Tuesday, March 22, 2011

How does ethnnocentricity cause conflict?

On Jan 26th of year 1788, the British arrived to a place which is today known as Sydney, only to find that someone was already there. The British could not have found a more different group of people. Unlike the British, the 'First Australians' were black in skin tone, and were armed differently and believed in different belief systems. The British's objective was to now, interact with these natives, and try to connect with them. Eventually, the attempt was unsuccessful due to the British people's bias and prejudice perspectives of the natives, caused by ethnocentrism. Even though relations seemed to be smooth and easy, many of the new comers could not stop think that the natives were, in some aspects, savage, and wild. Soon the British had to devise a method to co-exist with the land, and the native Australians. Their methods soon turned out to involve digging up the native crops such as yam, and replacing them with familiar crops like corn and potatoes. Clearly the British were not comfortable with change in their lifestyle and decided to show there ethnocentric views. In effect, the ethnocentric views of the British people seemed to have formed a deluded idea in their heads that their lifestyle is right and unquestionable, thus the only logical thing to do is to fit this new land to meet their demands. The actions caused by the British's views later caused a conflict which could not be ignored. Enraged by the fact that their land was taken the that his people were starving, a man called Pemulwuy set fire to strategic points of the corn farms to burn a large portion of the British people's food supply. As this continued, what was supposed to be a conflict, later evolved to look more like a war. Eventually Pemulwuy's head was taken and transported to England in a jar of alcohol. The act of beheading a man and taking it is much more than a sigh of victory, it is also an insult to those who were close to him, because with no head to go with the body, Pemulwuy cannot be given a proper burial, which the First Australians strongly believed in. A short while after Pemulwuy was silenced, Bennelong, who has set sail to England to experience their world, has returned to find that his land has changed in a way that he has never expected. His wife has left him, his people were starving and in peril, and he has lost his powerful position within his people. While Bennelong kept to the British culture, the rest of the British people were satisfied. However, when he developed an addiction towards alcohol, he was made a drunk. He was not wanted among the whites. As soon as Bennelong decided to go back to his own people, the British regarded him as a savage. The British had thought that they had finally succeeded in helping Bennelong shift from his wild and savage ways and be a civilized man, but their tendency to see issues based on their own belief, has stopped them from ever wondering, nor understanding how Bennelong himself felt about his situation. This again shows the British people’s ethnocentric ways. All in all, the British new comers were bias, selfish, and inconsiderate to the culture of the First Australians, and all caused events that could have been prevented, had they ignored their ethnocentric views and accepted the different lifestyle of the First Australians.

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