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Colonized

fifteen

Member
English
Can anyonbe tell me a noun for the following sentence:-

When we look at this story from Njoroge’s eyes, an African colonized, we find controversy about the real interests of the Western, European societies upon Africa.

I think this sentence is wrong but I can't find a noun in the dictionary.

Thanks
Well, to begin with, "colonized" is not a noun, it's a past participle being used as an adjective.

There's nothing wrong with the boldface word in the sentence, although "colonized" is being used in a somewhat unusual sense. Here, it means "living in a colony" or "under the authority of a colonial power."

The only problem I can find with the sentence is the use of the word "upon." The sentence should read either "interests . . . in Africa" or "effects . . . upon [or "on"] Africa."

Who wrote this, and where?
Sometimes people use the word "colonized" to refer to an individual. It generally means that, regardless of the political situation of the person's country of origin, that the person herself is somehow under the influence of colonial powers. So "an African colonized" might be an African person who somehow feels that Europe is superior to Africa, or who is otherwise affected by European ideas. People talk about "decolonizing their minds," which means, roughly, freeing their minds from colonial and oppressive ideas, and embracing their own culture.

Could this be how the author is using the term?
Yes, I know that "colonized" is an adjective so when I read an African colonized" I thought, an African colonized what? Person? So, I wasn't sure if it was unusual or incorrect. I also thought "the colonized" is fine as a noun for people who have been colonized but "a colonized" I can only see as an adjective. The sentence is being used to describe a book about British Colonialism in Africa.
It's just an inversion "a colonized African". It would be helpful to know the source (Rule 4 in the Forum Rules) since that might explain the use of an inversion. There are some other oddities in this apart from the use of "upon". That and the inversion would cause me no surprise if the text is not recent.
I haven't heard this sense of "colonized" before, but I'll take your word for it. Somewhat like fifteen's interpretation, I wanted to know "colonized by what"? The US was colonized by the English (and others), so poor Njoroge must be colonized by bot fly larvae or something equally small and awful. 👁 Wink ;)
I don't have a source because it's a sentence that a friend of mine is writing. The person is doing an English Philology degree and reads a lot of "old" books and writes in an old fashioned manner.
The person is doing an English Philology degree and reads a lot of "old" books and writes in an old fashioned manner.
That could explain the style.
The inversion "African colonized" is poor style for academic prose because, as you have seen from the responses, it causes confusion in understanding. It would be fine in poetry.

I will now go off topic:

The comma in Western, European is incorrect since Western European is a collocation acting as a single adjective specifying the societies.

The interests ... upon Africa construction is correct but old-fashioned.
Thanks everyone. This has been interesting for me.
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