Th Act: Franz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth

 This task is given by Megha ma'am. In this blog we have to write 2 questions related to Franz Fanon's "The Wretched of the Earth".

Q 1)- According to Fanon, what is wrong with the “racialization” of culture?

Introduction:

Fanon and Colonial Racism

Frantz Fanon, in his works Black Skin, White Masks (1952) and The Wretched of the Earth (1961), examines how colonialism does not only occupy land but also colonizes the mind and culture of the oppressed. One of his major critiques is the racialization of culture — the practice of interpreting all cultural differences through the lens of race. For Fanon, this process distorts both culture and humanity itself.

a) Culture as a Historical Process, Not a Racial Trait

Fanon believes culture is not biological or hereditary, but historical and dynamic. Every society’s culture develops through its material conditions, historical struggles, and social interactions. Colonial ideology, however, tried to present culture as something fixed within racial essence — as if Africans, Asians, or Europeans each had “natural” ways of thinking and behaving.This pseudo-biological view allowed colonizers to justify domination. By presenting European culture as inherently rational, progressive, and civilized, and non-European cultures as emotional, backward, or primitive, colonial powers established a hierarchy of humanity. Fanon calls this a myth of cultural difference used to maintain racial superiority.

“The Negro is not. Any more than the white man.” — Black Skin, White MasksFanon insists that both categories are social fictions, not realities of culture.

b) Racialization and Cultural Alienation

When colonized people internalize racialized thinking, they begin to measure their worth through the colonizer’s standards. Fanon describes this as cultural alienation: the process by which a colonized person rejects their own culture as inferior and imitates the colonizer’s behavior, language, and values.He analyzes this psychologically in Black Skin, White Masks, explaining how the Black man desires to “become white” — to gain recognition and humanity through assimilation. Yet this aspiration leads only to self-division and inferiority, because the colonizer never grants full equality.

Thus, the racialization of culture harms not only knowledge but also selfhood. It erases authentic cultural expression and replaces it with imitation and dependency.

c) Essentialism and False Pride

Fanon also criticizes the reactionary response to racialization: the belief that liberation means glorifying a pure, precolonial culture. He warns that this “nativist essentialism” — the romanticization of ancient traditions or ethnic purity — merely reverses the colonial binary instead of transcending it.He argues that true liberation lies not in a fixed “African” or “Black” identity, but in creative synthesis — where people forge new cultural forms through struggle, not nostalgia.

“A national culture is not the folklore… It is the sum total of all the new forms of expression which are created during the struggle for freedom.” — The Wretched of the Earth

d) Fanon’s Vision: A New Humanism

Ultimately, Fanon rejects the idea of race-based cultures altogether. He envisions a decolonized humanism, where individuals are free to create and participate in universal culture beyond racial boundaries. For him, cultural renewal is inseparable from political liberation — both require breaking the colonial logic that defines humanity through difference.

Conclusion

The racialization of culture, according to Fanon, is wrong because it fixes living societies into racial molds, legitimizes inequality, and alienates the oppressed from their own humanity. True culture, he insists, must emerge from freedom, struggle, and shared human creativity — not from the myth of race.

Q 2)- What is the national bourgeoisie, and why does Fanon think it is “useless”?

Introduction:

 From Colonial Rule to Neocolonial Continuity

In The Wretched of the Earth, Fanon analyzes the period following decolonization and identifies a dangerous class — the national bourgeoisie. These are the educated elites who inherit power from departing colonizers. Fanon argues that, instead of leading their countries toward genuine freedom, they reproduce the same exploitative systems. Hence, he calls them “useless” and “mimetic.”

a) Who Are the National Bourgeoisie?

The term refers to local elites — politicians, intellectuals, landowners, bureaucrats, and business leaders — who rise to prominence after independence. Many were educated in European systems and adopted Western values. During the anti-colonial struggle, they presented themselves as spokespeople for national liberation; after independence, they become the ruling class.

But Fanon warns that this class lacks economic power, creativity, and moral vision. They do not industrialize, innovate, or empower the people — instead, they rely on foreign investment and old colonial markets. They occupy the administrative positions vacated by the colonizers without changing the structure itself.

b) A Class of Imitators

Fanon describes the national bourgeoisie as “the mimic men of the West.” They seek prestige, consumer luxury, and validation from Europe. They maintain the colonial city-country divide: modern cities for the elite, underdeveloped rural areas for the masses.They prefer importing European goods over producing locally, leading to economic stagnation. Fanon calls them “an intermediary class” — brokers between Western capitalism and local labor.

“The national bourgeoisie discovers its historical mission: that of intermediary. It is not engaged in production, nor in invention, nor building, nor labor. It becomes a transmission line between the nation and a capitalism, rampant though camouflaged.” — The Wretched of the Earth

c) Political and Moral Failure

Politically, this class is conservative. Once in power, they use nationalism as a slogan but fear genuine social revolution. They suppress workers’ movements and peasant demands to protect their privileges. Fanon calls this the betrayal of the revolution, because the bourgeoisie halts liberation at the point of political independence, refusing to pursue economic or social transformation.

They rely heavily on foreign aid and maintain colonial economic patterns, thus turning independence into a façade — a form of neo-colonial dependency.

d) Fanon’s Alternative Vision

Fanon proposes a “revolutionary humanism” led by the masses, not the bourgeoisie. He calls for peasants and workers to become agents of history. For Fanon, the true mission of independence is to restructure society, create new forms of economic production, and build solidarity across the formerly colonized world.“The third world must start a new history of Man, a new humanism.” — The Wretched of the Earth

Conclusion

The national bourgeoisie, in Fanon’s analysis, is useless because it reproduces colonial structures under a new name. Instead of liberating their nations, they become gatekeepers of global capitalism, dependent on former colonial powers. True freedom, Fanon insists, can only emerge when leadership comes from the people, grounded in social justice and creative renewal.