Objectives:

• To survey the causes and course of European imperialism since the 15th century
• To explore the complex, multi-sided nature of colonialism from multiple  perspectives
• To analyze the role of individuals withing the colonial sphere 
• To examine concepts of identity (racial, national, post-colonial) and their historical evolution
• To employ a variety of evidentiary materials and to think critically about them

	Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness (Dover, 1991): A modernist masterpiece, this is the story of Marlow's physical and psychological journey deep into the heart of the Belgian Congo in search of the mysterious trader Kurtz. It exposes the tenuous fabric that holds 'civilization' together, and the brutal horror at the center of European colonialism. Also available online.
	The Life of Olaudah Equinao (Dover, 1999): The autobiography of a Nigerian sold into slavery in the West Indies who saved enough money to buy his freedom, moved to England, converted to Christianity, and became an ardent member of the abolition movement.
	Paul Gauguin, Noa Noa: The Tahitian Journal (Dover, 1985): In 1891, French painter Paul Gauguin fled to the island of Tahiti, 'a sixty-three days' voyage, sixty-three days of feverish expactancy.'  His diary describes his fascination with the indigenous people he encountered, and his disgust with the European 'civilization' he left behind.
	Stuart Schwartz, ed. Victors and Vanquished (Bedford/St. Martin's, 2000): A compilation of both Spanish and Nahua (Aztec) views of the conquest of Mexico that emphasizes the complex nature of the encounter as well as issues of perception and narration.
	Michael Fisher, ed., The Travels of Dean Mahomet (University of California Press, 1997):  The autobiographical travel narrative of an Indian recalling his years as camp-follower, servant, and officer in the East India Company's army, and later his emigration to Britain where he opened what was probably the first Indian restaurant in England. Also available online.
	Mehdi Charef, Tea in the Harem (Serpent's Tail, 1989): This exemplary 'beur' novel ('beur' is a French slang word for 'Arab') presents the bleak world of a forgotten post-colonial underclass. Majid, the son of Algerian immigrants, lives on the fringes of French society in a concrete slum.  Neither French nor Arab, he is the son of immigrants, caught between two cultures, two histories, two languages, and two colours of skin.

Assignments:

• Three short (three-page) papers:  the first will compare the Spanish and Mexican accounts of the Spanish conquest, due Feb. 27th ; the second will compare Dean Mahomet's and Equiano's Travels and is due March 27th ; and the third will analyze Gaugin’s Noa Noa, and is due May 1st  (20% each).
  
• Class attendance and participation: to ensure that you are keeping up with the readings and reading well, there will be several short worksheets to be turned in that will be graded on a check, check-plus, check-minus basis. Due dates to be announced (10%).
• A final exam, scheduled for May 22, 8:00-10:00 p.m. (30%).

Part I.  Early Colonial Mentalities

Jan. 30  Introduction

Feb. 6 Encounter and Engagement

Schwartz, Victors and Vanquished, 1-126
Reading Worksheet [due Feb. 13]

Feb. 13 Tenochtitlan and its Aftermath

Schwartz, Victors and Vanquished , 127-243

Feb. 20 Cannibalism and Exoticism

Montaigne, On Cannibals (1580)
Diderot, Supplement to Bougainville’s Voyage (1772)
Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality, Part I (1755)
Cook & Omai: The Cult of the South Seas

Feb. 27 Film: Black Robe

First Paper Due

Black Robe (1991) - Directed by Bruce Beresford (Driving Miss Daisy, Double Jeapardy, Breaker Morant), it documents the clash of cultures between the Huron Indians of Quebec and the Jesuit missionaries from France who are tying to convert them to Catholicism.  While focusing on the physical and spiritual journey of a single 17th century priest who is escorted through the wilderness by Algonquin Indians to find a distant mission in the dead of winter, this film empahsizes the difficulty both sides have understanding the other, and raises provocative questions about the 'civilizing' mission.

Case Study: India

March 6 Britain in India

The Travels of Dean Mahomet , Preface , Part I and Part II

March 13 Indians in Britain

The Travels of Dean Mahomet , Part III
Orientalist Art

March 20  Slavery and Abolition

Olaudah Equiano, Equiano’s Travels (1789)

March 27 The Construction of Race

David Hume, "Of National Characters," Essays: Moral, Political, and Literary (1742)
Kant, Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime ( 1764)
"Negro," Encyclopedia Britannica (1798)
Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, Ch. 7, "On the Races of Man"
Film: The Life and Times of Sara Baartman
Second Paper Due

The Life and Times of Sara Baartman (1998) - Sara Baartman, the 'Hottentot Venus', was a Khoi Khoi woman from South Africa who was taken to London in 1810 and exhibited as a freak.  Four years later she was taken to France, where she became the object of scientific and medical research, and, after her death the following year, an icon of racial inferiority and black female sexuality.  Using historical drawings, cartoons, legal documents, and interviews, this documentary by Zola Maseko has won numerous awards.

April 3 Deepest Darkest Africa

Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness (1901)
Reading Worksheet [Due April 3]

April 10 No Class: Spring Break

Paul Gauguin, Noa, Noa (1919)

Gauguin's Paintings

Case Study: Algeria

April 24 Algerian Independence

Franz Fanon, "Algeria Unveiled" from Studies in a Dying Colonialism

May 1 Film: The Battle for Algiers

Third Paper Due

Battle of Algiers (1965) - A French film by an Italian director, Gillo Pontecorvo, that recreates the events leading up to Algerian independence in a pseudo-documentary style in what has become the definitive study of terrorism.  Although the director's allegiances are clear, he offers a sympathetic handling of both sides of this agonizing, brutal, struggle, offering a comment on all manifestations of political violence, whether perpetrated in the name of liberty by freedom fighters, or under the banner of law and order by colonial forces. This movie foregrounds the role of women in Algeria's struggle for nationhood.

May 8  Return of the Native

Mehdi Charef, Tea in the Harem

May 15 Exhibiting People

Coco Fusco, "The Other History of Intercultural Performance," English is Broken Here (1995)
Film: Cannibal Tours (1988; 70 mins)

Cannibal Tours (1988) - This humorous documentary by Dennis O’Rourke follows a group of European tourists as they travel up the Sepik river in Papua Guinea to view 'exotic cultures'.  It show how, ironically, they want to see 'authentic traditions' only after the indigenous people have left those traditions behind because previous generations of westerners disapproved of them.  This film attempts to discover the place of 'the other' in the popular imagination; a glimpse of what 'civilized' people see when encountering 'the primitive'.