In this supposedly “post-colonial” age, the idea of the native continues to be distorted and deployed, whether in Narendra Modi’s India or calls for “British jobs for British workers”. How and why has this word – so powerful in the age of empire – lived on into the 21st century? Who gains? And how has it gone from being a term applied to those ruled over by colonisers, to a label chosen by people promoting their own interests against others?

Nandita Sharma joins Alexis and Rosie to discuss all this and more, including the exclusionary logic at the heart of the post-colonial nation state. We further ask: how can true decolonisation occur if the very idea of the nation state still features colonial logic? Does it make the idea of decolonising the “national” curriculum an oxymoron?

Also, Nandita exposes the assumptions revealed by researchers’ fears of “going native”, and reflects on the idea of a borderless world. Plus: a celebration of Manuela Zechner’s “Remembering Europe”.

Guest: Nandita Sharma
Hosts: Rosie Hancock, Alexis Hieu Truong
Executive Producer: Alice Bloch
Sound Engineer: David Crackles
Music: Joe Gardner
Artwork: Erin Aniker

Find more about Uncommon Sense at The Sociological Review.

Episode Resources

Nandita, Rosie, Alexis and our producer Alice recommended

• Manuela Zechner’s film-essay “Remembering Europe”
• Nakkiah Lui’s playwriting work
• Snotty Nose Rez Kids’ songs’ lyrics
• Cathy Park Hong’s book “Minor Feelings”
• Daša Drndić’s book “Canzone Di Guerra”

From The Sociological Review

• “Migrant NHS nurses as ‘tolerated’ citizens in post-Brexit Britain” – Georgia Spiliopoulos and Stephen Timmons
• “Securitized Citizens: Islamophobia, Racism and the 7/7 London Bombings” – Yasmin Hussain and Paul Bagguley
• “State containment and closure of gendered possibilities among a millennial generation: On not knowing Muslim young men” – Mairtin Mac an Ghaill and Chris Haywood
• Decolonising Methodologies, 20 Years On: The Sociological Review Annual Lecture – Linda Tuhiwai Smith

By Nandita Sharma

• “Home Rule: National Sovereignty and the Separation of Natives and Migrants”
• “Against National Sovereignty: The Postcolonial New World Order and the Containment of Decolonization”
• “No Borders As a Practical Political Project” (co-editors: Bridget Anderson and Cynthia Wright)

Further readings

• “Racism, Class and the Racialized Outsider” – Satnam Virdee
• “Return of a Native: Learning from the Land” – Vron Ware
• “Natives: Race & Class in the Ruins of Empire” – Akala
• “Us and Them? The Dangerous Politics of Immigration Control” – Bridget Anderson
• “Neo-colonialism: The Last Stage of Imperialism” – Kwame Nkrumah 
• “Decolonization is not a metaphor” – Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang
• “Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples” – Linda Tuhiwai Smith
• Frederick Cooper’s work on how people fought against subordination in the French empire
• Gurminder Bhambra’s work on Decolonizing Whiteness

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