The late 19th and early 20th centuries marked a period of empire building for much of Europe. In Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad addresses a specific problem of European hegemony: the treatment of natives. Critics accuse Conrad of having colonial prejudices in his writings, stereotyping "savage" natives and glorifying "benevolent" Europeans. Indeed, Conrad's main character and alter ego, Marlow, initially views the natives as inferior to Europeans, but this was the commonly accepted anthropological view at the time. In order to be racist in a more useful sense, Marlow and Conrad must defend the supposedly natural right of Europeans to dominate an inferior race throughout the novel. As Marlow's journey down the river progresses, Conrad does the opposite. It depicts the natives as mistreated by their colonial conquerors. Conrad shows that he is not racist by creating a progression of his protagonist in which subtle irony and the motif of restraint differentiate the natives from the Europeans. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Initially, Marlow thinks that the African natives are inferior to the European settlers. Marlow reveals his racist position in his many descriptions of the natives. He calls them “niggers,” “savages,” “creatures,” and “prehistoric.” Such language is certainly insensitive to ethnicity. Additionally, Marlow rarely refers to the natives as human or gives them human qualities. In fact, Marlow sees them as having more in common with jungle animals than with humans. He describes one of these “creatures” as walking on all fours, like an animal. Marlow is particularly condescending in his description of the savage who serves as fireman on the steamboat. Marlow describes him as an “improved specimen” (Conrad 109) compared to the other “specimens” who walk on all fours. Marlow again reduces the native by giving him animal characteristics by stating that watching the fireman "was as edifying as seeing a dog in a parody of breeches and feather hat, walking on its hind legs" (109). Marlow reduces the role of the natives to that of trained animals. Marlow seems to believe that, just like a trained dog, the natives are incapable of thinking higher and doing meaningful work. Marlow summarizes his beliefs with the statement: "He was there beneath me" (109), meaning not only that the fireman was physically below him on the boat, but that he was also below him physically. racial. However, through a series of discoveries, Marlow's beliefs slowly change. Conrad contrasts the restraint of the natives with the excesses of the Europeans. As Marlow travels down the river, he encounters many European settlers and many natives. These meetings allow him to make judgments on the behavior and righteousness of each of these peoples. Marlow discovers that although, at first glance, the natives do not possess many of the physical characteristics of European dignity, they surpass the Europeans in their moral restraint. One such group of natives encountered are the cannibals who work on Marlow's steamboat. Although they are certainly short on provisions, they do not resort to the food of crew members to feed their primal instincts. Marlow “looks at them as you would any human being, with a curiosity about their impulses, their motivations, their abilities, their weaknesses, when put to the test of necessity.