How Has the Nature of Cultural Encounter Changed over Time - Coursework Example

Cultural encounters Cultural encounters are fascinating to study from a historical perspective. Aiming to explore cultural encounter in a historicalanalysis, this essay asks “How has the nature of cultural encounter changed over time?” By arguing that cultural interaction has been shaped by desires for dominance and political supremacy, this essay will explore colonialism and imperialism over the past two hundred years. How have colonialism and imperialism shaped the international order and what are the consequences of colonialism and imperialism today? We begin the essay by looking at the Portuguese experience in Angola then look at early American imperialism in the Philippines. Following this we turn to an analysis of American Imperialism today and look at the controversial US invasion of Iraq. In sum we conclude that cultural interaction over the past two hundred years has been shaped by a desire for one group to dominate the through violence and imperial domination. Portuguese Imperialism: Angola Angola, officially called the Republic of Angola, is a Portuguese-speaking Presidential Republic which gained independence from Portugal just over thirty three years ago in 1975. As a Portuguese-speaking country in Africa, Angola is just one of a handful of former Portuguese colonies on the continent which has kept the tongue and made it an official language (Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe, and Equatorial Guinea are the other majority Portuguese-speaking countries of Africa). In order to understand Angola today it is essential that we understand her history and as the largest country in the African empire of Portugal, Angola was heavily influenced by the colonial tradition (Forsythe 43-45). A developing country rich in mineral resources, Angola today remains one of the poorest countries in Africa and is beset by a plethora of social problems. Many of the problems Angola faces today can be attributed to its colonial legacy, which entrenched exploitation and began with the first European encounters as early as in the 15th century (Angola 2008). Although common in the Western world, it would be ethnocentric to believe that Angolan history began with the arrival of Europeans. In fact, Angolan history is rich and varied and although not fully documented prior to European contact, we do know that the area of present-day Angola was inhabited before the era of Christ. The original inhabitants of present-day Angola were nomadic hunters and gathers of Khoisan origin. By the 1st millennium A.D., the Khoisan-speaking inhabitants were replaced by Bantu tribes during successive waves of Bantu migrations southward. Described by the Europeans as Bushmen, the Bantu people slowly replaced the original Khoisans of Angola and were relatively advanced with knowledge of metal working, agriculture and ceramics. Portuguese encroachment and settlement in Angola began as early as 1483 and lasted for nearly four hundred years. In recounting the history of Angola it is impossible to ignore the significant impact the Portuguese have had on Angola for centuries. Initially attracted to Angola for its warm climate, vast natural resources including ivory and its abundance of potential slaves, Portugal began its Angolan adventure with the dual purpose of Christianizing the inhabitants of the land and engaging in the profitable slave trade with the rulers of the indigenous kingdoms. Slave-extraction became the primary modus operandi for the Portuguese in Angola, particularly after the expansion of the empire to the Americas and Asia, and thus began a long tradition of exploitation and extraction. Although Portuguese influence in Angola was not uninterrupted – there was a period of Dutch occupation during the 17th century – the inherently inegalitarian and exploitative relationship of the Portuguese to the people of Angola is an underlying characteristic of Angolan history. This bloody history, in fact, paved the way for a violent struggle for Angolan independence, beginning in the early 1960s (Wright 3-97). The aptly named Portuguese Colonial War began in the African countries of the Portuguese empire in the early 1960s and eventually culminated in the independence of the modern states of Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe, Equatorial Guinea and Angola. The fight for independence in Angola was fought by guerilla leaders and was bitterly contested by Portuguese authorities. Independence was finally won when on April 25th 1974 a group of junior officers in Portugal staged a coup and overthrew the government of the colonial power. A pillar of the post coup government was decolonization in the African colonies and Angola gained her independence in 1975. Civil war followed the end of colonialism and continued for 27 years until it recently ended. This long conflict, pre-independence and most recently post-independence, has had important ramifications in the Angolan social, political and economic spheres (Wright 90-97). Ravaged by a bloody civil war which may have killed up to 1.5 million and displaced more than 4 million Angolans, the industry of Angola has suffered as a result of the instability brought about by armed conflict. Although endowed with extensive natural resources including gold, diamonds and oil, Angola remains a developing country which has not fully utilized its potential. Although Angola is resource rich, a legacy of harsh colonialism, followed by civil war and violent civil strife has contributed to the continued economic stagnation of Angola. Although annual growth is high, GDP per capita is a better indicator of the lives of the average Angolan today and this figure remains low. Accordingly, an average life expectancy in Angola of 37.92 years for the total population, testifies to the impoverishment of the Angolan people today (Angola 2008). American Imperialism: The Philippines Charges of imperialism are frequently leveled against the United States in the twenty-first century and as the US experience in the wake of the Spanish-American demonstrates, these charges are nothing new. American imperialism predates the collapse of the Soviet Union and the past quarter century of American hegemony. As the American experience in the Philippines following the Spanish-American War persuasively demonstrates, questions of an imperial nature were discussed by prominent politicians, authors, soldiers and other public figures with respect to the US role in the Philippines at the turn of the twentieth century. There were many arguments for the annexation of the Philippines following the overthrow of the Spanish colonial power in the islands. Prominent politicians and public figures emphatically argued that the United States had a duty, a Christ-given mission, to subdue the savages of the Philippine islands. This was a civilizing mission, part of the white man’s burden (re: Rudyard Kipling) to quell the savage countries of the world. There was a firm desire to save the Philippines from “savage anarchy” (Theodore Roosevelt) and the uncivilized way of life which came to characterize the islands. From a tactical perspective, many thought that there would be financial opportunities in the Pacific region with a foothold in the Philippines; China could be traded with and the United States would have a strong hand in regulating Pacific trade. Furthermore, there was a need to maintain a base in the Pacific and challenge European rivals in this geostrategic region. Arguments against the US annexation of the Philippines rested on a variety of perspectives and included the interests of the Filipino people as well as those of the United States. Accordingly, arguments against the US imperial presence on the islands argued that the freedom for the Filipino people would not be served by another colonial power. Furthermore, there was no moral responsibility to “civilize” the people of the Philippines and the reported white man’s burden did not in fact exist. Arguing that the United States should not subjugate a people, many argued for the rights of the people of the Philippines. Despite this, racial arguments were prevalent in the era and racial argument against the inclusion of the racial argument Filipino people was based upon stereotypes and misconceptions. Other arguments rested on the fact that there was no real commercial interest for the US in maintaining a presence in the Philippines, the cost of the war and that it was not worth the cost in American soldiers’ lives. While each side differed with respect to its opinion on the US annexation of the Philippines after the Spanish-American War, in hindsight the arguments against US imperialism seem to make more sense. Despite this, at the time there were valid geostrategic arguments in favor of occupation which should not be discredited. These included the importance of having a foothold in the Pacific as well as the growth and incredible opportunities of the region in coming years. American Imperialism today The decision of the United States to invade Iraq and overthrow Saddam Hussein in 2003 was an important watershed moment in world history. The decision by the United States to invade Iraq in 2003 was perhaps the most controversial event in recent Middle Eastern history. Seen by many as an attempt by the United States to exert its global hegemony and dispose of a dictator not for the benefit of the Iraqi people, nor due to the supposed cache of weapons of mass destruction, but to obtain access to the vast oil resources of Iraq, this invasion is arguably the most controversial aspect of American foreign policy within the past quarter century. The US invasion of Iraq was controversial for a variety of reasons, the not least of which was the fact that the invasion did not first receive United Nations Security Council approval: an important condition in international relations which effectively legitimizes decisive political action. The US invasion of Iraq of 2003, codenamed “Operation Iraqi Freedom” curiously was not undertaken following Saddam Hussein’s genocide of the Kurdish minority in Halabja in 1988, nor after the violent suppression of a Shi’a insurgency following the First Gulf War. Instead US interests lie in securing the availability and continued flow of oil from one of the world’s most important producers of this important natural resource. Although cloaked in rhetoric concerning the freedom of the Iraqi people, the invasion in fact has led to untold death on both sides, military occupation and a violent 5 year old insurgency. American unilateralism has been both an explicit and implicit policy of the present Bush Administration since the aftermath of September 11th 2001. Although the United States has historically been committed to multilateralism, collective decision-making and international rules of law, in recent times the United States has rejected foreign policy precedent and has engaged in direct military action on a unilateral basis. Representing American imperialism in the 21st century, the US invasion of Iraq demonstrates that even now cultural interaction has been shaped by desires for dominance and political supremacy (Bloom, 2005). Concluding Remarks Colonialism and imperialism have ensured that the much of the world remains in a state of underdevelopment. Angola today is one of the poorest and most underdeveloped places on the planet and this is largely the result of the Portuguese legacy of imperialism and violent rule. The Portuguese came to Angola to extract and remove and did little to prepare the largest country in Portuguese-speaking Africa for eventual independence. The result today, in an era of globalization and widespread economic wealth, is that Angola remains sorely underdeveloped and in a state of economic stagnation. The legacy of Portuguese imperialism in Angola continues to ring true today. The American colonial experience is far less understood and many people forget about the American imperial enterprise in the Philippines following the Spanish-American War. As with Portuguese colonialism, American imperialism during this period was based upon exploitation, racist beliefs and the domination of an entire people. More than 100 years later the American experience in Iraq harks back to the unfortunate period of American colonialism in the Philippines. The invasion of Iraq shows just how far American desires for oil and imperial domination will go in the 21st century. As Portuguese colonialism in Angola and the US imperial conquests of the Philippines and Iraq today show, nature of cultural encounter has barely changed over the past 200 years and is based upon the domination of one culture over another (see Waltz 1979). WORKS CITED Bloom, Mia. Dying to Kill: The Allure of Suicide Terror. New York: Columbia University Press, 2005. Central Intelligence Agency. “Angola”. Retrieved August 13, 2009 from: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ao.html Forsythe, D.P. Human Rights and Comparative Foreign Policy. New York: United Nations University Press, 2008. Waltz, K. Theory of International Politics. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1979 Wright, George. Destruction of a Nation: United States Policy Towards Angola Since 1945. London: Pluto Press, 1997. Read More