POSTCOLONIALITIES - THE CHALLENGE OF NEW MODERNITIES

This article discusses the current and coming state of postcoloniality and argues that this phase is in the process of being superseded by t he growth of new modernities, especially in Asia. It takes the view th at postcoloniality as a concept is to be distinguished from decoloniza tion in so far as it represents the cast of mind of intellectuals and cultural critics of the developing world consequent on the collapse of communism and the internal decay of the regimes of many developing co untries. This set of circumstances has generated an agnostic conscious ness which represents the translation of postmodern angst into the cir cumstances of the developing world. The development of this postmodern postcolonialism is traced in anthropology through an examination of t he work of 'external' and 'internal' anthropologists and critics. The rise of Asia transforms much of this debate because 'Asian rationality ', certainly in the case of Japan, is forging new modernities which ar e ahead of the West when judged from purely rationalistic, materialist ic standpoints. This growth of a multipolar modernity offers new possi bilities for a multipolar anthropology which is free of ethnocentrism of any kind.