This paper answers some important questions in connection with Michael Taussig’s essay, Culture of Terror-Space of Death: Roger Casement’s Report.
This paper critically reviews Michael Taussig’s essay on the culture and society in which terror reigns supreme. It isolates Taussig’s most important point that no matter how much we try to understand the psychology of terror or victimization, we can never satisfactorily reach its core because we have never really experienced it personally. It discusses exposure to extreme terror, that forces people to escape reality and explores Taussig’s concept of `the space of death`. The significance of this `space of death` is assessed, applied to victims of colonization and the writer gives his/her personal opinion on this coping mechanism. Taussig’s work is compared to that of Eric Wolf, who wrote Europe and the People without History, about life in the colonies during imperial rule; and the authors’ differing approaches are highlighted.
`Michael Taussig has conducted a very powerful analysis of the culture and society in which terror reigns supreme. He has focused on the world of victims and victimizers to explain how and why their thinking differs from those who fortunately do not fall in either of the two categories. The strongest point made by Michael Taussig is that no matter how much we try to understand the psychology of terror or victimization, we can never satisfactorily reach its core because we have never really experienced it with our own eyes or flesh. This means that since the stories of terror usually reach us through word of others, we are simply unable to understand why someone would go to such extreme lengths to destroy other human beings. He is of the view that Indians or Africans and all those who suffered under the Imperial rule did not exist in the same world as we do today.`