Brown Skin, White Masks

Book excerpt: In this unprecedented study, Hamid Dabashi provides a critical examination of the role that immigrant "comprador intellectuals" play in facilitating the global domination of American imperialism. In his pioneering book about the relationship between race and colonialism, "Black Skin, White Masks," Frantz Fanon explored the traumatic consequences of the sense of inferiority that colonized people felt, and how this often led them to identify with the ideology of the colonial agency." Brown Skin, White Masks "picks up where Frantz Fanon left off. Dabashi extends Fanon's insights as they apply to today's world. Dabashi shows how intellectuals who migrate to the West are often used by the imperial power to inform on their home countries. Just as many Iraqi exiles were used to justify the invasion of Iraq, Dabashi demonstrates that this is a common phenomenon, and examines why and how so many immigrant intellectuals help to sustain imperialism.The book radically alters Edward Said's notion of the "intellectual exile," in order to show the negative impact of intellectual migration. Dabashi examines the ideology of cultural superiority, and provides a passionate account of how these immigrant intellectuals -- homeless compradors, and guns for hire -- continue to betray any notion of home or country in order to manufacture consent for imperial projects.