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El blanc i el negre (The black and the white) |
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Summary |
| Contributed by: |
Pau Lanau, Carme Vinyoles |
EL BLANC I EL NEGRE (THE BLACK AND THE WHITE)
An in-depth discussion on immigration, politics and citizenship
This book presents a conversation between Aliou Diao (of Senegalese origin) and Joan Manuel del Pozo (of Andalucian origin) about world immigration and globalization. They consider various themes from their own viewpoints which, although distinctive, often agree.
When Diao and del Pozo accepted the invitation to sit down and talk in front of a tape recorder, they both shared one wish: that the ethics of denunciation and of learning be well represented.
Denunciation refers to the silence and indifference that, throughout the course of history, has tolerated the most abhorrent crimes. And learning is mentioned due to its ability to broaden horizons and perspectives and, as a result, to act as an effective antidote to any mental or physical racial fed by poverty.
There certainly is a lot to denounce and even more to learn as this discussion overflows with ideas and experiences. del Pozo does not display the ethnocentrism proper to the centuries of colonialism nor does Diao cite the submission and servitude which the New World Order continues to demand from his continent. On the contrary, the pair concentrate their efforts on destroying the inheritance of centuries of violence and imposition (i.e. the slave trade and colonialism) that blacks and whites have shared. They both back the idea of relations forged out of the universal value of equality, but without underestimating the importance of diversity.
The authors echo the words of the Senegalese poet and politician Léopold Sédar Senghor who says that each person, each people of the world, is able to offer something useful to the others, something that can contribute to the progress of humanity. All that is needed is that they are allowed to live. That is to say that the Developed World renounces the pretext of cultural superiority to justify its right to exploit the Third World.
Throughout the conversation it becomes evident that it is not cultures that clash, rather it is prejudices. They speak of the genocide of 25,000 deaths every day from starvation; the cynicism of considering poverty to be a natural condition of those who suffer it; the establishment of new colonies and the pitfalls of official co-operation which results in infinite dependence; the intellectual construction of racism and its current tactics; the substitution of biology with culture to justify discrimination etc.
They also talk about notions of progress, democracy, human rights, equality and liberty from an open-minded perspective which questions the different ways of interpreting and living out these universal values
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