(Post) Colonialism: A Small Place and Jane Eyre

The very term “post- colonialism” has garnished criticism on the basis that it assumes that we are currently living in a post- colonial moment. This is problematic as it seems to relegate colonialism, as well as its impact, to the past, overlooking colonialism’s very healthy prominence in the world today. Together, Jamaica Kincaid’s A Small Place and Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre paint an image of a long Creole history with colonialism, one that is existent in the modern day. Creole culture is a particularly good context in which to imagine colonial practices, as it is a culture born from the colonization of Caribbean lands by European settlers. By comparing and contrasting certain aspects of these narratives, we can come to a clearer understanding of how colonialism is operating within both.

It is prudent to start with a practice that is evident in both Kincaid and Bronte’s piece, the ‘othering’ in both Antigua and Small Town, Jamaica, that must take place in order to establish the logic of colonialism. This Other is dependent on a binary that is constructed between the colonizer and the colonized, one that projects any negative attributes on to the East in order to not only incite fear and hatred for the Other, but to strengthen and reproduce loyalty to the West. Consequently, the Creole body, as the Other, has been imagined by the readers of Bronte’s generation much the way that Bertha is described; as less civilized, less mentally sound, in all, less human (at one point she referred to as a hyena(70)). This might be expressed best by Rochester’s claim that his ideal mate, is “the antipode of the Creole” (94). The Creole, as the Other represents everything that the West is not, literally situating it at the polar opposite of the European idea of perfection. It is interesting to note that while Bronte’s main characters are obviously implicated as colonizers, Kincaid chooses to identify with the colonized, giving her narrative a different perspective. This Other is still evident in her passage, even in her very diction. She chooses to address her reader as “you” in an almost accusatory fashion, while she uses “we” when speaking of the native Antiguan people. Further she describes the way that the natives of Antigua hate tourists, often mocking them for being so backwards, or having poor manners, or for trying to behave as the natives do (1229). By offering this insight, Kincaid is not only establishing the line between us and them, between colonizer and colonized, but she is also offering resistance to common discourse by which colonized are compelled to mimic their colonizers (in this case secondary colonists) in internalizing colonialism. It is as though Kincaid is attempting to write Antiguan people a resistance to colonial practices.

A means often used to justify the power relations of colonialism and one that is evidently used to continue the oppression of the Creole people is that of knowledge, one that lead Kenyan writer, Ngũgĩ, to call for a “decolonization of the mind”. By controlling what is generally accepted as ‘fact’ or ‘knowledge’ the colonizer finds opportunity to exert power over the other and to reproduce the narratives of power that facilitate their domination. This is evident in the very construction of the Bronte’s Creole characters, which appear to be almost a caricature of the racist stereotypes and beliefs that would have been disseminated in 20th century England. Not only is Bertha’s brother often considered effeminate (69) in keeping with his role as the ‘colonized’, but ‘madness’ seems to run through her entire family as Rochester states, “Bertha Mason is mad; she comes from a mad family;-idiots and maniacs through three generations! Her mother, the Creole, was both a madwoman and a drunkard” (69). It is not only relevant that Rochester makes a point of pointing out her mother is a Creole before making his claim that she was mad, but also that the mother plays such a role in his claim to begin with. This is directly related to what Francoise Verges describes as “Creole Pathology” (221) whereby the so- called ‘mad’ behavior and aggression of the colonized person was medicalized, turning him into a patient, a subject of study, instead of an individual responding to systemic injustice and micro-aggressors which were surrounding him (225). Interestingly, the European psychiatrists also concluded that it was the mother’s role as head of the family that caused these symptoms of aggression, which is reflected in Rochester’s focus on Bertha’s mother in pleading his case. In this example, the Europeans’ power has extended past physical conquest to the appropriation of the Creole mind, health and history simply by passing off racist assumptions as ‘fact’ in order to justify the control they exert over these individuals. This is evident in Kincaid’s modern narrative of Antigua in which she describes the book and history that the ‘white’ tourist would prefer to read,

one of those books explaining how the West (meaning Europe and North America after its conquest and settlement by Europeans) got rich: the West got nothing and then undervalued labor, for generations, of people like me you see walking around Antigua but from the ingenuity of small shopkeepers in Sheffield and Yorkshire and Lancashire, or wherever; and what a great part of the invention the wristwatch played in it (1226).

The old adage here rings true, that it is the victor who writes history. It is clear that in exercising their power, the European colonizers would like to advertise their conquest while downplaying the contribution that slaves, and later ‘free’ colonized people had in the growth of their empire. It is by concealing this fact that the colonizer can make claims of superiority of the West and inherent ‘white’ traits which make them more suitable to be in control, logic which survives today in victim- blaming as Kincaid suggests, “this ugly but joyful thought will swell inside you: their ancestors were not as clever in the way that yours were and not ruthless in the way yours were, for then would it not be you who would be in harmony with nature and backwards in that charming way?” (1229). It is through this logic that power is not only exercised but reproduced, legitimating claims of superiority and justifying their conquest. This logic is the same as that found in Jane Eyre as Rochester states, “Hiring a mistress is the next worse thing to buying a slave: both are often by nature, and always by position, inferior: and to live familiarly with inferiors is degrading” (95). Here the slave/ master relation is described not only as having a basis in conquered/ conqueror, but in superior/ inferior natures, and requiring the “othering” and domination of the inferior in order to avoid degradation. This discourse is similar to that exercised in the once- enslaved Creole colony.

Also born of this idea of ‘white’ supremacy is the notion of civilizing missions (Walder, 1083) whereby the colonizer uses their power of knowledge production to frame themselves as a benefactor instead of an exploitive entity. By saving the Other from their ‘savage’ ways, they can teach them to be not quite ‘white’ but ‘white-like’ and acceptable as a colony. This is novelized in the way that Bronte describes the weather in Jane Eyre, with the East described as stormy, a place of confusion and despair which almost leads Rochester to his suicide, “a fiery West- Indian night…the air was like sulphur-steams I could find no refreshment anywhere…the sea rumbled dull like an earthquake- black clouds casting up over it…the waves, broad and red, like a hot canon ball” (89-90). This description is intended to describe the nature of the place, but also of the people, a place that is wild, in need of control, a place where desperation runs rampant. The West, as the colonizers, are represented as the rational, calming wind which restores order and rationality to the land, “A wind fresh from Europe blew over the ocean…the storm broke, streamed, thundered, blazed, and the air grew pure…it was true Wisdom that consoled me in that hour, and showed me the right path to follow” (91-92). It is this wind which “swelled with glorious liberty" and which restored hope for regeneration for Rochester (91). It is difficult to dispute that the climate is intended to embody the traits of the inhabitants of each nation; the Europeans bring truth and liberty and hope to the disorderly and uncivilized ways of the Caribbean people. This is a practice with lasting impacts as Kincaid makes clear in her own narrative. Fully aware of the irony of the situation, Kincaid describes the Antiguan custom of going to pray at church to celebrate the day that Antigua was granted independence, “Antigua got its independence from Britain, making Antigua a state in its own right and Antiguans are so proud of this that each year, to mark the day, they go to church and thank God, a British God, for this” (1226). This is evidence of the lasting effects of colonialism that can be found in Antigua even today, as the church was introduced by the British people and the colony was assimilated to the practice of European worship in a way that would make them better subjects of the empire.

Finally, of particular interest to Kincaid in A Small Place is the theme of motion, transportation and mobility. This is present in the roads, which are only paved where the Queen, the ultimate symbol of the colonizer, traveled (1227); the airport, where tourists have an easier time at customs than native Antiguans do because they are Westerners or ‘white’ (1224); and most movingly, in the way she describes Antiguans as natives who are “too poor to escape the reality of their lives” (1229). This immobility contributes to what is described as secondary colonialism whereby “the inhabitants of… poorer countries or the places themselves are converted into occasions for the… achievement of self- fulfillment by secondary colonists” (1224). The inability of the Antiguan people to leave is exploited as they have few options but to participate in the tourism industry which they allegedly despise. These individuals are almost cast as part of the landscape, part of the experience for the secondary colonists. The nature of this form of colonization is not only dehumanizing but acts as example of the persistence of colonialism and its affects in the world, even today. This discourse is similar to that surrounding Bertha in Jane Eyre as Bertha too experiences limitations on her freedom and mobility, as she is held captive in the attic. Further, upon revealing his Creole wife to his wedding guests, Rochester “bound [Bertha] to a chair…then turned to the spectators: he looked at them with a smile both acrid and desolate. ‘That is my wife” (71). Rochester in this act is not only stripping his wife of autonomy and ability to move, but in his manner of staying her for the benefit of the ‘spectators’, he is objectifying her, making her a subject as opposed to a person, as suggested even by his language, “That is my wife”. This is similar to the way that the people of Antigua are understood as part of the landscape to tourists, as an extension of the experience which exists to make them happy and comfortable and help them escape their own mundane situations.

Together these narratives illuminate the long history of oppression in the Creole culture. One that is still evident in the quality of living in Antigua, and places like it, today. Sadly, in both its impact and its practices, evidence of colonialism is evident across the world, complicating the term 'post-colonial' and making neo-colonialism a more appropriate designation.

Works Cited

Brontë, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. New York: Premier Classics, 2008. Print.

Kincaid, Jamaica. "A Small Place" 1998. Literary Theory: An Anthology. Oxford, UK: Blackwell, 1998. 1224-229. Print.

Verges, F. (1999). (Post)colonial psychiatry: The making of a colonized pathology. In A. Clarke & V. Olesen (Eds.), Revisioning Women, Health and Healing: Feminism, Cultural and Technoscience Perspectives (pp. 221–228). New York: Routledge.

Walder, Dennis. "Post-colonial Literatures in English: History, Language, Theory." 1998. Literary Theory: An Anthology. Oxford, UK: Blackwell, 1998. 1075-089. Print.

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