Joseph Tonda, Postcolonial Imperialism: Critique of the Society of Dazzlements – trans. Cheryl Smeall, Duke University Press, April 2026

Introduction available open access

Postcolonial Imperialism considers the inability to distinguish between reality and fiction as a key condition of contemporary life. If postcolonial theory has highlighted how white colonizers created images of racialized Others which project their own self-hatred or disavowal, Joseph Tonda here shows how these images have in turn colonized Western imaginaries. He argues that the Global North’s obsession with its own phantoms takes a newly powerful form in the dazzling images of postcolonial screens. With examples ranging from Nicki Minaj to Osama Bin Laden and child soldier Johnny Mad Dog, Tonda reflects on power by analyzing the dazzlements of both Central Africa and the West, showing how African life prefigures Western experiences. Translated from its original French, Postcolonial Imperialism is a prescient critique of authoritarian attempts to enforce alternate realities, and of the many ways screens can distort our vision.