Dependência mimética e ressentimento colonial: V. S. Naipaul e René Girard

Abstract

The relationship between colonizer and colonized represents one of the most unfolded correspondences established between the notions of superiority and inferiority. The mimetic dependence of the inhabitants of postcolonial countries, concerning the former colonizer, provides, through V. S. Naipaul s work, a set of psychological circumstances, which helps to reveal the mimetic mechanism responsible for the precariousness and temporariness of the notions of superiority and inferiority. However, although such notions can neither be seen as stable nor secure a solid ontological condition, the mimetic process behind them are grounded upon resentment. In between mimetic dependence and colonial resentment there is a series of mistakes, conflicts of interest and traumas; but at the same time there is a set of revelations, equivalences and opportunities. Thus, I will depart from the cultural environment in order to reach the unlikely economic sphere. My aim is to render clear the process that brings an individual, or even a nation, to the always changeable position of inferiority or superiority; process which is, according to my hypothesis, strongly mimetic.