Going native (in a good way)
A little more about going native (notice that I feel no need for the quotation marks...that's because I feel not at all self-conscious about my status as a colonial beneficiary)While I agree with Priya's post about the changes in going native in the last century and a half or so, it may be useful to note that the idea of going native has changed before.
Originally, going native was okay--it demonstrated a common attempt to become part of the colonized country, and was basically ignored. Colonial powers needed men who were willing to live (and probably die) in a foreign place with no real possibility of returning home, and the trade-off was a certain leniency when it came to the boundaries between "us and them." It wasn't until transportation and communications technology improved enough to allow direct control by the colonial core (and regular replacement of colonial officials who were too friendly with the them in question) that going native became anything other than "the way things are."
The clearest example that I can think of is the situation of early members of the Dutch East India Company, who were known to have worn local clothing, married local women, and in some cases converted to Islam with few repurcussions from the company. William Dalrymple wrote a biography a couple of years ago that dealt with one case on the edge of the switch from neutral to derogatory meaning. I can't remember the name of it, but if I find it again I'll post it.
As a caveat--this was a locational phenomenon. The same does not hold true for situations like that of the Christian Kingdoms in Palestine, where there was enough direct contact with Europe to allow for shades of meaning. In those cases, the low opinion held by Europeans of the knights who had gone native created serious friction when it came time to defend the region against new efforts by Muslim kingdoms to reclaim the land, and there wasn't really a time when going native wasn't seen as a problem.
But that leaves me with (at least) two questions. So is this a case of evolving meanings, or is it more of a pendulum swing? And which understanding of the status of going native matters: that of the colonial core, the colonizers, or the natives?
posted by Elizabeth @ 1:06 AM
2 Comments:
Remembered an article I read (when in undergrad so years ago) about the links between Dune and the Dutch East Indies company's activities with respect to the role of spices (v colonial: fascination and repulsion combined :-)). I also vaguely recall that there's a guy in Dune who has gone native and gets killed (left to die in the desert, I think). Dangers of going native, perhaps?
There are always dangers, and I don't think colonizers ever abandoned completely the idea that going native was a potential problem; I was just pointing out that the important opinion, that of the colonial authority, wasn't always so negative. It's been a long time since I read Dune--maybe it would be worthwhile to revisit it in this context. Right after I finish with Ragin (can fuzzy sets be used with system dynamics to refine our notions of causation? Stay tuned...)
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