If people want the native (den Inlander) in general to share in Western civilization, then one should guard against fostering imitation-Europeans [imitatie], hybrids with no inner strength, useless in the Netherlands as in the East-Indies itself. . . . What the Indies needs is not a generation of imitation-Europeans, but of developed natives who along with a broad knowledge of the old Indies civilization and culture have learned as much as possible from Western culture, who would appreciate its benefits without losing contact with their own people.

Ann Laura Stoler, Along the Archival Grain_ E…, loc. 660