political, social, economic and cultural level. We have few studies tracing how these West and Central African medical practices were influenced in an epistemological sense by the importation of Western medicine distinct from colonialism more generally. We also know that there was a wilful dismissal of indigenous medical practices by Western medical
8 A sample of Italian Fascist colonialism: nursing and medical records in the Imperial War in Ethiopia (1935–36)1 Anna La Torre, Giancarlo Celeri Bellotti and Cecilia Sironi Introduction: historical background The Italo-Ethiopian War (also known as the Abyssinian War or the Second Italo-Ethiopian War) refers to an armed conflict waged by Italy during Mussolini’s regime against the Empire of Ethiopia in 1935, which led to the proclamation of Africa Orientale Italiana (Italian East Africa) in 1936.2 The history of Italian colonialism started approximately fifty
Movement ( Barnett, 2011 : 1). This system is the sphere where the arguments about respect for other cultures have their most detrimental impact on the gender-transformative potential of humanitarian action. Humanitarianism’s Relationship with Cultures Modern humanitarianism is bound together with colonialism and imperialism, shaped by Western, Christian values ( Davey et al. , 2013 ). Early humanitarianism embodied the salvation
This article explores the history of the Alexander Ecker Collection and situates it within the larger trajectory of global collecting of human remains during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. This is then linked to the specific context of the genocide in then German South West Africa (1904–8), with the central figure of Eugen Fischer. The later trajectory of the collection leads up to the current issues of restitution. The Freiburg case is instructive since it raises issues about the possibilities and limitations of provenance research. At the same time, the actual restitution of fourteen human remains in 2014 occurred in a way that sparked serious conflict in Namibia which is still on-going four years later. In closing, exigencies as well as pressing needs in connection with the repatriation and (where possible) rehumanisation of human remains are discussed.
This excerpt from James Baldwin: Living in Fire details a key juncture in Baldwin’s life, 1957–59, when he was transformed by a visit to the South to write about the civil rights movement while grappling with the meaning of the Algerian Revolution. The excerpt shows Baldwin understanding black and Arab liberation struggles as simultaneous and parallel moments in the rise of Third World, anti-colonial and anti-racist U.S. politics. It also shows Baldwin’s emotional and psychological vulnerability to repressive state violence experienced by black and Arab citizens in the U.S., France, and Algiers.
opposition to coloniality, even in the most ‘benign’ of research and policy areas, like international aid and humanitarianism. Coloniality can be understood as the perpetuation of colonial systems and technologies of domination into the present. As discussed by scholars such as Quijano, Grosfoguel, Dussel and Ndlovu-Gatsheni, the concept of decoloniality encourages systemic and historical analysis of the organised (re)production of injustice and mass human suffering. Formal colonialism (which arguably existed from 1492 to the 1960s) and transatlantic
The 1965 debate at Cambridge University between James Baldwin and William F. Buckley, Jr., posed the question: “Has the American Dream been achieved at the Expense of the American Negro?” Within the contours of the debate, Baldwin and Buckley wrestled with the ghosts of settler colonialism and slavery in a nation founded on freedom and equality. Framing the debate within the longue durée, this essay examines the deep cultural currents related to the American racial paradox at the height of the Civil Rights movement. Underscoring the changing language of white resistance against black civil rights, the essay argues that the Baldwin and Buckley debate anticipated the ways the U.S. would address racial inequality in the aftermath of the civil rights era and the dawn of neoliberalism in the 1970s.
This essay reviews Hilton Als’ 2019 exhibition God Made My Face: A Collective Portrait of James Baldwin at the David Zwirner Gallery. The show visually displays Baldwin in two parts: “A Walker in the City” examines his biography and “Colonialism” examines “what Baldwin himself was unable to do” by displaying the work of contemporary artists and filmmakers whose works resonate with Baldwin’s critiques of masculinity, race, and American empire. Mirakhor explores how Als’ quest to restore Baldwin is part of a long and deep literary and personal conversation that Als has been having since he was in his teens, and in this instance, exploring why and how it has culminated via the visual, instead of the literary. As Mirakhor observes, to be in the exhibit is not to just observe how Als has formed and figured Baldwin, but to see how Baldwin has informed and made Als, one of our most lyrical and impassioned contemporary writers and thinkers.
, requires a considered debate about data colonialism. Two further contributions engage with the specific field of medical humanitarianism. Jafar, in her op-ed, takes the example of medical documentation to reflect on the challenges that overseas medical teams face in acute emergencies. Issues around security, ownership and sharing are pivotal when having to make decisions about electronic records versus pen and paper – and much might be said for the former. In an interview with the editors
the age of data colonialism ( Couldry and Mejias, 2019 ). 5 Wearables are understood as a form of ‘techno-science’ that contributes to the production of legible, quantifiable and consumable bodies, and which makes possible ordering practices that are materially productive of aid, but which may also create new protection needs for the digital/physical beneficiary body ( Asdal et al. , 2007 ; Jacobsen and Sandvik, 2018 ). Little critical scholarly attention has been