HIS 640/HIS 645 Gender, Sexuality and Imperialism
Kenneth J. Orosz Office Hours: W 9:00-12:00
Spring 2011 R 3:05-4:00
Class Meetings: Classroom Bldg C204 Office: Classroom Bldg C230
R 4:30-7:10 Telephone: 878-3203
E-mail: oroszkj@buffalostate.edu
Course Description
This course will examine the role and impact of western and indigenous women in colonial societies. Topics include the Destructive Female and Black Peril myths, miscegenation, constructions of gender and sexuality and their uses, women as agents of political, social and cultural reform/reaction, and women in anti-colonial resistance movements.
Requirements:
Academic misconduct (including cheating and plagiarism) will not be tolerated. Buffalo State College policies on academic misconduct, including the possible use of textual similarity detection software, are outlined on page 29 of the college catalog. Please note that the minimum penalty for cases of academic misconduct will be an F on the assignment.
Please note that in order to pass this course you must make a good faith attempt to complete all components and requirements. LATE WORK WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED WITHOUT PRIOR ARRANGEMENT. Incompletes will be granted at the sole discretion of the instructor and require a written application outlining the rationale behind granting the incomplete, a list of outstanding assignments and a timetable for their completion. This application must be signed and, if granted, will constitute a formal contract for the completion of the course.
All written assignments must conform to the broad stylistic guidelines outlined in the History Style Sheet. When it comes to citation and bibliography formats, Turabian’s Manual for Writers of Research Papers, Thesis and Dissertations 7th ed. is the bible for historians. The rules spelled out in her manual are simple and easy to understand. Come see me if you have questions regarding citation format, presentation of quotations, or other writing concerns.
30% Discussion: Regular attendance and active participation in weekly class discussions is required. As part of their discussion grade, all students will be required to prepare and lead at least one class discussion of the assigned readings. These readings, which are to be completed by the dates given, include required texts, journal articles, and selected book chapters. Most journal articles can be accessed through the library’s electronic databases; highlighted readings are available in Angel under the Lessons tab.
20% Précis: Students will write eight 2-3 page précis analyzing weekly assigned texts. Each précis should identify the main thesis of the work(s) in question and outline the key arguments/pieces of evidence used in advancing that thesis. It may also include a description of the work’s ideological orientation and its contributions to the larger historiography of imperialism. A précis thus provides its reader with a brief summary of a larger work. While the choice of which works to write your précis on are up to you, each précis is due in class on the day that the work in question is scheduled for discussion. Hence, if you are writing on Hyam, that précis would be due in class on February 3.
50% Historiographical Essay: Students will write a 20 page historiographical essay on a self-chosen topic that is germane to the course. These essays should analyze the evolution of historical thinking on your chosen topic, identifying key historical camps and their arguments, shifts in interpretation, methodologies, sources. Topics must be chosen by March 3 with a preliminary bibliography to follow by March 24. The essay itself is due in class on May 12.
Books: The following books are required reading and are available in the bookstore:
Janice Boddy, Civilizing Women: British Crusades in Sudan 0-691-12305-5
Antoinette Burton, Burdens of History 0-807-84471-3
Chaudhuri and Strobel, Western Women and Imperialism* 0-253-20705-3*
Lisa Chilton, Agents of Empire 0-802-09474-0
Ronald Hyam, Empire and Sexuality 0-719-02505-2
Tabitha Kanogo, African Womanhood in Colonial Kenya 0-821-41568-9
Patricia Romero, Women’s Voices on Africa 1-558-76048-2
Angela Woolacott, Gender and Empire 0-333-92645-2
*Full text version available electronically through Buffalo State College library catalog.
Suggested Background Reading:
D. K. Fieldhouse, The European Colonial Empires**
Piers Brendon, Decline and Fall of the British Empire**
Robert Aldrich, Greater France**
Scott Cook, Colonial Encounters in the Age of High Imperialism **
Woodruff Smith, The German Colonial Empire
**On reserve in the library
Class Schedule
January 27 Introduction and Imperialism Overview
February 3 Women and Downfall of empire
Hyam, Empire and Sexuality
M.T. Berger, “Imperialism and Sexual Exploitation: A Review Article,” Journal
of Imperial and Commonwealth History 17,1 (October 1988): 83-89.
Ronald Hyam, “Imperialism and Sexual Exploitation: A Reply,” Journal of
Imperial and Commonwealth History 17, 1 (October 1988): 90-98.
February 10 Constructing Gender
Woolacott, Gender and Empire
Catherine Hall, “Of Gender and Empire: Reflections on the 19th Century,” in
Gender and Empire, ed. Philippa Levine (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 46-76.
February 17 Constructing Gender II
Mrinilinha Sinha, Colonial Masculinity [On reserve in library]
Frank Proschan, “Eunuch Mandarins, Soldats Mamzelles, Effeminate Boys, and
Graceless Women: French Colonial Constructions of Vietnamese Genders,” GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 8, 4 (2002): 435-467.
Keith Breckenridge, “The Allure of Violence: Men, Race and Masculinity in the
South African Goldmines 1900-1950,” Journal of Southern African Studies 24, 4 (December 1998): 669-693.
February 24 Imperialism, Sexual Opportunity, and the “Black Peril”
Mrinilini Sinha, “Chathams, Pitts and Gladstones in Petticoats,” in Western
Women and Imperialism, ed. Chaudhuri and Strobel, 98-118
Jeremy Rich, “Une Bablyone Noire: Interracial Unions in Colonial Libreville, c.
1860-1914,” French Colonial History 4 (2003):145-169.
David M. Anderson, “Sexual Threat and Settler Society: “Black Perils’ in Kenya,
c. 1907-1930,” Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History 38, 1 (March 2010): 47-74
Pamela Scully, “Rape, Race and Culture: The Sexual Politics of Identity in the
19th Century Cape Colony, South Africa,” American Historical Review 100, 2 (April 1995): 335-359.
Krista O’Donnell, “Poisonous Women: Sexual Danger, Illicit Violence and
Domestic Work in German Southern Africa, 1904-1915,” Journal of Women’s History 11, 3 (Autumn 1999): 31-54.
Philippa Levine, “A Multitude of Unchaste Women: Prostitution in the British
Empire,” Journal of Women’s History 15, 4 (2004) 159-163.
Richard Philips, “Imperialism and the Regulation of Sexuality: Colonial
Legislation on Contagious Diseases and Ages of Consent,” Journal of Historical Geography 28, 3 (July 2002): 339-362.
March 3 Imperialism and Homosexuality
Ross Forman, “Randy on the Rand: Portuguese African Labor and the Discourse
on ‘Unnatural Vice’ in the Transvaal in the early 20th Century,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 11, 4 (October 2002): 570-609.
Frank Proschan, “Syphilis, Opiomania and Pederasty: Colonial Constructions of
Vietnamese (and French) Social Diseases,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 11, 4 (October 2002): 610-636.
Hike Schmidt, “Colonial Intimacy: the Rechenberg Scandal and Homosexuality in
German East Africa,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 17, 1 (January 2008): 25-59.
Daniel J. Walther, “Racializing Sex: Same-Sex Relations, German Colonial
Authority and Deutschtum” Journal of the History of Sexuality 17, 1 (January 2008): 11-24.
Colette Colligan, “A Race of Born Pederasts: Sir Richard Burton, Homosexuality
and the Arabs” Nineteenth Century Contexts 25, 1 (2003): 1-20.
Charu Gupta, “(Im)possible Love and Sexual Pleasure in Late Colonial North
India” Modern Asian Studies 36, 1 (February 2002): 195-221.
March 10 Female Explorers and Travelers
Patricia Romero, Women’s Voices on Africa
Susan Blake, “A Woman’s Trek: What Difference does Gender Make?” in
Western Women and Imperialism, ed. Chaudhuri and Strobel, 19-34.
Mervat Hatem, “Through Each Other’s Eyes: the Impact on the Colonial
Encounter of the Images of Egyptian, Levantine-Egyptian and European Women (1862-1920)” in Western Women and Imperialism, ed. Chaudhuri and Strobel, 35-60.
Julia Clancy-Smith, “The Passionate Nomad Reconsidered,” in Western
Women and Imperialism, ed. Chaudhuri and Strobel, 61-78.
March 17 Colonial Wives, Administrators and Agents
Helen Callaway and Dorthy Helly, Crusader for Empire,” Chaudhuri and Strobel,
Western Women and Imperialism, 79-97.
Barbara Ramusack, “Cultural Missionaries, Maternal Imperialists and Feminist
Allies,” in Chaudhuri and Strobel, Western Women and Imperialism, 119-136.
Nancy Paxton, Complicty and Resistance in the Writings of Annie Steel and
Annie Besant,” in Chaudhuri and Strobel, Western Women and Imperialism, 158-176.
Dea Birkett, “The ‘White Woman’s Burden’ in the ‘White Man’s Grave,’” in
Chaudhuri and Strobel, Western Women and Imperialism, 177-190.
Nupur Chaudhuri, “Shawls, Jewelry, Curry and Rice in Victorian Britain,” in
Chaudhuri and Strobel, Western Women and Imperialism, 231-246.
Karen Tranberg-Hansen, “White Women in a Changing World: Employment,
Voluntary Work and Sex,” in Chaudhuri and Strobel, Western Women and Imperialism, 247-268.
Janice Brownfoot, “Memsahibs in Colonial Malaysia: A Study of European
Wives in a British Colony and Protectorate, 1900-1916,” in The Incorporated Wife ed, Hillary Callan and Shirley Ardener (London: Croom Helm, 1984), 186-210.
March 24 Indigenous Women and Imp
Kanogo, African Womanhood
Padma Anagol, “Indian Christian Women and Indigenous Feminism c. 1850-c.
1920,” in Gender and Imperialism , ed. Clare Midgley (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998), 79-103.
March 31 No class - Spring Break
April 7 Female Emigration
Lisa Chilton, Agents of Empire
Marie-Paule Ha, “La Femme Française aux Colonies: Promoting Colonial Female
Emigration at the Turn of the Century” French Colonial History 6 (2005) 205-224.
April 14 Domesticity and Imperialism
Micheline Lessard, “Civilizing Women: French Colonial Perceptions of
Vietnamese Womanhood and Motherhood” in Women and the Colonial Gaze, ed Tamara Hunt and Micheline Lessard, (NYU Press, 2002), 148-161.
Samuel Thomas, “Transforming the Gospel of Domesticity: Luhya Girls and the
Friends Africa Mission, 1917-1926,” African Studies Review 43, 2 (September 2000): 1-28.
Susan Zlotnick, “Domesticating Imperialism: Curry and Cookbooks in Victorian
England,” Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s Studies 16, 2-3 (1996): 51-68.
Nancy Rose Hunt, “‘Le Bebe en Brousse’: European Women, African Birth
Spacing, and Colonial Intervention in Breast Feeding in Belgian Congo,” International Journal of African historical Studies 21, 3 (1988): 401-432.
Kathleen Sheldon, “I Studied with the Nuns, Learning to Make Blouses: Gender
Ideology and Colonial Education in Mozambique,” International Journal of African Historical Studies 31, 3 (1998): 595-925.
Deborah Gaitskell, “Housewives, Maids or Mothers: Some Contradictions of
Domesticity for Christian Women in Johannesburg, 1903-1939,” Journal of African History 24, 2 (1983): 241-256.
April 21 Missions, Reform and Cultural Imp
Janice Boddy, Civilizing Women: British Crusades in Colonial Sudan
Lata Mani, “Contentious Traditions: The Debate on Sati in Colonial India,”
Cultural Critique 7 (fall 1987): 119-156
Sylvia Jacobs, “Give a Thought to Africa: Black Women Missionaries in Southern
Africa,” in Chaudhuri and Strobel, Western Women and Imperialism, 207-231.
Rita Smith Kipp, “Emancipating Each Other: Dutch Colonial Missionaries’
Encounter with Karo Women in Sumatra 190-1942,” in Clancy-Smith and Gouda, Domesticating the Empire, 211-235.
April 28 No class - work on papers
May 5 Feminism and Imperialism
Burton, Burdens of History
Clare Midgley, “Anti-Slavery and the Roots of Imperial Feminism,” in Gender
and Imperialism , ed. Clare Midgley (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998), 161-179.
Barbara Bush, “‘Britain’s Conscience on Africa’: White Women, Race and
Imperial politics in inter-war Britain,” in Gender and Imperialism , ed. Clare Midgley (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1998), 200-223.
May 12 Women, Gender and anti-Colonial Resistance
Luise White, “Separating the Men from the Boys: Constructions of Gender,
Sexuality, and Terrorism in Central Kenya 1939-1959,” International Journal of African Historical Studies 23,1 (1990): 1-25
Partha Chaterjee, “Colonialism, Nationalism, and Colonialized Women: The
Contest in India,” American Ethnologist 16, 4 (Nov 1989): 622-633.
Cora Ann Presley, “The Mau Mau Rebellion, Kikuyu Women and Social change”
Canadian Journal of African Studies 22, 3 (1988): 502-527.
Suruchi Thapar-Bjorket, “The Domestic Sphere as a Political Site: A Study of
Women in the Indian Nationalist Movement,” Women’s Studies International Forum 20, 4 (July 1997) 493-515.
Frances Gouda, “Militant Masculinity and Female Agency in Indonesian
Nationalism, 1945-1949,” in Colonialism and the Modern World, ed. Gregory Blue, Martin Bunton and Ralph Croizier (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2002), 200-216.
Historiographical Essay Due