wretched-of-the-earth-frantz-fanon

On Violencenational reawakening, restoration of the nationto the people or Commonwealth, whatever the name used,whatever the latest expression, decolonizationevent. At whatever level we studychange ofname for a sports club, the guest list at a cocktail party,members of a police force or the board ofdirectors of a state orprivate bank-decolonization is quite simply the substitutionofone "species" of mankind by another. The substitution is unconditional,absolute, total, and seamless. We could go on tothe rise ofa new nation, the establishment ofa new state,economic and political orienta­tion. But instead we have decided to describe the kind of tabularasa which from the outset defines any decolonizatiois singularly important is that it starts from the very first daythe basic claims of the colonized. In actual fact, proof of successlies in a social fabric that has been changed inside out. Thischange is extraordinarily important because it is desired, clamoredfor, and demanded. The need for this change exists in araw, repressed, and reckless state in the lives and consciousnesscolonized men and women. But the eventuality of such achange is also experienced as a terrifying future in the consciousnessof another of men and women:the colonists.1