I hate the argument that all cultures absorb external influences, not because it’s wrong, but because it often ignores nuance.

External influences absorbed through grassroots adoption and external influences being mandated top-down by a foreign conqueror aren’t the same, y’all.

For example:

Hira gasy performers wear clothing based on 19th century British uniforms & dresses.

The lambahoany sarong is likely an East African import.

The trano gasy architectural style is European influences layered over traditional Malagasy houses.

Those are the former.

Those weren’t mandated. Those were things that Malagasy people saw and liked, so we now have our own versions of those things.

On the other hand—do you have any idea how much of our oral traditions are missing because, during the French colonial era, only pre-colonial literature written by foreign visitors was allowed to record it? Many of our surviving angano (oral tales) only survive because…

… they were considered useful or at least non-dangerous for the purposes of Civilizing the Malagasy Savage.