Postcolonial Reading of a Colonial Text

^Abstract

^{The discussion and analysis focuses on the ways colonialist discourse, in this case Maugham’s short story}

^{Footbrint in the jungle, positioned the colonized natives into European colonialist socio-cultural hierarchy. This}

^{study examines Maugham's depictions of non-white communities - Malay, Chinese and Indian. Hence, we look}

^{at how this colonialist writer reinforced and spread the idea of physical and social differences between the}

^{Europeans and the non-European races, rendering the latter an inferior position to the former. In this section we}

^{see that the distinction made was not only rooted in physically grounds but culturally and socially as well, which}

^{go hand in hand with Edward Said’s notion of Orientalism.}

^{The analysis shows that Maugham’s  narrative represents the Eastern social and cultural practices in an}

^{unpalatable manner. For example, the geography and landscape of the colonized territory is sketched as evil,}

^{savage, dark, et cetera. We see the forest in Maugham’s The Footprinst in the Jungle as a place where everything}

^{becomes dangerous: people lose their sanity; loves takes on the face of violence and hatred.}