Anglais

To what extent did the British Empire pave the way to the current multicultural British?

The preview : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFJe9sZ5ovU&t=476s

- AGRA 1887
- Britain has formally ruled India for 29 years
- Abdul bumped into an English soldier and was called “idiot”
- The governor general / mohars (ceremonial coin) => royal jubilee
- They chose Mr. Karim because he is the tallest
- India is British (Queen Victoria => the queen of India as well)
- Prejudice: Indians are tall
- Mohammed’s point of view=> barbaric, too cold
- Kevin’s and Karen’s point of view=> uneducated, not civilized, they need the
western’s help to be civilized
- Irony (you expect something to up but something else happens instead) =>

Intro: anfelito

We are gonna be focused on a movie = victoria and abdul

Storyline = we go back to 1887 when Britain formally ruled India for 29y. Abdul Karim arrives
from India to participate in Queen Victoria's golden jubilee. The both of them will forge an
unlikely and devoted alliance.

-> based on 10-minute review, we picked some moments that each one of us will talk, analyse…
and throughout those moments we will see how the british empire has changed compared to
how it was back then.
 - Raneem :

- This first scene that shows the contact between an indian and
an english man is our first impression of the relationship
between both cultures, which obviously isnt a very tolerant or
respectful one. Abdul goes on with a confused face and
brushes it off. This makes us believe that discrimination
happens on a regular basis for the indians, and as a
consequence they are unphased to such mockery.

5:34 => 6

- Sleeping on a white hammock / one is above the other like in a bunk

bed => Abdul is above Mohammed

Embarked a ship departing from the bombay port

Mohammed’s point of view :

- talks about the weather => “you know how cold it is in England ?
we’re gonna die there”
- “The tall one fell off an elephant , i wasn’t given the choice”
- “5 000 miles to present a bloody medal to the oppressors of the
entire indian subcontinent”
- “No they don’t eat pig’s blood”
- “They put pig’s blood in sausages”
- “This is completely barbaric”
Abdul’s point of view :
- “Why did you agree to come?”
- “You don’t realize what i a great honor this is for us”
- “Have you ever tasted English food , they eat pig’s blood”

- Mohammed knows more information about england than Abdul

- There is a contrast between these two indians
- One is very optimistic , happy and excited the other is quite
pessimistic and grumpy .
- Abdul is felicitous (he is tall ) , because he will meet the queen “You
don’t realize what i a great honor this is for us”
- Mohammed was obliged to come . In fact he “wasn’t given the
choice” In fact , he says “5 000 miles to present a bloody medal to
the oppressors of the entire indian subcontinent” = > He was
referring to the British Raj, which was the rule of the British Crown on
the Indian subcontinent from 1858 to 1947. The rule is also called
Crown rule of India.
- He then adds that The British are barbaric because they eat pig’s
blood. He could be either referring to blood sausage or to Black
pudding, a distinct regional type of sausage originating in Great
Britain and Ireland . It is made from pork or beef blood , with pork fat
or fat or beef suet , and a cereal , usually oatmeal , oat groats and
barley groats.
- Abdul defends the Brits , we could say that he is white-washed.

7:45=> 7:56

- “The hindus sir” => they are designed by their religion

- They are uncultivated because mohammed and abdul are muslim
names and not at all hindus name
- Also Abdul was praying at the beginning of the review
- For the brits all indians are hindus
 - “But they’re completely different sizes” => it feels like he wanted a
doll or something
- ABDUL is felicitous , the other one is quite short
- They are wearing a turban
- And are wearing an indian / british fusion type of attire

LEA: 1:48 => 2:32

- Abdul enters the Central Jail of Agra, written at the top of
the scene at 2:07. In this scene, people of Agra are sitting
on the floor, laying on the stairs and children in front of the
jail are playing together, which is an unusual spot where
children can have fun. At the bottom left, there is a soldier
interacting with the people on the stairs.
- While Abdul was walking in the hallway of the prison,
prisoners were seen on the ground with handcuffs on.
They might be waiting for their turn to work. Nonetheless,
the prisoners are mistreated. Abdul then enters a spot
where we can see two English soldiers who are chatting
around a table while the prisoners are working, fabricating
some sort of cloth. In the next scene, Abdul asks for the
name of a prisoner and writes it down. Abdul’s job is to
write down the name of the prisoners and then send them
to jail.
- Those scenes prove how the English empire was very
present in the roundabouts of India, as we saw in the city
of Agra, and how they impose their power forcefully. To
sum up those scenes, Indians citizens received bad
treatment, since they were seen as an ‘’uneducated’’
country and needed discipline.

Keyonx 1:05 →1:47

- The first scene of this preview starts with the phrase “based on
true events, mostly”. We suppose that the authenticity of this
 film stems from the the very real practice of discriminatory acts
that people of color, in this case the indians, had to face
regularly, especially during the 19th century where the very
dominant great britain colonized many third world countries,
such as india, which at the time presented in this movie has
been under the british rule for 29 years.
- What follows is a scene that puts the cultural/religious status of
india into context during the year of 1887. In the foreground, we
see our protagonist, Abdul, praying alone on top of a roof, with
a mosque in the background. This clearly indicates a very
dominant islamic importance for the natives to this country, as
well as the fact that they prove a necessity to keep their
traditions intact despite the western colonization.
- After having finished his prayers, the next 15 seconds of the
preview is dedicated to showing the conditions in which the
natives have been living though by following Abdul through a
narrow, crowded and dirty walkway in what we could presume
to be his hometown. This goes to show the very high poverty
rate that the British colonies were profiting off of to enforce
cheap labor.
- However, this scene also shows the vibrance of the Indian
culture, all the while showing traditional clothes worn by the
natives and the souq, where we see all different types of food
products, as well as living livestock like goats and sheep.
- Towards the end of this introduction scene, Abdul bumps into
an English soldier and gets called an idiot. Judging by the tone
of the soldier's voice, we’re given the impression that he is
making fun of the Indian accent. This first scene that shows the
contact between an indian and an english man is our first
impression of the relationship between both cultures, which
obviously isnt a very tolerant or respectful one. Abdul goes on
with a confused face and brushes it off. This makes us believe
that discrimination happens on a regular basis for the indians,
and as a consequence they are unphased to such mockery.
 JANA

6 min→ 7min 45

- In this scene we can see that Abdul Karim dans his

companion and co-worker arrive in England
- We can observe that as soon as they get out from the ship
Abdul and Muhammed are surprised and look everywhere
around them, because England is very different from India.
As if we gave them an utopian image of England
- The white man proudly shouts “civilization” which
implicitly means that in India people are note civilized,not
educated.
- We can also see that a tailor is making Abdul try on the
sash thinking that it is a traditional Indian dress. And abdul
affirms that it is not a traditional dress but the tailor replies
that the most important thing is to look authentic and that
the indian traditional dress didn't look very indian so they
made some “innovations” this clearly shows that the
english don’t care about how they look they just want the
tallest indian, and the more indian they look the better.
-
- 7min 56→ la fin

- In this scene Muhamed and Abdul are in the… palace?and they

seem very confused. They look strangely at the ceiling because
there are paintings on it whereas in India it is not the same thing
because it is a very different culture . They also look around
them since they are so confused.
- In this scene we can also realize that, again, the English want
Mohammed and Abdul to comply with their rules.
 - Also, when the servant explains to muhamed what to do, he tells
him that he has to show to victoria the tray,muhammed says i
thought it was a cushion.

conclusion: anfelito

To conclude, the British empire wasn't the same as it is now. They had poor
judgment and weren’t open minded. We could see that with how abdul and
his friend were treated. These scenes give us the perfect example of how
the British empire has evolved. The fundaments of the British empire have
proven to mold the very accepting current multicultural atmosphere present
in the uk today. Although their contact with the countries they’ve colonised
during their reign started fairly rough, it led to immigrants coming to the UK
and introducing their traditions to the Europeans. Over the past couple of
centuries, not only in the UK but people from all around the world have
learned to embrace each other’s cultural practices instead of being fearful
and hateful of them.