Is the notion of postcolonial Europe an oxymoron? How do colonial pasts inform the emergence of new subjectivities and political frontiers in contemporary Europe? Postcolonial Transitions in Europe explores these questions from different theoretical, geopolitical and media perspectives. Drawing from the interdisciplinary tools of postcolonial critique, this book contests the idea that Europe developed within clear-cut geographical boundaries. It examines how experiences of colonialism and imperialism continue to be constitutive of the European space and of the very idea of Europe. By approaching Europe as a complex political space, the chapters investigate topical concerns around its politics of inclusion and exclusion towards migrants, asylum seekers and refugees, as well as its take on internal conflicts, transitions and cosmopolitan imaginaries. With a foreword by Paul Gilroy
This book examines communist and post-communist literary and visual narratives, including the writings of prominent anti-communist dissidents and exiles such as Vladimir Nabokov, Czeslaw Milosz and Milan Kundera, exploring important themes including how Eastern European regimes and cultures have been portrayed as totalitarian, barbarian and "Orientalist" – in contrast to the civilized "West" – disappointment in the changes brought on by post-communist transition, and nostalgia for communism.
How has European identity been shaped through its colonial empires? Does this history of imperialism influence the conceptualisation of Europe in the contemporary globalised world? How has coloniality shaped geopolitical differences within Europe? What does this mean for the future of Europe? Postcolonial Europe: Comparative Reflections after the Empires brings together scholars from across disciplines to rethink European colonialism in the light of its vanishing empires and the rise of new global power structures. Taking an interdisciplinary approach to the postcolonial European legacy, the book argues that the commonly used nation-centric approach does not effectively capture the overlap between different colonial and postcolonial experiences across Europe.
In The Postcolonial Orient, Vasant Kaiwar presents a far-reaching analysis of the political, economic, and ideological cross-currents that have shaped and informed postcolonial studies preceding and following the 1989 moment of world history. The valences of the ‘post’ in postcolonialism are unfolded via some key historical-political postcolonial texts showing, inter alia, that they are replete with elements of Romantic Orientalism and the Oriental Renaissance. Kaiwar mobilises a critical body of classical and contemporary Marxism to demonstrate that far richer understandings of ‘Europe’ not to mention ‘colonialism’, ‘modernity’ and ‘difference’ are possible than with a postcolonialism captive to phenomenological-existentialism and post-structuralism, concluding that a narrative so enriched is indispensable for a transformative non-Eurocentric internationalism.
This book is an ambitious integration of ecological, archaeological, anthropological land use sciences, drawing on human geography, demography and economics of development across the East Africa region. It focuses on understanding and unpicking the interactions that have taken place between the natural and unnatural history of the East African region and trace this interaction from the evolutionary foundations of our species (c. 200,000 years ago), through the outwards and inwards human migrations, often associated with the adoption of subsistence strategies, new technologies and the arrival of new crops. The book will explore the impact of technological developments such as transitions to tool making, metallurgy, and the arrival of crops also involved an international dimension and waves of human migrations in and out of East Africa. Time will be presented with a widening focus that will frame the contemporary with a particular focus on the Anthropocene (last 500 years) to the present day. Many of the current challenges have their foundations in precolonial and colonial history and as such there will be a focus on how these have evolved and the impact on environmental and human landscapes. Moving into the Anthropocene era, there was increasing exposure to the International drivers of change, such as those associated with Ivory and slave trade. These international trade routes were tied into the ensuing decimation of elephant populations through to the exploitation of natural mineral resources have been sought after through to the present day. The book will provide a balanced perspective on the region, the people, and how the natural and unnatural histories have combined to create a dynamic region. These historical perspectives will be galvanized to outline the future changes and the challenges they will bring around such issues as sustainable development, space for wildlife and people, and the position of East Africa within a globalized world and how this is potentially going to evolve over the coming decades.
This edited volume explores the idea of Europe through a focus on its margins. The chapters in the volume inquire critically into the relations and tensions inherent in divisions between the Global North and the Global South as well as internal regional differentiation within Europe itself. In doing so, the volume stresses the need to consider Europe from critical interdisciplinary perspectives, highlighting historical and contemporary issues of racism and colonialism. While recent discussions of migration into ‘Fortress Europe’ seem to assume that Europe has clearly demarcated geographic, political and cultural boundaries, this book argues that the reality is more complex. The book explores margins conceptually and positions margins and centres as open to negotiation and contestation and characterized by ambiguity. As such, margins can be contextualized in relation to hierarchies within Europe, with different processes involved in creating boundaries and borders between different kinds of Europes and Europeans. Deploying case studies from different places, such as Iceland, Italy, Poland, Spain, Turkey, the UK, Romania, Cyprus, Greece, Sicily, European colonies in the Caribbean and the former Yugoslavia, the contributors analyse how different geopolitical hierarchies intersect with racialized subject positions of diverse people living in Europe, while also exploring issues of gender, class, sexuality, religion and nationality. Some chapters draw attention to the fortification of Europe’s ‘borderland,’ while others focus on internal hierarchies within Europe, critiquing the meaning of spatial boundaries in an increasingly digitalized Europe. In doing so, the chapters interrogate the hierarchies at play in the processes of being and becoming ‘European’ and the ongoing impacts of race and colonialism. This timely and thought-provoking collection will be of considerable significance to those in the humanities and social sciences with an interest in Europe. Chapter 11 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons [Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND)] 4.0 license.
Cosmopolitanism is about the extension of the moral and political horizons of people, societies, organizations and institutions. Over the past 25 years there has been considerable interest in cosmopolitan thought across the human social sciences. The second edition of the Routledge International Handbook of Cosmopolitanism Studies is an enlarged, revised and updated version of the first edition. It consists of 50 chapters across a broader range of topics in the social and human sciences. Eighteen entirely new chapters cover topics that have become increasingly prominent in cosmopolitan scholarship in recent years, such as sexualities, public space, the Kantian legacy, the commons, internet, generations, care and heritage. This Second Edition aims to showcase some of the most innovative and promising developments in recent writing in the human and social sciences on cosmopolitanism. Both comprehensive and innovative in the topics covered, the Routledge International Handbook of Cosmopolitanism Studies is divided into four sections. Cosmopolitan theory and history with a focus on the classical and contemporary approaches, The cultural dimensions of cosmopolitanism, The politics of cosmopolitanism, World varieties of cosmopolitanism. There is a strong emphasis in interdisciplinarity, with chapters covering contributions in philosophy, history, sociology, anthropology, media studies, international relations. The Handboook’s clear and comprehensive style will appeal to a wide undergraduate and postgraduate audience across the social and human sciences.
This book is a biography and reception history of the Lithuanian–American archaeologist Marija Gimbutas (1921–1994). It presents the first transnational account of Gimbutas’ life based on historical research, and an original examination of the impact of her ideas in various feminist contexts, both academic and popular. At the core of this book is a success story of an Eastern European woman who survived both Soviet and Nazi occupations of her homeland, lived as a displaced person in postwar Germany, and built her career and scholarly authority within the androcentric American academia. At the same time, it is also a story of a controversy, which followed Gimbutas’ theory of Old Europe – a prehistoric civilization, characterized by peacefulness, egalitarianism, women’s leadership, and the worship of the Great Goddess. First introduced in 1974, this theory inspired women’s movements worldwide, but was harshly criticized by other archaeologists. This book examines the various intellectual contexts (feminist, nationalist, theoretical) in which Gimbutas’ ideas were formed, received, and interpreted, as well as appropriated for different political goals. This timely study will appeal to scholars and students in the following fields: history of archaeology, prehistoric archaeology, gender studies, feminist studies, women’s history, Baltic studies, and religion and spirituality.
