Barbarians owe their name to the Greeks, who referred to them as "those who babble", ie, those who did not speak Greek and emitting sounds that sounded like bar, bar , bar . Βάρβαρος they called them; barbarus their heirs the Romans.
began as a pejorative term, its meaning has gotten worse over the centuries: first to define simply those who came from outside and did not speak the language, then, to refer to those without education, then to rate the invaders of successive empires, to today, which is the worst epithet that can be applied to any individual, country, culture, civilization as a whole.
And this is how the term "barbarian" is no longer used to define a more or less subjective to be used as "wildcard" to refer to everything bad that can happen to all the dangers lurk more across borders.
The problem is that this fixation on the dangers from outside and has blinded us from seeing the dangers from within, those who embody ourselves to ourselves and those around us: ignorance, bigotry , fear of the unknown, resistance to change, conservatism stale, if not clearly reactionary behavior.
Today I bring you two examples that literature has left us to masterfully illustrate the danger ourselves.
And both examples have the same title: waiting the barbarians.
One of JM Coetzee, the other of Konstantino Kavafis .
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| Duel with cudgels. Francisco de Goya. Museo del Prado |
• Waiting for the Barbarians . JM Coetzee, South African writer, Nobel Prize in Literature 2003. Ed Debolsillo . Madrid 2004. Novel written in 1980.
One day the Empire decided that the barbarians were a threat to its integrity.
came first to the border town police, who arrested especially those who were not barbarians but different. Tortured and murdered.
Then came the military. Many. Prepared to make heroic military campaigns.
The old magistrate of the place tried to make do with common sense that the barbarians had always been there and had never been a danger, they were nomads and they could not win battles, that the views they had on them were absurd ...
vain attempt. The judge only managed the prison and the people who had hailed the military when they arrived, his ruin.
• Waiting for the Barbarians. Konstantino Cavafy poem , Greek poet
- What do we gathered in a forum?
barbarians is to arrive today.
- Why such inaction in the Senate?
Why sit there without legislating the Senators?
Because the barbarians will arrive today.
What laws will make the Senators?
and legislators, when they arrive, the barbarians.
- Why did our emperor
and so early in his throne, at the gate of the city,
sitting, solemn, and girding his crown?
Because the barbarians will arrive today.
And the emperor waits to give his boss
welcome. Even prepared,
to deliver it, a scroll. It
many titles and honors have been written.
- Why have our two consuls and magistrates came today
red embroidered togas;
why are so many amethysts
bracelets and rings set with emeralds and sparkling;
why today wielding canes precious gold and silver
magnificently carved?
Because the barbarians will arrive today;
and entertainment and dazzle the barbarians.
- Why not come, as always, the distinguished speakers
to cast their speeches and tell her things?
Because today the barbarians will annoy them
eloquence and speeches.
- Why the confusion starts soon
and confusion? (How serious the faces have become!)
Why squares and streets emptied quickly
and pricked all go home?
Because it was night and the barbarians did not come.
Some have come
borders and told that the barbarians do not exist.
What will become of us now without barbarians?
These people, at last, after all, was a solution.
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two texts, one the review of the back of the novel, the other a complete poem, are the 
barbarians effect on our societies and our minds.
barbarians effect on our societies and our minds. entire works of Coetzee " question the apartheid regime of South African any form of racism, and explores its negative consequences for man and society".
writer not easy to read, especially in the topic it addresses, create awareness a situation that lived in first person and, fortunately, nowadays we consider being overcome.
Kavafis is not a poet too well known outside of Greece or literary fields.
His poem "Waiting for the Barbarians " allows many interpretations, especially when you consider his life story, poetry and politics.
Yesterday was South Africa, today there are other places waiting for the barbarians becomes an excuse.
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• Konstantino 100 poems of Cavafy . Coetzee
wikipedia 
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