Violence in Postcolonial Nations is a Colonial Legacy: A Study of Garcia Marquez’s No One Writes to the Colonel

Abstract

Colonialism, the most complex and traumatic relationship in human history, has left its mark on international relations, the social relationships within nations and the ideologies of all the peoples of the world. The collective memories that members of the formerly colonized and the formerly colonizing countries hold about the colonial times, and particularly about colonial violence, still permeate their current relationships. On the one hand, these memories certainly weigh on diplomatic contacts between the formerly colonized countries and their former colonizers. On the other hand, they also undermine the inter-group relationships within societies or nations. This violent past also has enduring consequences on the former colonized people’s wellbeing. The way this violent past is collectively remembered today, is therefore a crucial factor for understanding the contemporary instances of inter-group conflict, prejudice, stigmatization, and racism.