of knowledge in non western cultures. As I understand, this has been the practice in this part of the world before the westerners came with their formal systems that go back to the ancient Greeks.”
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by Prof. Nalin De. Silva

(April 9, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) Capitalism, according to some "postmodernist" Marxists such as Fredric Jameson, is in its third stage having passed the stage of imperialism as identified by Lenin. Jameson, apparently, has conceptualised a third stage for capitalism, having being influenced by the concept of late capitalism of Mandel, a guru in the Trotskyite tradition. However, there are many Marxists who do not believe in postmedernity, let alone a third postmodernist stage of capitalism, and as far as some of them are concerned, modernity is a continuing process. There is no world outside theories, concepts, and so called facts associated with such theories and concepts, and it is clear that even the Marxists, who are very fond of "understanding" an already existing world, are only describing different worlds. All these worlds, whether of the Marxists or of the non Marxists, have one thing in common. They are worlds as seen by the westerners.

Those who live in Asia, Africa and South America have to be satisfied with seeing or "understanding" these different worlds created by the westerners. The so called intellectual discussion outside the western world is only an echo of the "discourse" centered around the fashionable western "schools". The "intellectuals" outside the western centers are no better than the young and not so young Romeos and Juliets in the so called third world who celebrate the Valentine day. Even the third world is a world created by the westerners, and in spite of there being no second world now, following them, we in this part of the world, continue to refer to our countries as third world countries.

This is nothing but cultural colonialism. A western Sociologist would object to the use of the words cultural colonialism saying that it is a concept that is not well defined. No concept is well defined for that matter, as a concept has to be defined in terms of the other concepts. These other concepts have to be defined in terms of yet another set of concepts and the process has to be terminated with undefined concepts. At least western Mathematics has acknowledged this weakness, as the western Mathematicians begin with undefined entities. For example in Euclidean Geometry, the point is an undefined element, though the other concepts in that discipline are defined in terms of the point. In western Physics, nobody knows what entropy is, though there would not be a subject called Thermodynamics without that concept. However, not only Thermodynamics is taught to students of Physics, but also more "practical" disciplines such as Mechanical Engineering exist. As mentioned earlier western Sociologists and Philosophers are not agreed on the existence of a postmodern world, but that has not prevented them from teaching and propagating so called postmodernist ideas, not to mention creating postmodernist literature.

The concepts, theories and others such as "facts" could be understood, or felt through, only as a combined whole and it is futile to ask for a fool proof definition of a single concept. A student of Geometry, who begins with an undefined point, finally "understands" it through other concepts such as straight lines, planes, curves, tangents etc, which in turn depend on it. Even though nobody knows what entropy is, Physicists have not been debarred from discussing an "Arrow of Time" that depends on the increase of entropy. However, when it comes to cultural colonialism the western academics and the imitators in their third world, would take up arms against those who use that concept.

Cultural colonialism, like any other concept, is meaningful with respect to a cluster of concepts. I think that we have to emphasise the importance of a cluster of concepts, rather than a single concept, in creating different systems of knowledge in non western cultures. As I understand, this has been the practice in this part of the world before the westerners came with their formal systems that go back to the ancient Greeks. In a discipline such as Ayurveda, the "thridosha" concept cannot be understood or defined at the beginning of a course and a student gradually comes to terms with it as more and more concepts are taught. The Buddha did not begin the first "sutra" by giving the definitions of anicca dukka anatta to the "pas vaga thavusan". (Of course, the Buddha was not trying to teach any concept as it is the meaninglessness of meaning or "avidya" associated with concepts and theories that is "important" as far as Nibbana is concerned. It has to be emphasised that the Buddha was not interested in "deconstruction" a la Derrida, as Derridean deconstruction is also, in the final analysis, a construction that is aimed at understanding the "reality". Derridean deconstruction itself has to be deconstructed, though not in a Derridean sense.)

Any knowledge created by us should make use of clusters of definitions, that depend on each other, and whose interrelationship is cyclic and not linear. Ignoring criticisms by the western intellectuals we should be concerned with a cyclic whole in constructing theories. The imposition of the western linear dependance of one concept on the previously defined concepts, is itself part of western cultural colonialism. Western intellectuals had been the chief actors in western cultural colonialism, and as they would not be prepared to accept the existence of such a component in western colonialism, they would ask for strict definitions of cultural colonialism when they themselves have not given such definitions in the other fields.

Western colonialism that arose in the latter part of the fifteenth century is a result of western modernity that began in the earlier part of the same century. Western modernity is still continuing and so is western colonialism. Western cultural colonialism is a component of western colonialism that comprises political colonialism and economic colonialism as well. These three components are not mutually exclusive and they are inter dependent. The western colonialism has only one ambition, namely to bring the whole world under the western system in the fields of politics, economics and culture. Many people know about western colonialism in politics and in economics, but very often, they are not aware of cultural colonialism.

When cultures interact with each other they borrow and absorb certain features from one another. If two groups of people live for centuries in the same region without any restrictions on absorption, it is most probable that they would finally evolve as a group having a common culture. This is what has happened in Bharat after the Aryans (those who spoke Aryan languages) migrated from the north west and interacted with the indigenous people who lived there. In Sri Lanka as well, the Aryans who came from Bharat have mixed with the people who were living here to form the Sinhala nation with a common culture, in the reign of king Pandukabhaya. This was not the case when the westerners went to north America, Australia, New Zealand and Africa. In the first three regions the westerners almost annihilated the indigenous people who lived there and went on to build a "nation" of the whites with their culture. The term aborigine could be used in such cases to denote the people who had been living in a region when a conquering race or nation that arrives refuse to mix and culturally interact with the former. In Sri Lanka there are or were no aborigines as the Sinhalas did not come from Bharat and lived separately from or annihilated the others. It is clear, that the Veddas had decided, on their own, not to mix with the Aryans, and to remain outside the Sinhala nation. In Africa the westerners could not annihilate the indigenous populations, though they decided to settle in that part of the world resulting in the creation of a South Africa and Rhodesia. The Spanish and the Portuguese were somewhat different as they were prepared to mix with the others while massacring them and as a result of the cultural interactions a new South America has come into existence.

Under cultural colonialism the culture of one group of people is imposed on another group by force as well as by other means, and very little if not no cultural interaction is found. Western cultural colonialism is imposed also through religion, schools, universities, media, especially the electronic media. The Christianity came to this part of the world as part of cultural colonialism and not as a religion as such. A Buddhist or a Hindu converted into Christianity was an instrument in the hands of the western colonialists, whom could be used to impose the western culture on the others. The schools were created as a medium to spread the western culture and not so much to give an education as such. In any event, the education that was given in the European languages media was alien to the country. Even through education western colonialists imposed their domination. It was taught gradually that western knowledge was objective and universal, while other systems of knowledge were subjective and regional.

The technology created by western science has been used to bring people of the world under the western hegemonic cultural system. At present the television has become the main vehicle that carries ideas in western cultural colonialism to the people. It has even bypassed the schools and the universities and unless the "local" schools and the "local" universities change their attitudes and methods their days are numbered. They have no role to play, except teaching students in order to get some certificates, diplomas and degrees. Previously they functioned as carriers of western culture not only in knowledge but in attitudes, world views, social manners etc. These functions have been taken over by the visual electronic media and with the advent of CDs and VCDs even the "traditional" role of imparting knowledge could become the prerogative of the television and the computers.


In this country, in the not so distant past, western cultural attitudes reached the distant rural areas through Colombo, then the important towns and finally through the semi urban areas. At present the diffusion of western culture to the society does not take this route. The western culture or some imitation of it directly reaches the remote villages through the television. Those days it was mandatory for people who imitated the west first, to speak English. Only those who spoke English used to wear shirts and trousers. Western cultural colonialism has become more efficient now. Now one does not have to be conversant in English to wear trousers and anybody is free to imitate the western culture and adopt western cultural values. The film "Vala (Valentine- The first "a" in Vala could be pronounced as in Vat or as in What) in London" is now being shown in the towns and semi urban areas. Kurunduwatte (Cinnamon Gardens) has lost its "status" as the region that is exposed to western culture before the rest of the country. Now people have direct access to western culture without waiting for it to come through Kurunduwatte.
- Sri Lanka Guardian