Youre in the stream today were kicking off a weeklong look at the Global Impact of colonial colonialism and how does colonialism shape the wealth that we actually live in and what ways has it influenced your life so many of you have already answered that question with hash tag because colonialism and ill be sharing your responses throughout the week so join our conversation on twitter or live on you tube. Ok my jaffery Story University of amsterdam and you are in history. By the early 19th century of vast majority of the worlds nations have been colonized by european powers the empire building average source driven exploitation of states and their populations continue to influence the world today from language religion and cultural beliefs to an economic systems in 7 countries colonial practices included slavery genocide and the creation of political and ethnic divisions that remain to this day others have argued that western allies zation in some instances benefit colonise populations with the rule of law and also infrastructure so joining us to talk about colonialism history and how its remembered today and Bangalore IndiaPriyamvada Gopal professor of english at the university of cambridge shes also the author of insurgent empire anticolonialism and british descent in the u. S. State of indiana and they show can an associate professor of comparative literature cinema and media studies at Indiana University and in lisbon portugal. President of the association of history teachers in portugal welcome all of you to the story and i want to start with our community because they have so much to say so ill start with this tweet from some. Mishandle is the humble milkmaid they write colonialism has affected my life because we still proudly use english names because country interest start with european conquest as the 1st historical intrigue date and because many people cant name 20 facts about their tribe of origin so priya ill turn to you with this because this is what youve studied this is what you teach this are really big question to start with how was colonials colonialism impacted your life but i want to do just that what would you give a story answer well i always begin my or lecture. Year telling my students that i wouldnt be in that room if it wasnt for naught macaulays 835 minutes which created what he called a race of people not english blood and color but in all the way so english education in india was intended to create a class of interpreter between the Colonial Government and the vast indian population and i belong my ancestors belong to that breed of people as it were english in every way about blood and color so the very fact that i speak english and im speaking english to you now and that i teach english is intimately bound up with colonialism and this is something i always insist my students understand when im in the room we go im just thinking about how we think of ourselves in the world and somehow the influences of colonisation still feel so frewen as priya was discussing you were born in angola yes she was at that time it was a it was a colony of portugal so that makes you african as well as portuguese do you feel. Not much actually half so this concept of how to think of yourself in the wild from the portrait pulls perspective of us as as a come to that happy calling holes how flat impact the one thing the mouth and think about. Well to begin with as you said i was born in one goal when it was a portuguese colony and it marked my existence for sure because while i was there until i was 10 wrong and i didnt really. Realize how much in a segregated society i leave being i mean detail was the official tally was that it wasnt Cigarette Society and i only came became conscious of these when i actually when i returned portugal after 9975 and later on studying in 40 schools Public Schools state schools and. Everything police from angola and mozambique from the former colonies which. In an goal lloyd self i didnt have in school so that says a lot about the system that was in place and only shaped me so my. Conscience of torches colonialism and collusion in general. Laws of the late. Came later in my life lets say what do we want a song now that you dont understand as a tiny. Well. To begin with. I didnt really question the way society was organized in angola. So i didnt never questions why we lived in. You know a place i lived in the center on law in a place that was called new leaves one at a time and always one. Of those 2 is the 2nd biggest city in angola or the 2nd most important city and go and actually we lived in a white sheet only the servants. Were african were black. And. I never question that i never sort of it i thought it was normal when we traveled around i saw the i sold the africans. The different tribes that constitute angola. Indian villages leaving their lifes for me twas like. They made part of the landscapes imo but they didnt it really didnt come to me that they were the real inhabitants of that place for myself very. So i hear your story and i want to share one more this from a couple of people who mentioned this one via tweeting one via video comments and clearly people are on the same wavelength here so this person sedate us on twitter says because cornell is a still exists in the economic grounds were getting into specifics here he writes i have asked and world bank and thats why many africans risk their lives seeking a better life outside of the continent even though africa is the richest continent in terms of resources culture history and a dynamic population you can see where where where this persons views are on that but someone else takes up on that idea about the economic ground and seeing the legacy of colonialism there this is Alderman Young hes an assistant professor at Princeton University and heres what he told us. The majority of private capital is allocated to developed countries Europe North America japan and then whatever small sliver of capital is left capital the highest risk premium is allocated it to the former colleagues and i think this is reminiscent of the colonial plight internet case the point consequence of this is that sudans largest or most profitable export actually is a sudanese people themselves food and Human Capital the best of which is professionals and laborers go to your north america the middle east and are forced to work there to earn a living because of the lack of Economic Opportunities that. This carries off and has many resonances with the spirit of the 19th century of and slave men and then the colonial market. A lot in there but the economy currency were the make of that well. I can go ahead or oh ok i was just going to say that its actually an go and take because for me its not so much british gotten anything im nigeria was going on at that british as the india will. Uganda and ghana. But for me growing up i think its the american colonialism which is more of their cultural imperialism in media religion kind of i think i actually spoke moderate amine because by the time i came to my sense of myself as an individual nigeria was that the panic country so i really didnt have a colonial experience and know from reading from study from history that if youre with a colony and if i dont speak english nigeria is a function of that but i guess that for me the fight that even at night you know is becoming independent there was also before that i mentioned to the social space which was dominated by American Media so my being in america i dont know that directly result of that but i guess that part of the reason why we talk about colonialism to be even so much it is of course because of the colonial history but also because im going to i think in over the american empire have defined back and actually have totally been in practice and so we need in america to find that people are going on about the war to look for ways of life find a better option of that look at what we bankrobber off. I cant remember any more. But. Thats what happens when a move on pretty you get what you had to ag i had no i just i just wanted to agree that one way in which we all share the legacy of the european empire was the age of empire is that we most of us live in capitalist economies and capitalism is very much tied up with the imperial project and although it had very profound our cultural and racial guy mentions you cant really understand colonialism without understanding capitalism so even the sense that colonialism was in the past i think is likely misguided because if you live in a capitalist economy which most of the world does then you are very directly every single day engaging with the legacy the afterlife as i prefer to call it the afterlife the ongoing lie if of colonialism of the european imperial project so i was just agreeing with up in the air that that is quite vital and that in some ways the mantle of colonialism does shift from the european empires to america but we also need to be attentive to the ways in which it is now shifting to parts of the postcolonial world the ways in which brazil china and india are starting to play a role as you know in some ways as as colonizers involved in massive amounts of appropriation and resource extraction i just want to actually get to this conversation and that is looking at the legacy of what european nations left behind in the developing world and kind of judging that in terms of was anything left behind that was positive have been built on something thats been a positive legacy something came to mind and its often used as an example a humorous example of what potentially could. Be a positive angle i want to show you a little clip from 1979 film called the life of brian have a look here my laptop it is called a fine study of colonialism from this tweet up here and let me just play a 20 seconds also i have a listen. I have ever given up front. Were not on top of. The trash oh yeah sorry i should remember used to be like you know all gonchar sanitation of true things around with that and a row for your obviously not proud of and i would go without saying no. Prayer so this is a this is a this is this is the idea that you have the terrible people but they brought you this this is and it goes on and on and on and on. Second yes well its the railways claim rights of britain if you raise the question of empire people will say yes but the railways d well to rob me the great guy and then the. Colonial writer and campaigner had a very good riposte to those he said you know the british didnt build railways in africa or india so that africans and indians could visit their friends they did it as part of a resource extraction project the railways in africa invariably lead to boards from which the materials could be shipped out in india it was bought a friend or an administrative apparatus so just because certain things got left behind and then they got used by the legatees of colonialism doesnt mean that they were done with the benefit of of colonial subjects in mind we have a tendency to take something that happened and make it positive but that doesnt mean it was it was put there was a positive intention we got ahead well and i think that that. So are you going to catch me oh ok no i was just going to i was just going to say that that comparison that you see there on the life of brian with the roman empire is it and fair because the romans that they that there they are patient and then colonization will it spread over a long long period and also they didnt have the means that european nations and in the 19th century so the colonisation of the 19th and wasnt much faster and much brutal much more brutal to my point of view and also the other point i wanted to just to talk about was about the you talked about brazil and sink brazil is a very good case of a country where the declination still asked to be done inside brazil because there is a. There is obviously in brazil a very very obvious division between europe ian this people that dissent from the from european and the others and its very structural and i think. All a lot of these let in American Kids are very good example of something in the off way between. Between the 2 ideas of colonialism and unfortunately you know i think you have fingers you look over at that is all the so on that lets put it that way and european sides of sickness you know legs. These 2 points and it was a letter that in fact quoting here is him isnt the one actually the tree and the roots and its an inspiration it is more than easy and the indian arads actually is not only in his book intimate any actually sees that mundanity east the liberal side of colonialism that colonialism is the military wing so colonizing broccoli or violence but there was also something going on which was that it was including you look at mission everywhere ok how to become modern how to have these a year of being an individual which was not even then europe to start with so you find the idea is also not going to is improvement anything but that it was impossible for humanity to be said to operate and i guess that point of the argument the reference that a pretty had drawn from what i read me and theres it in and you have a lot of work in his book properly simply entered modernity in africa what have you that in fact proud to call him here isnt that in a way africa can really just because you actually were already becoming modern who actually were trying to do those things that would only if i dont go in there is indeed was to satisfy those people so as much of it was later already in the west ive got for instance it daily bridge that tend to become more than africans from iceland outfoxed but africa is one of the phone at what it can get and its not just. Before you jump in there before you jump in because i want to give you something i want to give you something because our community i would say agrees with most of you on this point but there are a few people who raise the calendar argument so i want to pose this to you this 1st person says as we discuss this legacy of colonialism please consider voices from it the opiah and liberia i was shocked to my at the opie and powell wish to they were also colonized to benefit from the infrastructure that the british did after she stepped foot in nairobi so thats one persons perspective heres another and this person here an example is really interesting because in fact a lot of anti colonialists all going to around the invasion of ethiopia in 835 ethiopia is very beloved in a kind of pan african context because it was the only non colonized african nation and had a selassie stood up to the european powers and ethiopian independence and if your peons very selous guarding off its independence inspired anti colonial struggles across the world i think its a its a really kind of factual so idea that you need at colonialism in order to bring infrastructure and development i mean if you want if you you know if you think that its following to have massive amounts of land expropriation as kenya. And massive amounts of bloodshed and explore exploitation in order to get a couple of airports and railways that seems like an extraordinary price to have to pay as our king was saying a few minutes ago there were tendencies and lots of cultures to head in in good directions in interesting directions and all of those possibilities have now been lost to us and weve we all believe this notion that only through your up could we have arrived at good things how do we know what was lost how do we know what where the world might have gone where ethiopia might have gone without the intervention of europe in the form of the italian invasion and subsequent. You know it was prayed like many parts of the world were 2 european influence i like that you raise how will we know how how would we know of course because in hindsight who knows but i wanted to share this because you saw this on your screen just a minute ago so i want to share this because its another person with that perspective that guy says colonialism brought a lot of development in the colonies the white man should have stayed for 100 years more in the colonies for instance in 24 years the black man has been in charge in south africa its been full of corruption and it is youll get another form of. People people online believe this but i would love to hear your response what would you tell them youre a professor how would you then educate them. Well i mean i think one thing to say is this that could only alyson relied on corruption it relied on local elites in india it relied on local elites in parts of africa and what has happened and c. L. R. James the great caribbean writer explains this that what happened is that when england or france or belgium pulled out of asian african countries its those collaborating corrupt elites who ended up taking over and colonialism didnt just disappear i mean you know. All of former colonial powers continue to have huge stakes in. Their in their former colonies and neo colonialism is something that we havent talked about very much the ways in which you can only listen continue and in certain ways with the help of local elites so you know talking about white men and black man i mean 1st of all that is outright racist but also its just it bears no resemblance to how history actually operated and it seems to me extraordinary that people can talk still in racial terms as though the white man was somehow medically equipped to do make the world is a lot less and what is the argument here as a matter of class of africans of routinely. It capitalist system very exploitative system it meant mom was the president of south africa not what the media now yesterday said in certain book up to 2012 when the american as aggressive he was an investor or an actually one member of one of the Mining Companies so what is written matter when its capitalism as a matter of are as. Well developed or its the function of of capitalism its absolute nonsense present that thats going on south africa is going on energy or is going on in india because i want to get a chilean because this is really important i actually want to go to the job that you do as a teacher because you are looking at. Education system in portugal are looking at how colonialism has been to court and want to shake thought of a problem i fear that we will care price for us to wrap up our conversation on how the until much colonialism to a country turn motion for at least a half colony. Well thats said in a big issue actually its a b. B. C. Right now because we are on the we were on the last 3 is on the process of changing the curricula and trying to make it more open to these kind of these questions instead of having more closed narratives and the measure of the fact is that i dont think its an issue with these 3 teachers because i think most of them are actually quite well prepared to. Teach indies a new way lets say but there is a large part of the society and a lot of people from my age and older. And from 45 to lets say 70 and blessed that were taught a certain tailless its never a keep and for them its really really very difficult to suddenly to come to terms with the fake that and that they reacted to. Come to terms with the fact that glue these mother negli face. For most of them actually they didnt refuse it. Plainly and well and they just go into the defensive and say oh we havent done anything we havent left anything that so all the porch is. A colonial easter is just an easter real mess occurs and slavery. And suffering no no no because and then they come they say that we need to fight these we need to fight back but the reality is that i think. That just the fact that the discussion is in real part is a very good thing because lets say that until 15 years ago we wouldnt have been discussed these issues and everything was there and we wouldnt even think of it. And we would just consider thats not to all of us such a big chunk of history mcgavock is kind of hard to avoid talking about it have to talk about it at some point thank you for helping us talk about it today its got at house or is off to a really interesting stop many ill end with this tweet from someone who explains why we should learn about it reno says learning about colonialism through Reading Research and Life Experience has helped shaped my curiosity about the world my constant striving for knowledge on the origins of wealth inequality and power ranking to priya to atlanta and also to michaela for discussing colonialism such a hairstyle thank but we managed to draw it down and really got some excellent examples we continue with our conversation on change style as we. Continue with asocial week of shows on colonialism cook the poet and trauma of colonialism whats occurring in her well look at the debate among scientists and so watching rick and i will see on why. December on aljazeera as this year comes to an end we look ahead to 2020 and the stories that may shape the year people in power investigates the shocking truth of disabled people in Eastern Europe scared decide to give future of the u. K. And its place in europe will the general election result the breaks it is shes a story a palestinian women wasnt about part of the struggle for freedom against all and the worlds best Football Team had to cancel for the fee for Club World Cup 2019 join a specific actual couple. December on aljazeera. Going green bacteria in a bar drinking and. Baking to gas escaping from volcanic well in the gritty the halls in a basin in the front what happened to experiments both exploring and. How counter the impacts of Climate Change the science of capturing called the musing night on d the far end of the con the back of my maintains the mind of captain tends to tag no more knowledge is here. To. Cut. Well you know. Some of it i like. How the owner and hayden on the top stories are now jazeera the u. S. House Judiciary Committee has been formally receiving investigative findings in the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump lawyers from the democratic and republican parties are presenting their case for why trump should or should not be impeached based on recent testimonies and other evidence trump is accused of withholding military aid to ukraine in exchange for an investigation into his political rival and current democratic president ial hopeful joe biden democrats say the president s actions present a clear danger to u. S. National security to