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British Imperialism In Toronto: An Analysis

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However, to solely conceptualize colonialism as a set of governance projects based on the dispossession of indigenous peoples from their spaces for the purposes of installing settlements and extracting resources would be a gross simplification of colonialism. To do so would be to ignore how the colonization of indigenous territories by European settlers was an ideologically and culturally contested process as much as it was a material one. As explained by Said (1995), imperialism and colonialism were both supported by ideological formations that were comprised of notions that indigenous peoples and territories require and beseech domination (p. 9). Expanding on this analysis, Jacobs (1996) discusses how racialized notions of the Self and the Other were the building blocks for the hierarchies of power under colonialism, as negative constructions of the …show more content…

2). The taking of indigenous spaces through the displacement of indigenous peoples cannot solely be seen as a competition for material resources. Rather, the cultural and ideological processes that constructed indigenous peoples as racialized Others must be analyzed to better grasp the logics and rationalities that legitimated imperial projects and colonial space-taking governance.
Given that the focus of this paper is colonialism within Toronto, this would necessitate an examination of British imperialism. As such, attention must be directed to English philosopher John Locke, who, as Blomley (2004) reminds us, was deeply involved with the colonization of North America and wrote extensively on colonial affairs (p. 116). In fact, Locke had a profound influence on British political thought as his theory of political society and property was widely disseminated in the eighteenth century and was interwoven with theories of progress, development and

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