Reading Fanon’s “On National Culture” made me rethink what culture actually means under oppression. Instead of seeing culture as something fixed in the past songs, myths, or traditions. Fanon frames it as something that grows out of struggle and action. His description of the three phases of the native intellectual feels especially powerful because it mirrors a journey from imitation to awakening. At first, the colonized intellectual copies European styles to gain legitimacy, but this only deepens their sense of alienation. In the second phase, they turn back to memories and legends, trying to recover a lost identity, yet even this can feel artificial because it is filtered through colonial ways of thinking. It is only in the final “fighting phase” that culture becomes truly alive when art and writing are no longer about nostalgia but about mobilizing people and shaping a collective future. This makes culture less about preservation and more about responsibility. What stood out most to me is Fanon’s warning against treating tradition as something sacred and untouchable. He argues that clinging to “mummified” customs can turn culture into a kind of performance rather than a living force. Real national culture, for Fanon, can only exist through national liberation, because without political freedom, culture cannot renew itself or speak honestly to people’s conditions. I also found his critique of broad racial or continental identities convincing, while movements like Negritude were important, they could not fully address the specific realities of different nations. In the end, Fanon’s idea of a “new humanism” feels both hopeful and demanding. He challenges formerly colonized societies not just to reject European imitation, but to invent something new, an identity and culture rooted in their own struggles and future possibilities. This reflection makes culture feel less like inheritance and more like something we could build together.