Postcolonialism as a Reverse Discourse in Egyptology: De-colonizing Historiography and Archaeology of Ancient Egypt and Nubia Part 2
Uroš Matić, 2023
Abstract This paper investigates the use of postcolonial theory in Egyptology and Sudan archaeology. Theories and concepts developed out of examinations of specific historical colonial encounters were often applied by Egyptologists with little or no critical historical contextualization. Consequently, when using postcolonial theories and concepts some Egyptologists unwillingly transferred specific historical backgrounds to both ancient Egyptian experiences and those of their neighbours. This is inspected using the concept of reverse discourse as developed by M. Foucault. We need to construct novel and more data-informed concepts to understand the experiences and realities of living under Egyptian occupation.
In 2020, criticism of the decolonial project in Egyptology appeared with the basic argument that the demand to de-colonize Egyptology was no less simplistic than the idea that this field was a Western invention (Gertzen, 2020, p. 199; on complexity of the problem see most recently Jurman, 2022; Lemos, 2022). However, the fact that some Egyptologists erroneously referred to Sudanese exchange students and colleagues, attending an Egyptological conference in Münster in 2018, as members of the Egyptian Antiquities Service, and therefore as Egyptians, is a demonstration that de-colonization (both political and epistemic) is more than necessary.
Furthermore, in this paper, I will demonstrate that the postcolonial theory used in Egyptology and Sudan archaeology in the last two decades actually has very little to do with postcolonial theory (cf. Silliman, 2015 for a similar criticism of it’s use in archaeology). There are two main reasons for this. The first reason is an apparent misunderstanding of concepts borrowed from postcolonial theory, probably because it was filtered to Egyptology and Sudan archaeology from provincial Roman archaeology in Britain (e.g., Hingley, 2000, 2005; Webster & Cooper, 1996 quoted by van Pelt, 2013). It seems that the origins of these concepts are not always clear to Egyptologists. For example, it was suggested that concepts such as hybridity, creolization, syncretism and mestizaje came to postcolonial studies from biology, linguistics and social anthropology (Bader, 2013, p. 259). That the word ‘hybrid’ is also used by biologists for offspring resulting from combining the qualities of two organisms of different breeds, varieties, species or genera through sexual reproduction, and that it was recurrent in 19th century racial anthropology does not mean that the same meaning is implied by postcolonial theorists (cf. Silliman, 2015, p. 280; Young 1995, p. 5). Syncretism is used as a reference to the combination of different beliefs or schools of thought, often expressed in arts; however, it has been much criticised due to assumptions of “coherent theological systems, irresistible religious teachings, and native passivity and ignorance” (Frankfurter, 2017, p. 15). Mestizo is a racial classification originally used to label people of combined European and Indigenous American ancestry (Vento, 1998). It does not originate from any scientific field. Egyptologists and archaeologists should be careful in making assumptions about terms used by cultural theorists relying on the legacy of poststructuralism. Words change meanings.
It has been recently argued referring to Egyptian–Nubian New Kingdom (ca. 1550-1070 BCE) encounters that “Entanglement and hybridisation are terms now frequently deployed in the study of this encounter, balancing the narratives of conquest and domination set out in Pharaonic texts and foregrounded by earlier scholarship” (Spencer, Stevens and Binder, 2017, p. 1). However, although they can be useful when understood and applied in proper manner, these two terms should not be used by Egyptologists to mask the facts of conquest, domination, exploitation, violence and their consequences (cf. already argued by Fanon, 2008 [1952]; 1968 [1961] among postcolonial theorists; for most recent examples in the practice of Egyptology see Jurman, 2022). The colonized can question colonial authority both through physical violence and subversive acts exactly because they find themselves in asymmetrical power relations. The dark side of ancient Egyptian conquest and domination will be addressed with examples at the end of this paper.
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