Tracing the development of British colonial administration in West Africa over the course of the long eighteenth century, Caulker illuminates the solidification of the administration as it goes through a learning process of power. This book analyzes the documents and treaties that the indigenous peoples of eighteen-century Sierra Leone made with their future British colonizers, and compares them with the writings of Adam Smith to uncover a colonial philosophy linking European economic success with the process of civilizing Africa through moral education. A discussion of other archival materials demonstrates the ways that an emerging anthropological science and pseudo-scientific methodology contributed to colonial ventures and exploration. The book concludes with an analysis of the postcolonial novel The Last Harmattan of Alusine Dunbar, demonstrating that the study of this long eighteenth-century archive has as much to do with the present postcolonial era as it does with the period of African colonization.
Format:
CONTRIBUTORS: Tcho Mbaimba Caulker
EAN: 9780739127438
COUNTRY: United States
PAGES:
WEIGHT: 454 g
HEIGHT: 240 cm
PUBLISHED BY: Lexington Books
DATE PUBLISHED: 2009-03-16
CITY:
GENRE: HISTORY / Africa / General, HISTORY / Europe / Great Britain / General, LITERARY CRITICISM / African, LITERARY CRITICISM / European / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh
WIDTH: 162 cm
SPINE:
Book Themes:
Literature: history and criticism, European history, African history
In The African-British Long Eighteenth Century, Tcho Mbaimba Caulker has provided a vigorous study of the other side of the long eighteenth century, a history and culture beyond slavery, inside and outside empire. Delving deep into the often forgotten archive of Afri-British settlement in Sierra Leone, the author has written a work that will make Africa visible in the powerful narratives of modern identity on the colonial periphery. In this powerful book, Sierra Leone has found its rightful place in the narrative of the "Black Atlantic"., The African-British Long Eighteenth Century marks an important paradigm shift at the intersections of colonial history, postcoloninal theory, and eighteenth-century studies. Exploring the discursive and material colonization of Sierra Leone by the British from the eighteenth century to the present, via the study of literature, history, cartography, and postcolonial theory this book re-tells the story of British colonialism from the perspective of Sierra Leone.
Tcho Mbaimba Caulker is a scholar/practitioner-in-residence at the University of New Haven, CT.
