Edward Said and Coexistence

           I was touched, particularly, by Said’s idea of people from different cultures, religions and backgrounds coming to understand one another in order to prevent violence. It is incredibly easy for tainted perceptions of other people to become twisted into a form of dehumanization, at which point many forms of violence and oppression become acceptable.

            I’ve always been aware that contradicting perceptions of others exist, as I have grown up being exposed to anti-British sentiments and stories of my freedom fighter ancestors who were brutally oppressed and even murdered by radical Protestants and righteous, tyrannical Brits. It came as a shock to me, when in high school, many of the other students weren’t even aware that Northern Ireland was a country separated from the rest of the island, much less that the nation had been ravaged by years of violence and oppression by the English. In fact, I was rather indignant when my history teacher told the class that the IRA was a terrorist organization.

            Consequently, it comes as no real surprise to me that an entire race of people can be hideously misrepresented and even come to be abused as a result. Instead, the aspect of Edward Said’s commentary that caught my attention was his vision of coexistence rather than “this idea that somehow we should protect ourselves against the infiltrations, the infections, of the other.” I know that in Ireland, it was through the efforts of John Hume, and other peace seeking individuals that the assumptions of righteousness and principal hatred of an individual because of their background were dampened and an uneasy peace was established.

            Once, when comparing the differing international perceptions of others with one of my Irish cousins, he presented me laughingly with the idea that in Ireland, it is said that “Protestants’ eyes are too close together… but we know that isn’t really true.”  It is my hope to come away from this class with a truer understanding of people from different cultures and backgrounds in order to dispel stereotypes like the one mentioned above, which does not seem inherently malicious, but at one time was part of a torrent of hatred and violence which led two groups of people sure enough of their superiority to abuse and kill one another.