Critical Perspectives on Colonialism Writing the Empire from Below [Hardcover]

This collection brings much-needed focus to the vibrancy and vitality of minority and marginal writing about empire, and to their implications as expressions of embodied contact between imperial power and those negotiating its consequences from below. The chapters explore how less powerful and less privileged actors in metropolitan and colonial societies within the British Empire have made use of the written word and of the power of speech, public performance, and street politics. This book breaks new ground by combining work about marginalized figures from within Britain as well as counterparts in the colonies, ranging from published sources such as indigenous newspapers to ordinary and everyday writings including diaries, letters, petitions, ballads, suicide notes, and more. Each chapter engages with the methodological implications of working with everyday scribblings and asks what these alternate modernities and histories mean for the larger critique of the imperial archive that has shaped much of the most interesting writing on empire in the past decade.

Introduction  Fiona Paisley and Kirsty Reid  Part I: Writing Back to Colonial and Imperial Authority  1. Denouncing Americas Destiny: Sarah Winnemuccas Assault on U.S. Expansion  Frederick E. Hoxie  2. Chinese Warnings and White Mens Prophecies  Marilyn Lake  3. Orality and Literacy on the New York Frontier: Remembering Joseph Brant  Elizabeth Elbourne  Part II: Speech Acts  4. History Lessons in Hyde Park: Embodying the Australian Frontier in Interwar London  Fiona Paisley  5. Patriotic Complaints: Sailors Performing Petition in Early Nineteenth-Century Britain  Isaac Land  Part III: Mobilities  6. Zulu Sailors in the Steamship Elc†