Deconstructing ‘Self’ and ‘Other’ with reference to Joseph Conrad’s ‘Heart of Darkness’

The word ‘Deconstruction’ (Derrida 34) introduced by French philosopher Jacques Derrida to demonstrate that any text is not a discrete whole but contains several irreconcilable and contradictory meanings; that any text therefore has more than one interpretation; that the text itself links these interpretations inextricably; that the incompatibility of these interpretations is irreducible; and thus that an interpretative reading cannot go beyond a certain point. In psychological terms, the Other is but the undiscovered territory in the Self. In the colonial enterprise, this territory of the unconscious is displaced onto another people who both allures and terrify. The colonizer, fearing to succumb to the Other, attempts to contain it- through subordination, suppression, or conversion. These strategies of containment are designed to preserve the opposition and inequality between Self and Other that justifies the imperialist enterprise. The central trope of imperialism is what Abdul R. Janmohamed terms “Manchean allegory” (Hena 13) that converts racial difference “into moral and even metaphysical difference”. (13) This allegory characterizes the relationship dominant and subordinate culture as one of the ineradicable opposition. Although the opposing terms of the allegory change- good and evil, civilization and savagery, intelligence and emotion, rationality and sensuality- they are always predicated upon the assumption of the superiority of the outside evaluator and the inferiority of the native being observed. Colonialist literature, as byproduct of the imperialist enterprise, necessarily re-inscribes the Manichean allegory either to conform or to interrogate it in an effort to move beyond its limits. As a result, colonialist texts...

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...his image, be self-evident. Europe’s own idea of itself was thus predicated on its image of Africa. This means that each Other is a Self and each Self an Other, depending on one’s perspective. This does a lot to undermine the absolute distinction between the Self and the Other essential to the imperialist ideology.

Works Cited

Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. New Delhi: Penguin Publishers. 1975. Print.

Hena. York Notes on Heart of Darkness. London: York Press.2001. Print.

Hudson, Robert. Joseph Conrad: A Critical Study. New Delhi: Anmol Publications. 2006. Print.

Ashcroft, Bill. Postcolonial Studies: The Key Concepts. New York: Routledge Publication. 2007. Print.

Derrida, Jaques. Derrida and Deconstruction. Ed. Hugh J. Silverman.New York: Routledge Publication. 1989. Print.

Said, Edward. Culture and Imperialism. New York: Knopf Publishing House. 2012. Print