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Danling Ye
English 137H
Dr. Mary Miles
October 10, 2013
Shooting an Elephant: Imperialism and Dehumanization
Most people respect police officers. Citizens believe in the judgment of authority
figures and fear the consequences of angering those in power. However, in the 1920s, the
Burmese insulted the Imperial Police Force and hated their interference, at least
according to George Orwell in Shooting An Elephant. In his essay, Orwell describes a
seemingly small incident and connects it to imperialism as a whole. Orwell searches for
an elephant that has been ravaging a village and finds a trampled corpse. He asks for a
rifle to protect himself, and the Burmese assume that he will shoot the elephant. Orwell
kills the elephant despite his qualms against doing so because he fears the laughter of the
people he supposedly has control over. Though scholars differ on whether Orwell
actually shot an elephant during his time in Burma, Orwell did experience the brutality of
colonialism first-hand as an imperial police officer. In Shooting An Elephant, Orwell
argues that imperialism dehumanizes all parties involved through his portrayal of the
Burmese, himself, and the elephant.
Though Orwell sympathizes with the Burmese, he still depicts them as less than
human. On many occasions, he refers to their yellow faces, reducing a crowd of
thousands of individuals to a bunch of faces, indistinguishable from each other. The
adjective yellow separates the Burmese from their white conquerors, further
dehumanizing the indigenous population by placing them in a separate category, apart
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from their fellow white humans. Orwell states that a white man mustnt be frightened in
front of natives and refers to the Burmese as natives on multiple occasions. When
used in the context of his essay, native has a negative connotation, indicating that the
Burmese are viewed as backward and primitive while implying that the British are
superior. By using language that degrades the Burmese, Orwell appeals to the pathos of
his Eurocentric audience. People tend to feel alienated from others different from
themselves, and Orwells audience is no exception. Orwell allows his readers to feel
emotionally distant from the hideous nature of imperialism, emphasizing the debasing
nature of the enterprise.
Orwell portrays himself as incapable of escaping the mask he wears as an
imperial police officer. He develops his ethos by framing his essay as an account of his
first-hand experience in Burma; Orwell the narrator has matured since his time as an
imperialist. He recalls that when faced with a choice whether to shoot the elephant or
not Orwell was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow
faces behind. Despite the power inherent in his position, Orwell felt that he lost the
power to decide what to do in a given situation. He realizes that [the imperialist]
becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy instead of a human with real agency. Orwell
implies that he did not start out as a dummy, but rather became hollow through his
experiences. By having to suppress other human beings, the imperialist loses his own
self. He puts on a mask, claiming that despotism is democratic, that slowly eats away his
humanity, leaving behind nothing but an empty shell. Reflecting back on the incident,
Orwell decides, I was very glad that the coolie had been killed; it put me legally in the
right, which serves as an appeal to logos. Orwell should be glad that he did the right
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thing according to the law; however, Orwell had moral qualms about killing the elephant
because his own moral code differed from the one he had to adopt as an imperialist. He
shows the logical contradiction inherent in imperialism wrong becomes right in the
eyes of the law which dehumanizes those involved by muddling their ability to judge
right from wrong. The governments laws become a source of oppression instead of
freedom because they do not protect the welfare of the imperialist, who is allowed to act
in unethical ways with impunity yet cannot act according to his own moral judgment.
The character of the elephant demonstrates the destructive nature of imperialism.
The man the elephant trampled is described as lying with arms crucified and head
sharply twisted to one sidewith an expression of unendurable agony (Orwell). The
vivid image appeals to pathos of the audience, utilizing peoples natural inclination to
dislike horrific deaths to show the hurtful effects of imperialism. The corpse is portrayed
as a crucified figure, a sacrificial lamb given up as atonement for the sins of imperialism.
The death of the man was dehumanizing because he died without dignity; he was
trampled by the elephants foot, the lowest part of the elephants body. The portrayal of
the elephants misdemeanor shows how painful imperialism can be.
Orwells portrayal of the elephants death also appeals to pathos. If British
imperialism did not exist, the elephant would not have died because none of the Burmese
had weapons capable of killing the elephant. However, imperialism makes it possible for
the elephant to die very slowly and in great agony with tortured gasps. Moreover,
Orwell writes, it seemed dreadful to see the great beast lying there, powerless to move
and yet powerless to die, and not even to be able to finish him. His description of the
dying elephant shows how imperialism renders a person helpless over a situation he
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supposedly has power over; Orwell is incapable of hastening the elephants fate in the
same way that the elephant is incapable of moving or dying. Orwell cannot stand to
watch the elephant die and walks away from the scene, demonstrating the extent of the
elephants pain. The elephants inhumane death elucidates how imperialism places
individuals in a situation that allows them to witness horrors. Though the elephant is not
dehumanized, his treatment shows the dehumanization of the individuals watching his
death; Orwell has no power over his situation and the Burmese act like a mob of faceless
individuals, excited to see the death of the elephant.
Shooting an Elephant can be viewed as a cathartic essay, written by Orwell to
absolve himself of the sins he committed while acting on behalf of the English empire. It
is a confession that warns others with imperialistic motivations. By dehumanizing others
that are inherently equal, an imperialist ends up dehumanizing himself. However,
Shooting an Elephant is more than a condemnation of imperialism in a far away country,
it is also a condemnation of peoples fear of looking a fool. Orwell became the
murderer of an elephant to escape the laughter of the Burmese in much the same way that
students in a college campus will go along with their friends and get drunk at a party or
bully another individual to protect themselves from the scorn of their peers. The fear of
how one appears in front of others ultimately forces one to put on a mask to reflect
societal expectations, stripping a persons true identity as the face conforms to fit the
mask. Shooting an Elephant is a stark warning: action will define you, slowing molding
your identity into a grotesque contortion of your former self, solely to avoid looking a
fool.

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Works Cited
"How a Nation Is Exploited ? The British Empire in Burma." The Orwell Prize. N.p., n.d.
Web. 09 Oct. 2013.
"Native." The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. 4th ed. N.p.:
Houghton Mifflin, 2009. The Free Dictionary. Web.
Orwell, George. "Shooting an Elephant." Shooting an Elephant. N.p.: Penguin Limited,
2003. N. pag. Print.
Perlez, Jane. "In Myanmar Outpost, a Fading Orwellian Link." New York Times. N.p., 23
May 2013. Web. 8 Oct. 2013.
Tyner, James A. "Landscape and the Mask of Self in George Orwell's ?Shooting an
Elephant?." Wiley Online Library. N.p., 30 Aug. 2005. Web. 7 Oct. 2013.