Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

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Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby parel » Fri Sep 04, 2015 7:24 pm

They Created A Monster. A Mrs Universe Monster. A First Nations Mrs Universe Monster!
By Chris Graham


Some believe that beautiful women in beauty pageants are there to been seen and not heard. Or at least, if they are to be heard, they’re meant to talk about ‘world peace’.

Image

Ashley Callingbull – a 25-year-old First Nations model and actress from Alberta’s Cree Nation - was anything but peaceful after winning the Mrs Universe pageant overnight.

The Mrs Universe contest has been running since 2007. Unlike the similarly named ‘Miss Universe’ – owned by global redneck Donald Trump – Mrs Universe is open to women aged between 25 and 45 who are married.

In a Facebook post earlier today, Callingbull corrected any misperceptions that she was going to use her crown to flash winning smiles and open county fairs.

“Really? People think I'm too political for my first day as Mrs Universe. Did you really think I was going to just sit there and look pretty? Definitely not. I have a title, a platform and a voice to make change and bring awareness to First Nations issues here in Canada. I'm getting all this media attention and I'm going to use it to the best of my ability. I'm not your typical beauty queen. Look out... I have a voice for change and I'm going to use it!”


The comment was in response to the expected onslaught of Canadians attacking Callingbull for raising First Nations issues during her very public media victory lap.

She tweeted that Canadians needed to get out and register to vote for the October poll, and added that "We need a new PM", a reference to conservative Stephen Harper, widely accused of harming the interests of First Nations people in Canada during his decade in power.

For hardened pageant veterans everywhere horrified by Callingbull’s bluntness, she signed the post off with a smiley face.

Callingbull’s disarming nature hasn’t convinced everyone though. She told Canada’s CBC network overnight that as she rose through the pageant ranks in 2010 she was the target of many racist comments.

"A newspaper (wrote), 'What is she going to do for her talent, write a welfare cheque with her toes?'" Callingbull said.

Like Australia, Canada has long struggled with First Nations issues.

It has its own Stolen Generations history, known in Canada as the residential schools scandal.

Up to 30 per cent of First Nations children were removed from their families and placed in boarding school accommodation, where authorities tried to assimilate them into non-Aboriginal Canadian life.

The system began with the passing of the Indian Act in 1876. The last government-owned residential school was finally closed in 1996.

Inspired by Kevin Rudd’s National Apology in 2008, Harper issued a national apology of his own in June that year. Unlike Kevin Rudd – and Australia – the Canadian government also delivered a $2 billion settlement to compensate the victims of the policy.

One of the biggest scandals to rock Canada in recent decades is the murder and/or disappearance of more than 1,000 First nations women between 1980 and 2012.

In May 2014, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police finally released a report into the scandal – it’s first attempt nationally to investigate the issue, and only after a decade of mounting pressure. To date, 105 women are still officially listed as missing.

Despite their struggles, First Nations people in Canada fare comparatively better than First Nations people in Australia on all major social indicators, such as health, housing, education and employment.

Life expectancy gaps, however are similar, at around a decade or more, depending on locality.



So, on FB I kept seeing all these photos of dead toddlers on beaches and they were deeply disturbing. Apart from offering to host refugees in NZ, I felt utterly helpless. The borders of Australia where I currently live are sealed off by Border Force and Australia's shockingly cruel treatment of asylum seekers has already internalised a deep sense of shame. And people kept posting these images, sometimes with petitions attached. They are still posting them today. Anyway, I posted this old Tuhoe song that describes us as a people with the headline "hei kakahu mo Paptuanuku" which translates to "a cloak for mother earth". It was an offering, a form of prayer. So deep was my shame as a human being that I wanted to call out to the world, or rather sing along with, to offer our mother a garment, to cover the shame of her offspring's despicable behaviour and to keep those in the line of danger safe.

Next minute, I read that Mrs Universe is a Cree woman with a voice. Ashley Callingbull.

These are frightening, heartbreaking and exciting times we are living in. Perhaps this is a chessgame being played out by gods and demigods and we are just pawns in that game. My ancestors, family and kin have been talking about "the clean-up" that has been longtime coming since like, forever. I guess its here. But the way I see it, you're either on the cleaning gang or you're going to be one of the ones being cleaned up.

I'll post the video about our ancestress Hinepukohurangi (the mist maiden) with lyrics and translation that explain our geneological roots and our worldview as a people.

Arohanui. With love.

Kia Kaha! Stay strong!


Proud Tuhoe wahine.






Hiki ake te kohu e
Ko Hinepukohurangi
Tapapa ana ki nga koawa
Hei kakahu mo
Papatuanuku

Hora nei te moenga
Mo te tipua nei a te Maunga
Ki runga o Onini e
Ka hono ki a
Hinepukohurangi

Hurainga ko nga rarauwhe
Kia puta ko nga Potiki
Nga uri o te Maunga
Nga tamariki o te Kohu

A shroud of mist rises
It is Hinepukohurangi
Nestling in the gullies
A garment
For Mother Earth

A bed is laid
For the ancestor mountain
On top of Onini
There he embraces
Hinepukohurangi

Unravel the ferns
So that Nga Potiki may emerge
The descendants of the Mountain
The Children of the Mist
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby Grizzly » Fri Sep 04, 2015 7:42 pm

Breathtakingly Beautiful.
“The more we do to you, the less you seem to believe we are doing it.”

― Joseph mengele
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby parel » Sat Sep 05, 2015 2:59 am

an alternative version of the Iron Maiden classic...dedicated to strong Cree woman, Callingbull.
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby norton ash » Sat Sep 05, 2015 9:27 am

My local paper got a letter to the editor-- the front page of the Arts-Entertainment section had stories on the MTV Awards as well as Ms. Callingbull's win and statement. The paper chose to run a big picture of Miley Cyrus in her space-hooker get-up, and the LTE nailed them quite rightly for de-emphasizing the much more Canadian (and interesting) story.
Zen horse
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby seemslikeadream » Sat Sep 05, 2015 4:29 pm

Ashley Callingbull is being careful Image


Akua tuta tshekuan kaminekuin
Akua tuta
Naketuenta kiei tshin tshekuan
Kanetaunekuin
Akua tuta
Akua tuta tshekuan kakunuene mekuin
Akua tuta
Naketuanta kiei tshin tshekuan kauitshikuin
Akua tshe tessinnu
Akua tuta nete kiei tshin kanetaunekuin
Akua tshe mushumenut
Akua kiei tshukumenut eshei
Akua tshe tuassimenut
Akua kiei tsheshimenut eshei

Be careful what you do
Be careful
With what has been given to you
The way you were raised
Be careful what you do
With the thing you protect
Be careful what you do
With what has helped you
Take care of our land
Be careful of the way you were raised
Take care of our grandfathers
Take care of our grandmothers, too
Take care of your children
And your brother's and sister's children, too
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby parel » Sat Sep 05, 2015 8:39 pm

Image
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby parel » Sun Sep 06, 2015 1:04 am




Tangaroa


Ko Papatuanuku me Ranginui nga matua o te ao
I puta mai nga tamariki nga Atua o te ao
He Atua o te moana
Ko Tangaroa he Atua o te moana
Tu mai te ihi
Tu mai te wehiwehi
Tu mai te wanawana e


Hi ha aue.



From the divine heartbeat of Mother Earth and the ever-elusive constant of Sky Father
All descend and all ascend the natural world
The timeless current of tranquil stillness
The harmonic music of ones infinite ocean
Resilient are the vital influences of the universe
Stand liberated by the inner radiance
Be still be silent and all shall be revealed.


Hi ha aue.
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby parel » Sun Sep 06, 2015 6:27 am

yeah, the Piggy Palace has been haunting me..

Mrs. Universe Calls Out Canada's Neglect of Aboriginal Women



Image

Less than a week after being crowned Mrs. Universe, Ashley Callingbull is calling for political change in her native country of Canada and putting the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women in the spotlight.

The 25-year-old made history last weekend in Belarus when she became the first Canadian and first aboriginal woman to win the international pageant, one for married women that focuses on community work rather than looks. Callingbull, whose married name is Burnham, hails from the Enoch Cree Nation in Alberta. The theme of this year's competition, which is unaffiliated with the Miss Universe pageant, was addressing domestic violence. As a survivor of physical and sexual abuse, Callingbull has said the theme resonated with her.

Callingbull, an actress and model, has made it clear that she intends to make the most of her new international platform, raising awareness of issues affecting Canada's aboriginal people. Within days of winning the title, Callingbull called on aboriginal people to vote out the Conservative party and its leader Stephen Harper in the upcoming federal election, taking place next month.


Callingbull told CBC News she wants the current government out because it's put indigenous issues on the back burner, including its approach to missing and murdered aboriginal women. "There's a lot of issues that aren't addressed in First Nations communities, like for example the murder and missing women that I've been talking about in every interview. There's just a lot of things that we aren't getting from the government. I believe that this government was created to work against us, and not for us."

Missing, Murdered Women
Nearly 1,200 aboriginal women were murdered or went missing between 1980 and 2012, most in rural areas, according to a report released by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police last year, and aboriginal women have a homicide rate roughly 4.5 times higher than that of all other women in Canada. The RCMP updated those figures earlier this year to include 32 new homicides (within their jurisdiction) from 2013 to 2014, and 11 new cases of missing aboriginal women. The new report also confirmed that aboriginal women are most frequently killed by someone they know.

In response, CBC launched a database of unsolved cases of missing and murdered indigenous women in April. CBC Aboriginal shares a story weekly via social media, using the hashtag MMIW.

"I think that the murdered and missing subject is so crucial. It's so sad. Say, for example, a Caucasian woman is missing in the news, it's a big deal, but for First Nations women we are just pushed aside because there's so many of us missing," Callingbull told APTN.

There have been continuous calls for a national inquiry into the murders and disappearances of these women, but so far the Canadian government has ruled out such a move. In addition to the inquiry, some aboriginal leaders point to investing in education, training and child care on reserves and developing an action plan on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's recommendations on residential schools, released earlier this year, as election priorities.

An attempt by the satirical news website The Beaverton to draw attention to the issue of national coverage of missing and murdered indigenous women backfired after it withdrew a controversial article on Callingbull's win and issued an apology. Headlined "Mrs. First Cree Woman to Gain National Coverage If She Disappears," the article said, "Burnham is showing all those aboriginal girls out there that as long as you look like a supermodel and get on TV, you too can get the same news coverage as a white girl should you ever be abducted." The article was met by major backlash and outrage from indigenous and other groups.
Last edited by parel on Sun Sep 06, 2015 6:43 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby coffin_dodger » Sun Sep 06, 2015 6:41 am

"callingbull" - wonderful name.
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby NeonLX » Tue Sep 08, 2015 1:50 pm

coffin_dodger » Sun Sep 06, 2015 5:41 am wrote:"callingbull" - wonderful name.


Dang it! I was going to say the same thing.

This woman is fascinating.
America is a fucked society because there is no room for essential human dignity. Its all about what you have, not who you are.--Joe Hillshoist
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby American Dream » Thu Mar 03, 2016 5:42 pm

https://decolonization.wordpress.com/20 ... from-here/


the sound from here

by Nadia Rhook



over there

colonisation sounds like business



I can hear money tinkling

Got change? Yeah, nufor a latte anyways



from the universe-ity it’s

empires, eroding my ears, by overlapping waves

Si, me encanta este ciudad

But y’now she’s got issues like the rest of them



but from here

colonisation is quiet



squatting on my front porch

the Dandenongs are mountain ranging

children dart up this path on bikes

I hear them scoot away

the trickle of water on a spongy garden bed



in an arrangement, signed & unspoken, we

rent this place and water the roses when we remember



from this porch settler colonialism sounds easy

like suburbia



the question, not how can that be? but

how long til it sounds different





Nadia Rhook lectures and researches history at Latrobe University, on the Wurundjeri land of the Kulin nations. Her PhD explored the aural dimensions of migration and colonialism in Melbourne. She’s concerned with the decolonisation of language(s), and is co-curating a heritage exhibition, ‘Moving Tongues: language and difference in 1890s Melbourne’, to show in October 2016.
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby Joe Hillshoist » Thu Mar 03, 2016 8:29 pm

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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby parel » Sun Mar 06, 2016 6:05 am

So excited about this generation coming up right now. This is the one we have been waiting for.....

Indigenous teen gives instructions to city police chief if she goes missing

"If I go missing and the WPS has not changed the behaviours I have brought to your attention, I beg of you, do not treat me as the indigenous person I am proud to be.

My mom needs me, and I want to have my future. And if I do go missing and my body is found, please tell my mom you are sorry. Tell her I asked to be buried in my red dress, for I will have become just another native statistic.

The colour of one’s skin, their socio-economic status, or whom their legal guardian is, should not determine the level of assistance and resources put in place to find them if they are missing and yet, it does."


read more at link
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby American Dream » Thu Mar 10, 2016 2:45 pm

https://decolonization.wordpress.com/20 ... -struggle/

We Be, Therefore, I Struggle

by Alex Abbasi



Decolonization

Is more than a verb

Noun, adjective or word

It is a particle

An atom of light

Jihad

Bursting

Sometimes fast, sometimes shadowed

From the depths of darkness

Sharper than a sword

Swearing to one’s Lord

¡Allahu Akbar!




Nothing is greater than the One

The ego a cube of ice

In the middle of a room

Repeatedly, melting away

Annihilated into the flowers of friends – on fire – surrounding your garden

Creating we out of me

Me out of we

Mercy towards

Not just homo sapiens

But all non-beings

Ecologies

Placed on the underside

Of a history not ours

A Self, body

Alien and invisible

Double triple quadrupled con(flict)sciousness

Got us trapped in a sublime

Mess that is not hours

Long – so stop the clock and think



Re:

Tick

Member

Tock.



Who are you – no really

Who.

Tick.

Are.

Talk –

you?



Where do I come from and how does it feel?

Has the anger/sorrow left me unable to heal?

Or the happiness too fake to fathom deep joy?

To be modern is to be toy

Barbie skinny blonde

Ken white military ethics boy

Straight and disciplined

Penetrated by a thought

The colonial is an imaginary

True reality unthought



Decolonization is not a word

It is the story of Adam and Eve

This time no sin – just forbidding the tree

The poisoned apple of

Mo-Dern-I-Ty

From letting slip into the mirage

So deep inside

Forced to forgot what who why how where

I am

Not due to I think

No.

I am not, nothing

No.

I am not

Therefore

I know.



¡Jihad!



From Struggle

Let.

We.

Be.



Alex is a Calistinian (Palestinian + Californian) born and raised in Los Angeles, Khaliphaztlán. Currently a PhD candidate in Religion Studies at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa where he focuses on Islamic liberation theology and decolonial theory. Somewhere between an academic in activist clothing, and an activist in academic clothing.
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Re: Singing her to life - the indigenous peoples' revolution

Postby American Dream » Mon Jun 06, 2016 2:14 pm

http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/24 ... -historica

Settler Colonialism: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis?

Jun 06 2016
by Ran Greenstein


Increasingly in the last decade, settler colonialism has gained currency as a new field of study. As a descriptive and political term, its utility seems obvious. It identifies a cluster of countries in which colonial rule was combined historically with the large-scale immigration of European settlers. It allows us to focus on particularly resilient forms of domination that serve the interests and concerns of settler populations that made a new home for themselves in overseas territories. Almost invariably facing resistance from indigenous people, settler colonial societies were shaped by ongoing political conflict. This provided them with common features and a sense of shared destiny, understandable given the similar challenges they face. Solidarity among those at the losing end – indigenous people, the enslaved, and others marginalized through this model of colonial rule – is the counter-part of the process.

At the same time, the extent to which the term serves a useful purpose in historical and theoretical analysis is less obvious. I argue here that its utility in these respects is limited and it may be misleading at times. For this reason, we might be better off with other, more precise, concepts and models. I draw on examples from Israel/Palestine and South Africa to illustrate the point.

What is the problem with settler colonialism as a historical concept? In a sense, its strongest point is also its weakest: it is applicable to many cases that exhibit a great diversity of conditions. It has been applied to countries that saw settlers overwhelm the indigenous population to such a degree that it became demographically and economically marginal. For example, indigenous people are no more than three percent of the population in the USA, Canada and Australia. In other countries, such as Kenya, Rhodesia, Algeria, Mozambique and South Africa, indigenous people remained the bulk of the population, as well as the main source of labor. Slavery featured prominently in some cases (USA, early colonial South Africa) but not in others. Settlers of European origins retained strong legal and political links to the mother country in Algeria, Kenya, Rhodesia, and Portuguese African colonies. They became independent in the USA, South Africa and other British offshoots, at times as a result of a violent intra-colonial conflict.

In some places most settlers left the territory after independence from colonial rule – as in Algeria, Mozambique, Angola, and Rhodesia. Large numbers stayed put in other countries, such as Namibia and South Africa. And, of course, where they became numerically dominant, settlers used their political independence to consolidate their rule, marginalizing “natives” further. But they also incorporated them into the new polity when the demographic ratio was sufficiently favorable so as not to pose a threat to settler domination. This contrasts with the maintenance of legal-racial divisions in places where indigenous people remained a majority of the population.

Indigenous strategies have differed as well. They have consisted of attempts to integrate as individuals on an equal basis in some countries. In others, indigenous people sought to maintain pre-colonial identities and modes of organization. Still others have formed nationalist movements on the new ground created by colonial settlement, or focused on race as a basis for resistance. Most of these strategies acknowledge, to varying degrees, settlers as legitimate members of the envisaged future liberated society.

It is not only the broad contours of history that vary greatly in settler colonial societies but also patterns of social change over time. Constant geographical expansion while driving out indigenous people has occurred in the USA and Australia. Elsewhere there has been constant expansion while incorporating indigenous people as labor power, in South Africa most notably. In other cases there has been an initial takeover of the entire territory with more-or-less fixed relations of subordination throughout the period – for example in Algeria, Kenya, Rhodesia, and Namibia. There have been different degrees of incorporation of “urban natives” in a relatively privileged position compared to rural populations, and different combinations of direct and indirect despotism, to use Mahmood Mamdani’s notions of colonial rule in late colonial Africa.

In other words, the category of settler colonialism is compatible with different demographic ratios and different trajectories of indigenous-settler relations. It can go along with different relations between settlers and metropolitan centers and different destinies of settlers in the post-colonial period. It is compatible with different social structures, relying variously on free white labor, and indentured immigrant labor, from Europe, India or other places. Or it can rely on African slavery, indigenous labor subordination, and combinations of the above. In all these respects, settler colonial societies do not share a single historical dynamic nor do they exhibit a tendency to move in similar directions. They may end up with the consolidation of settler rule or its demise through indigenous resistance and victory. None of the possible outcomes serves to mark the historical trajectory of settler colonialism apart from other types of colonial societies.

In the absence of a unique trajectory, does settler colonialism display perhaps specific conceptual features? That is to say, does it work as a theoretical model? A model offers a relationship between a limited number of concepts or variables. It aims to make sense of large number of observations. It reduces the infinite variety of empirical reality into discrete units with distinct dynamics or laws of motion.

Do models of colonial societies (settler, exploitation, plantation, and so on), show us how some cases differ from others in theoretical terms? Do they outline distinct ways in which concepts such as class, race, ethnicity, identity, state, gender, power, sexuality, ideology, space, time, and discourse, manifest themselves concretely or intersect with one another?

If we pose the question in this way, the conclusion seems unavoidable. Settler colonialism as a category of historical analysis does not establish any specific social-theoretical dynamics unique to it. We cannot use its historical features to distinguish it analytically – not just descriptively – from other types of societies, be they colonial or not.

If settler colonialism has no specific historical or theoretical dynamics then, how do we deal analytically with societies that fall within its definition? As an alternative method of investigation, I suggest a strategy of addressing the multiplicity of colonial and post-colonial societies with a three-track approach:

· Studying them in their full historical specificity without imposing artificial boundaries between classes of cases;

· Deploying general analytical concepts instead of developing idiosyncratic models. Such models abound: “colonialism of a special type,” “ethnic democracy combined with protracted military occupation,” “exclusionary colonialism,” or “regimes of separation.” They may serve as useful political labels but are theoretically without predictive value.

· Engaging in selected comparisons in order to highlight general and unique features by examining them against each other. This should allow us to enhance the complexity of good empirical description as well as the generality of social theory. But it would not compromise either one of these imperatives.

To illustrate this approach, I apply it to two settler-colonial societies, Israel/Palestine and South Africa. In what ways does such a study offer a better prospect for historical analysis? Is the concept of apartheid, originating in one of them and increasingly applied to the other, a useful analytical substitute?

In brief, these two have in common an ongoing conflict between indigenous people and settlers. It has stretched over centuries and involved conquest of territory, massive land dispossession, and a constant quest for innovative modes of political domination well beyond the period of global colonial expansion and subsequent decolonization. This continued all the way to the last decade of the twentieth century, in South Africa, and into the twenty-first in Israel/Palestine. At the same time, there are important differences between them. They include the centrality of indigenous labor in enhancing settler prosperity, the religious symbolism of the land, the prevailing mode of collective organization (nationalism as opposed to race), and the degree of international legitimacy. These differences shape both power and resistance, the nature of the state and society, as well as the possibilities of indigenous social and political mobilization.

Neither settler colonialism nor apartheid as analytical concepts can help us predict the trajectories of these societies. For that, we have to study them in concrete historical detail and outline the precise configurations of forces at work in each case. The approach proposed here though, directs our attention to key historical processes seen from a comparative angle. For example, it can point out the impact of indigenous modes of political organization on conquest and resistance. It can also highlight the greater capacity of pre-1948 Palestinians to shape the terms of the evolving conflict. And, it can point out the more fragile modes of social organization of indigenous people in South Africa. These, in turn, facilitated their conquest and incorporation into settler-dominated economic structures. It raises questions about the ways in which parties to the conflict in Israel/Palestine made use of their links to global Arab, Islamic and Jewish identities and resources. In contrast, actors in South Africa were reliant for long periods – before the nineteenth century and for much of the twentieth century – on local affiliations and resources.

In a contemporary vein, this approach leads us to examine strategies of resistance by focusing on the centrality of the labor movement in South African struggles as compared to its marginal role in Israel/Palestine. This can be linked to patterns of settlement and conquest as well as to affiliations with extra-territorial populations – creating jobs for Jewish immigrants as a crucial imperative, for example. The implications of this difference for mobilization and change are important as well – indigenous race/class synergy in South Africa compared to a split between these factors in Israel/Palestine. Additionally, we could look at culture and discourse. We could discuss the prevalence of demographic considerations in the one case, and its relative absence in the other. The concern of Jewish settlers with becoming a majority had to do with the prior historical consolidation of ethno-national identities in Israel/Palestine. It was also linked to the absence of the technological advantage that was central to relations of domination between settlers and indigenous people in South Africa, making a settler majority less of an imperative there. This, in turn, affected political strategies of demographic exclusion, leading to ethnic cleansing in Israel/Palestine. It contrasts with the incorporation/exploitation of indigenous people as providers of labor power and, later on, as citizens, in South Africa.

A note of caution. The comparative approach cannot on its own facilitate the development of general theoretical models. We have no reason to expect the social theory applicable to our cases to differ from theory applicable to other cases and societies, regardless of their relationships to colonialism as a historical phenomenon. Whether we focus on power, identity, culture, class, gender or any configuration of these concepts, they are all universal in nature. This is not to say that they operate in the same way across time and space, or that they always enter the same relationship with one another. Rather it means the generality of theory is premised on the notion that all societies are subject to the operation of the same forces, though these manifest themselves in specific ways. And yet, outlier historical cases such as those represented by settler colonial societies may help theoretical formulation in unforeseen ways.

To illustrate, South Africa and Israel/Palestine have been sites of political struggle. Those struggles have combined questions of class and material resources on the one hand, and racial and ethnic identification on the other. In what ways does studying these questions in a comparative context allow us to develop insights about the intersection of race and class with broader theoretical relevance? In what ways does the study of identity formation and political conflict in the context of immigrant and extra-territorial populations, such as Afrikaners and Jews, allow us to understand global identity formation? It is precisely the nature of the case studies as atypical societies that offers an opportunity to gain useful theoretical insights that might be obscured under more “normal” conditions.

What is the concept of settler colonialism good for then? It has played an important role in global solidarity politics and mobilization around issues of similar concern. It serves as a way to raise questions and encourage thinking about colonialism and resistance, liberation movements and mass participation. At the same time, it does not provide us with clear answers about historical trajectories and theoretical dynamics. If we acknowledge its analytical limitations, we can use it creatively. We can also combine it with other conceptual efforts in order to develop our understanding of what has been going on politically and what needs to be done.
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