Decolonization and the Decolonized

Albert Memmi is well known for his book The Colonizer and The Colonized (1957). As a kind of follow-on "Decolonization and the Decolonized" (2004 French, 2006 translation), I had high expectations for this book (and had not having read the reviews). After reading the book, and now having looked at reader reviews and comments, I tend to agree: this is a disappointing work, (unexpectedly) discriminatory, colonialist in attitude, and full of inaccurate and broad-brush generalizations based on neatly selected examples. Probably strangest of all, given that Memmi worked as a professor at a number of higher institutes of learning and that this book is published by an academic press (University of Minnesota for the English, with funding from the French Ministry of Culture for the translation), there are no references, at all. This point stands out even more in the author's defence of the book in the Afterward where he explains that he made use "of the most reliable sources" (p. 146). I struggled to finish the book. I only pushed on because of an old habit of feeling the need to do so. Not recommended.