olonialism’s Oiifatire ae 4 hea x? _ @ Study in Black and White — Anthropology, Travel and Government NICHOLAS THOMAS Colonialism’s Culture Frontispiece J. W. Lindt, Aboriginal man, c.1873 Colonialism’s Culture Anthropology, Travel and Government Nicholas Thomas Princeton University Press Princeton, New Jersey First published in 1994 by Polity Press in association with Blackwell Publishers Copyright © 1994 by Princeton University Press Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540 All Rights Reserved \ ISBN 0-691-03732-9 ISBN 0-691-03731-0 (pbk) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress Typeset in 11 on 12.5 pt. Baskerville Princeton University Press books are printed on acid-free paper and meet the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources http://pup.princeton.edu Printed in the United States of America LOO Be Wee iror Saas enol LOO RS 2G S432 Contents List of Illustrations vii Preface ix Introduction 1 From Present to Past: the Politics of Colonial Studies 11 2 Culture and Rule: Theories of Colonial Discourse a) 3 From Past to Present: Colonial Epochs, Agents, and Locations 66 4 Colonial Governmentality and Colonial Conversion 105 5 Imperial Triumph, Settler Failure 143 6 The Primitivist and the Postcolonial 170 Notes 196 Notes to Plates 2a) Index 235 for Julian Thomas and Jeannine Jacobson List of Illustrations Frontispiece. J. W. Lindt, Aboriginal man. Albumen print, c.1873. Courtesy of the Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney Plate 1 Furniture from Artikeln, published in The Good Weekend, 1 September 1990, pp. 84-5. Photograph by Brendan Read, courtesy of the John Fairfax Group 29 Plate 2. Thomas Andrew, “The Vanquished’, ¢.1894. Courtesy of the Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney 34 Plate 3. ‘Mosque at Lucknow’. Aquatint after Henry Salt, in Twenty-four views taken in St Helena, the Cape, India, Ceylon, the Red Sea, Abyssinia and Egypt (London: William Miller, 1809). Courtesy of the South Australian Branch of the Royal Geographical Society and the State Library of South Australia 55 Plate 4 Detail from ‘The great bull, a Hindoo Idol, at Tanjore’, 1798. Aquatint by Thomas and William Daniell after Thomas Daniell, in Onental Scenery (London: ‘Boydell, 1797-1810), ii, plate 22. Courtesy of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library 56 Plate 5 Hudson Lagusu demonstrates use of the sacrificial altar. From Geoffrey M. White, Jdentity through History: Living Traditions in a Solomon Island Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), plate 2 62 Plate 6 ‘A Javan of the lower class’. From Thomas Stamford Raffles, The History ofJ ava (London: Black, Vili List of Illustrations Parbury and Allen, 1817). Courtesy of the Australian National University Library 87 Plate 7 ‘A Papuan or native of New Guinea, 10 years old’. From Thomas Stamford Raffles, The History ofJ ava (London: Black, Parbury and Allen, 1817). Courtesy of the Australian National University Library 88 Plate 8 ‘A Study in Black and White’. Crown Studios postcard, ¢.1908. Courtesy of the Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney 130 Plate 9 ‘Rev. J. F. Goldie with some of the first Converts, Rubiana, Solomon Islands’. Australasian Methodist Missionary Review, 4 February 1908. Courtesy of the Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney 132 Plate 10 Book spine from Henry M. Stanley, Jn Darkest Africa (London: Sampson Low, 1890). Courtesy of the Australian National University Library 135 Plate 11 Tracey Moffatt. Some Lads II. 1986. Gelatin silver photograph, 45.7 X 45.7cm. Kodak (Australasia) Pty Ltd Fund 1987. Collection: Australian National Gallery, Canberra. Reproduced by permission of Tracey Moffatt and the Australian National Gallery, Canberra 193,