In the second half of “Land as Life: Unsettling the Logistics of Containment,” Mishuana Goeman places an emphasis on the indigenous people’s relationship between the land and the body and how they were both colonized by settlers, changing that relationship and how they are viewed individually as concepts as well. In Tuck and Yang’s paper “Decolonization is not a metaphor,” she fights against the way that the word decolonization has been turned into a metaphor that is no longer used to talk about Indigenous struggles or contributions. She also goes into the different types of colonialism, meaning that decolonization will look different depending on how it is originally colonized. Another important topic was how colonizers use various techniques to appear innocent despite their actions.
Both papers talk about people who are of both native and white descent and how native heritage has been diluted as a means to aid colonization. The first paper mentioned how the one drop rule exempts native individuals from claiming land, allowing for their populations to die out and allowing colonizers to take their land once again. The second paper shows how colonizers view native bodies as something to colonize similar to land. They are connected by the implications of colonization and expand upon that idea that land is not the only thing affected. By reading both papers, it allows me to see a more complete picture that shows both how colonization has immediate implications on the current and future population.
The second article made me think about the definition of the word colonization and how I feel that it is also used as a metaphor in modern day contexts to express a simple take over which undermines the implications of the original word as well. The first article made me think about how decolonization is something associated with the past because of the de- part of the word but also because it refers to getting rid of colonizer influence but the decolonization must take place in the future. Reverting things to how they were in the past is only part of the goal but the betterment of these communities must also be taken into account. This reminds me how in developmental psychology the goal in helping a recently impaired child is not only to restore their past abilities but also expand and improve upon them so that they are up to speed with peers of the same age. Just because the native community is trying to undo something doesn’t mean that it will be negative but it allows them to grow.
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