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Westernization and Human Welfare · Maryam Jameelah

whw 0032

social, economic and political problems? Each thoughtful, educated and intelligent person from Asia and Afiica must ask .himself (or herself) what h~ he ibdivid11ally· or his people collectively to gain from it? A perceptive Pakistani scholar has this to say:

The slave culture is behaviour -intellectual, emotional and social-which makes·a people depend on a foreign cultureple~urable, in fact, respectable in their own eyes. - Throughout history cultural exchanges have occurred. People ha\fe frequently borrowed from other cultures. But the eaential difference between the process of” norm” cultural borrowiDc and slave culture is of attitude. In me slave culture, the merit lies not in the thing borio~ed but in the people and place borrowed from. The slave culture must always remain passive and subordinate to the master culture. It is neVer creative and never innovative.

A conquered people might succumb. to the political rule of aliens without going into raptures about it and without accepting the rulers or their culture as superior. TheyJDaY protect their culture by building sacUlI fences arouDd. themselves . and maintain their self-respect, dignity and pride even in defeat as due to unfavourable circumstances or dUe [^10] God’s wrath for the people h”aviog left their virtuous ways. Thus a cultural regeneration may take place among the subject people. The shock of defeat may therefore reinforce the subject culture . rather than weaken it. But the revene also can happen.

No tailor or designer of Karachi can start a fashion ‘of dreu even in Pakistan, not to speak of London or Paris.. No .carpenter of Lahore can alter the furniture design of the drawing rooms of Gulberg. It is the other side of th’ tame coin that wealthy Pakistanis should feel socially comfortable only when they Wear their coat and tie in the sweltering heat of Karacm summers or place a bath-tub in their houles when they know they will never use it except for washing clothes. The

Cite this chapter

Jameelah, Maryam. “whw 0032.” In Westernization and Human Welfare (1976). Scan: archive.org, https://archive.org/download/al-islam-maryam-jameelah/English_WESTERNIZATION_AND_HUMAN_WELFARE.pdf. Online text: Islamic Internet Archives, https://islamicarchives.org/works/mj-westernization-and-human-welfare/whw-0032/

© Mohammad Yusuf Khan (publisher); free scan at Internet Archive