Orwell’s “Shooting an Elephant”: Reflections on Imperialism and Neoimperialism

Abstract

Imperialism has been the most powerful force in world history over last four or five centuries. The world has moved from the colonial to post-colonial era or neo imperialism. Throughout the period, the imperialists have changed their grounds and strategies in imperialistic rules. But the ultimate objective has remained the same- to rule and exploit the natives with their multifaceted dominance-technological, economic and military. Through dominance with these, they have been, to a great extent, successful in establishing their racial and cultural superiority. George Orwell is popularly known to be an anti-imperialist writer. This paper, I believe, will lead us to an almost different conclusion. Here, we discover the inevitable dilemma in a disguised imperialist. We discover the seeds of imperialism under the mask of anti-imperialism. In this regard, it studies his revealing short story “Shooting an Elephant”. It also humbly approaches to refute Barry Hindess’ arguments supporting neo imperialism.