Empire's Children: Race, Filiation, and Citizenship in the French Colonies Contributor(s): Saada, Emmanuelle (Author), Goldhammer, Arthur (Translator) |
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ISBN: 0226733076 ISBN-13: 9780226733074 Publisher: University of Chicago Press OUR PRICE: $107.91 Product Type: Hardcover - Other Formats Published: March 2012 |
Additional Information |
BISAC Categories: - Social Science | Anthropology - Cultural & Social - History | Africa - General - History | Asia - General |
Dewey: 305.805 |
LCCN: 2011032762 |
Physical Information: 344 pages |
Themes: - Cultural Region - African - Cultural Region - Asian - Cultural Region - French |
Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
Publisher Description: Europe's imperial projects were often predicated on a series of legal and scientific distinctions that were frequently challenged by the reality of social and sexual interactions between the colonized and the colonizers.When Emmanuelle Saada discovered a 1928 decree defining the status of persons of mixed parentage born in French Indochina--the m tis--she found not only a remarkable artifact of colonial rule, but a legal bombshell that introduced race into French law for the first time. The decree was the culmination of a decades-long effort to resolve the "m tis question" the educational, social, and civil issues surrounding the mixed population. Operating at the intersection of history, anthropology, and law, Empire's Children reveals the unacknowledged but central role of race in the definition of French nationality. Through extensive archival work in both France and Vietnam, and a close reading of primary and secondary material from the Pacific islands and sub-Saharan and North Africa, Saada has created in Empire's Children an original and compelling perspective on colonialism, law, race, and culture from the end of the nineteenth century until decolonization. |
Contributor Bio(s): Saada, Emmanuelle: - Emmanuelle Saada is associate professor of French at Columbia University.Goldhammer, Arthur: - Arthur Goldhammer is an award-winning translator who has translated books by Georges Duby, Jacques Le Goff, and Jean Starobinski. |