Frantz Fanon and Cultural Nationalism in Ireland :: Essays Papers

Frantz Fanon and Cultural Nationalism in IrelandOnly latterly has Ireland been included in the extensive study of postcolonial societies. Our geographical closeness to Britain, the situation that we are racially identical, the fact that we speak the same phraseology and sire the same value systems make our status as postcolonial problematic. Indeed, some would point it is impossible to tell the difference between Irish and British. However, to mistake Irish for English to some is a grave insult. In this essay, I would corresponding to look at Irelands emerging postcolonial status in sexual intercourse to Frantz Fanons The Wretched of the Earth. By examining Fanons theories on the fancy up of cultural nationalism in colonised societies, one can befool that events taking place in Ireland at the end of the nineteenth vitamin C bear all the hallmarks of a colonised peoples anti-colonial debate through the revival of a culture that attempts to assert difference to the colon izer and the insistence on self-government. The years 1870 to 1890 in Ireland saw the fervent betrothal of Charles Stewart Parnell and his Home Rule party for home rule in Ireland. This consisted of Ireland having its own parliament to deal with internal affairs while still remain under the control of Westminster in international affairs. It was not the desire for a full separation from Britain that would come later. However, by 1890, problems in Parnells in-person life lead to a breakdown in communication with the blush Minister and to a split in the Home Rule party. harmonise to M E Collins, this left a void in Irish politics and life that was filled with a new cultural sentiency and a questioning of Irish identity the new movements were different. They stressed the magnificence of Irish identity, Irish race and Irish culture (170 M E Collins, Ireland 1868 - 1966). It is at this point that Fanons Wretched of the Earth becomes relevant to Irish history. In his chapte r entitled On National Consciousness, Fanon stresses the colonised innate fears of being assimilated totally into the culture of the coloniser, of being swamped (169 Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth). These were the exact concerns that sedulous the minds of the Irish people after the failure of home rule. They began to be animated about what Collins terms the distinguishing marks of Irishness a culture and language that was different to Britains.