The Intellectuals’ Predicament Of The Cultural Identity In Africa

Vidiadhar Surajprassad Naipaul, the winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in2001, is atypical representative of the postcolonial literature. As an intellectual who comes from thethird world, he not only concentrates his energy on the postcolonial writing, but also caresabout the current situation of the intellectuals, which is obviously reflected in his works.A Bend in the River is the most representative novel about intellectuals among Naipaul’sworks. This book describes the current situation of Africa in the postcolonial period and theintellectuals’ confusion of cultural identity in those new countries. This thesis analyzes theintellectuals’ situation and confusion about their cultural identities based on the postcolonialtheories and some of Said’s and Gramsci’s views about intellectuals. By the study of theexiled intellectuals’, native intellectuals’ and European intellectuals’ cultural identities, it isobviously to see that they are faced with many cultural problems and the future of the Africancountries is not optimistic, although they have gotten independence.This thesis analyzes the problem of cultural identity in a newly independent Africancountry and it is divided into five parts. The first part is the introduction of Naipaul’s life andworks, postcolonial theories, the literature review and the structure of the thesis. The secondchapter studies the cultural rootlessness of the exiled intellectuals. Due to long-termseparation from their homeland, they are unable to integrate themselves into their originalculture. Besides, they are alienated from the African tradition because they are foreigners innatives’ eyes. Moreover, they are also excluded from the western culture. The third chapteranalyzes the dilemma of the native intellectuals who dangle between the colonial and nationalculture. Because of the absence of history and national culture, the results of long colonialperiod, these people are destined to fail in seeking for their cultural identities although manyways they have tried. The fourth chapter concentrates on the analysis of the Europeanintellectuals’ cultural identities in the postcolonial Africa. Their social status, religion andwestern culture have not been the center of the new Africa, which leads to their culturalmarginality finally. The last chapter is the conclusion of the thesis. Through the analysis of three kinds of intellectuals’ cultural identities above, it comes to the conclusion that thesenewly founded countries in the Africa are still confronted with many cultural problemsalthough they have gotten independence politically and economically. They are still enslavedculturally and can not possess their cultural identities and positions properly.