Daru Imperialism

Throughout the globe, societies expect individuals to conform to its own ideologies, customs, and laws of its own. An example of this is Albert Camus’s “the Guest,” in which Daru struggles between the clash of French and Arab culture in the plateaus of Colonial Algeria, and the isolation created by moral dilemmas. Outside of societies like Colonial Algeria, readers function in society as well. They, readers, use their own societal expectations to define right and wrong within a text. But often, the line between right and wrong is obscure, and one action that is morally correct in one society, could be improper and “bad” in another. This was displayed in George Orwell’s “Shooting an Elephant”
Daru, a simple schoolmaster faces this same clash of cultures, as he is French, but wants to …show more content…
The French empire forcing its culture upon its colonies is displayed in his teachings and the symbols. “On the blackboard the four rivers of France, 1 drawn with four different colored chalks, had been flowing toward their estuaries for the past three days.” This represented French colonialism, and how as a teacher, Daru must teach Algerian children about the rivers and lands of their overlords, rather than their own homeland.
The ethnic divide is further emphasized by Daru’s location within Algeria, in a schoolhouse which is located on a remote and isolated plateau. As compared to many families in Algeria who were suffering from a massive drought, Daru constantly was supplied with food and water, which was “enough to resist a siege, for the little room was cluttered with bags of wheat that the administration left” and this