An interesting debate has begun in the academic world. At the centre is a recent controversy emerging from the Oriel College at the University of Oxford. At the entrance to the college is a statue of one Cecil Rhodes. The gentleman attended the college in the latter part of the 19th century. Later, he had a flourishing career as a colonialist in Britain’s African empire and gave his name to a country once called Rhodesia, later renamed Zimbabwe. The said gentleman also bequeathed a hefty sum to his college. To honour the endowment, the university offers a scholarship named Rhodes to exceptional students from around the world. The award has brought scores of brilliant people from the former colonies to Oxford. Recently, students at the college have launched a campaign to have Cecil Rhodes’ statue removed. They believe having the figurine is akin to celebrating a man who, other than being a politician and a businessman, was an ardent racist. Campaigners associated with the ‘Rhodes Must Go’ movement argue that keeping the statute is offensive to people from the former colonies and reflects poorly on a university that promotes cultural diversity, liberalism and democracy. On the other hand, Cecil Rhodes also seems to have quite a following. The Telegraph has reported that donors have threatened to withdraw endowments worth over £ 100 million if Rhodes’ statue is removed from Oriel. This could translate into fewer Rhodes scholarships for overseas students.
The Rhodes controversy goes beyond the dispute over a figurine. It becomes a question of identity at history seminars, a moot point at debating clubs, a test of ‘postcolonial selfhood’ in faculty lounges and much more. Is the Rhodes scholarship itself a genuine endeavour to ameliorate an ugly past? Or is it a clever attempt to keep an unsavoury figure and the associated colonial memorabilia alive under the guise of academic philanthropy? In any case, the controversy does seem to drive a point home: the historical past is complex and most attempts to read it are positioned in existing ideological paradigms. It might not be possible to attempt a completely unprejudiced appraisal of ‘what happened’ but it might be possible to try to come to terms with the past without revising it.
The Rhodes Must Go campaign is in line with the postcolonial riposte of recent years. The former colonies now demand a share in the historicisation of their past. Many marginalised communities have found a voice and envision a world that celebrates ethnic diversity and cultural pluralism. To such communities, the historical past has to be revisited and figures like Cecil Rhodes presented as they truly were: hardboiled colonialists. At the same time, some people also harbour a somewhat sentimental sense of being deprived of a pristine indigenous culture because of the colonial campaign. The culture of Hindustan, for instance, has been irreversibly anglicised, civilisations like the Aztec and the Inca in South America virtually wiped out because of European conquests. Resultantly, there is kind of a ‘they owe us’ vein in many young candidates who aspire to go to Oxford and Cambridge. “The Rhodes and other such scholarship are the least they could do,” says a student in my undergraduate Shakespeare class. “They founded their economies on cheap labour and raw materials from the subcontinent. Compared to what they took from us, a few bursaries here and a few endowments there do not mean much,” he adds sarcastically. The road to Rhodes might not be that simple, I say.
The statue reflects an ethos that mutely celebrates the empire of yesteryears but also tries to channelise the controversial legacy into something productive. The fund is used to sponsor students from around the world. Taken in this perspective, would it be ever so slightly awkward if you were at Oxford because of a bursary initiated by Cecil Rhodes and demanded for the removal of his statue? Furthermore, the Rhodes Must Go campaign is in line with popular credos, many of which have been made into academic disciplines like postcolonial and cultural studies at institutes like Oxford. It would be far from simple for someone who attends Oxford, and takes courses in postcolonial studies on a Rhodes scholarship. There is more.
For people from the former colonies, figures like Cecil Rhodes constitute a reminder of the ugly past. In condemning what Rhodes stood for, the campaign might have equated denouncing the ideology and values of colonialism with erasing history. In this way, removing Rhodes’ statue becomes synonymous with wiping the past clean. While removing the statue is important for its symbolic value, the campaign to have it removed also constitutes an attempt to reduce the past into an amenable category. The historical past has to be taken for what it was. Colonialism cannot be undone. Removing the statue would offer closure to a hitherto unfinished tale, as if saying the past is done with!
The statue is offensive. It should be allowed to stay at Oriel precisely because it is offensive. It should stay because it provides a heuristic site to people from the former colonies. It should stay because it reminds us that the colonial campaign is still underway in the Middle East, parts of Africa and South Asia in one form or another. It should stay because it reminds us that it is convenient to read the past in line with the spirit of the present age but, should we decide to revisit history, we should be able to identify our position first. Self-positioning is an important step in trying to change that position into a vantage that rises a step above the politically correct.
The writer is a lecturer in English Literature at Government College University, Lahore. He may be reached at [email protected]