FREE ESSAY ON GULLIVER'S SUPPOSED ENGLISH SUPERIORITY

GULLIVER'S SUPPOSED ENGLISH SUPERIORITY

Gulliver's typical Anglocentric Enlightenment views are best exemplified in Chapter 1 of
Part IV of Gulliver's Travels. The long paragraph, in which he describes his encounter
with the Yahoos as well as the circumstances leading up to it, illustrates the climax of
his Anglocentric views, after which his English pride begins to gradually degenerate and
his desire to emulate the Houyhnyms arises. His English pride in this paragraph is
demonstrated by his resolution to trade his life with the local "Savages" using "Toys" as
his only means, his judgment of the Yahoo's lack of comprehensive language ability, and
his ever-present disgust for bodily functions. 
As the passage opens, Gulliver considers his situation and decides "to deliver [himself]
to the first Savages [he] should meet; and purchase [his] life from them by some
Bracelets, Glass Rings and other Toys, which Sailors usually provide themselves with in
those Voyages." Despite all his previous voyages in which Gulliver encountered people who
were not at all savage (and possibly more civilized than him), he automatically assumes
again that people in territories outside of Europe will be inherently savage. Not only
does he underestimate their level of civilization, but he then proceeds to assume that
the Native people will be intellectually inferior when he believes he can buy his life
with what he himself refers to as "Toys." Gulliver's belief, however, is not completely
grounded in arrogance because imperialistic powers did trade cheap jewelry with the
Native Americans for furs or even land. Using this logic, Gulliver feels he can extend
trading "Toys" for life. He feels that if they are dumb enough to trade furs for glass
rings, it is likely that he can guarantee his life in the same manner--that his life can
be traded for something so insignificant. Due to his sense of Enlightenment superiority,
Gulliver does not even entertain the possibility that his life actually is as
insignificant as the Toys which he plans on trading for it. Ironically, as his pride
degenerates into a hatred for his own race, Gulliver indeed starts to believe in the
insignificance of human life.
After Gulliver considers his options, he inspects the island and observes a species of
animals whom he likens at different points in the paragraph to goats, squirrels,
monsters, cattle and beasts. It is no wonder then, that later when Gulliver reveals that
these creatures are human beings, that his reader is surprised. He describes their shapes
as "Singular and deformed….their Skins were of a brown Buff colour." Perhaps one
reason Gulliver does not initially see any resemblance between himself and the Yahoos is
because they are not white; perhaps his Anglocentric ideal does not permit any color but
white to be acknowledged as his equal. What seems certain, however, is the fact that
Gulliver feels an immediate antipathy to the Yahoos because they show no indication of
having a rational language. In watching them, he does not see them speak to each other
and this alienates him because as we see in each voyage, it is imperative to Gulliver
that he learn the language of the peoples he encounters, from the Lilliputians to the
Brobdingnagians. As with all his journeys, he wants to find inhabitants that he may
converse with but when he sees no sign of a language, he feels helpless and cannot then
put the Yahoos in his frame of reference. Language is a tool Gulliver uses to maintain a
sense of security, something that he equates to rationality and thus, to himself. In
order to trade his life for toys, he needs to be able to communicate with the inhabitants
but these creature seem to Gulliver to be beyond savage. When, he strikes a Yahoo with a
hanger and the creature reacts by "[roaring] so loud, that a Herd [flocks] about
[him]…howling and making odious Faces," Gulliver decides that this a truly
irrational and repulsive species. When he first encounters the two Houyhnhnms, however,
he is impressed by their seeming language ability and their behavior (their striking of
hooves like the shaking of hands) and concludes that they must be "orderly and rational."
Thus Gulliver separates himself from the language-less barbarian Yahoos and resolves to
learn the language of the Houyhnhnms. It is interesting to note that he learns to
understand their "graceful and significant" language in ten weeks, and in three months
can speak enough to answer his "Master's" questions, whereas it took much less time to
learn the languages of the other islands. This indicates that he exalts the language of
the Houyhnhnms more than any of the other foreign languages he has learned in his
voyages. 
Finally, the most memorable part of the passage seems to be that in which the Yahoos
strike at Gulliver's vulnerability: his disgust for bodily functions, particularly
excrement. As the stricken Yahoo signals the other Yahoos, they crowd around him, jumping
into the tree, "from whence they discharge their Excrements on [his] head." The Yahoos do
not just relieve themselves on Gulliver but they do so on his head, the source of
Gulliver's Enlightened brain, the source of his rationality. Thus, not only are they are
a threat to his rationality mentally because they have no coherent language but they a
threat to his rationality physically as well because they literally dump their dung on
it. Furthermore, this gesture of the Yahoos causes great shame because it is as if they
seem to mistake Gulliver for one of their own, in effect, initiating him into their
species. Dropping excrement is not an uncommon thing to do among Yahoos as the they
perform this ritual on the "Favourite" of the "Ruling Yahoo" when he chooses a new
"Favourite." Mistaken for a Yahoo causes Gulliver such discomfort that he considers them
to be the lowest form of life and sets himself as far apart as he can from them. Gulliver
was taught, in an Anglocentric society, to believe that bodily functions are embarrassing
and shameful. We see this all throughout the novel, from when Gulliver is ashamed of his
abundant pile of excrement to when he wears it on his head. Excrement almost seems to
function as a symbol of man's evils. It is what he needs to dispose of or it will consume
him in the same way that evil will. Gulliver does not accept it as a part of nature. His
pride and rationality are so threatened by the Yahoos that he cannot acknowledge the
Yahoos as forerunners of his kinsmen even though they are a lowly version of himself.
This dislike for the Yahoos later turns into a denouncement of his species but even
though he is not proud of his humanity, he is still proud. Gulliver considers himself
better than all other Yahoos because of his knowledge from the Houyhnhnms. The excrement
itself is not the reason behind his pride. Nobody would want to be covered in it. The
excrement, however, is the major foundation for Gulliver's loathing for the Yahoos and he
would not have been so affected by it had he not lived in a society which is ashamed of
its natural processes. 
In his novel, Swift does not use the Yahoos to show the evil of man but rather, to show
the potential for evil that man has. Gulliver, however, takes his notions of judgment,
and presupposes his intellectual superiority which feels he confirms based on the Yahoos'
lack of language and their not-so-warmhearted welcome. As he gradually begins to believe
that all humans are at the Yahoo level, however, his Anglocentric pride fades. Thus, this
passage is effectively the last time we really see Gulliver act on his presupposed
English notions.