Native Races and the War

Butler, Josephine Elizabeth Grey, 1828-1906Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 2.5

Word count: 278K words
Chapters: 28

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Native Races and the War by Josephine Elizabeth Grey ButlerAuthor: Butler, Josephine Elizabeth Grey, 1828-1906,Language: English, Class: DT: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: Africa, Release Date: Dec 8, 2004

Editor's review

This work comes from the pen of the nineteenth-century British social reformer Josephine Butler and sets out an argument on the relationship between war and the so-called "native races"; it is a primary source on colonial questions in the imperial age. Its value lies less in offering complete historiographical conclusions from today's perspective than in giving readers direct access to the language, concerns and modes of argument of a reformer of the time, and in showing how an activist wove moral demands, religious conviction and the realities of colonial problems together. The book's attention to the situation of indigenous peoples in wartime can be read alongside such issues as the Victorian abolitionist movement and the social purity movement, and it is suitable as supplementary material for research on colonial history, imperial history and the history of women's social activism. Its historical limitations should be kept in mind: the racial classifications and modes of expression the author uses carry an unmistakable nineteenth-century Eurocentric colouring, and today's readers should examine them with a critical eye. As a public-domain eBook from Project Gutenberg, it is easy to search and cite, and suitable for selecting passages for classroom discussion, source comparison and essay writing.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Scholarly readers in nineteenth-century British colonial history and imperial discourse
Scholars interested in Victorian social reform and the writings of women activists
University students who need primary English sources for classroom discussion or citation in essays
Serious non-fiction readers interested in historical narratives of abolition and indigenous issues

Not a good fit for

Beginner readers expecting a systematic general history or a modern scholarly survey
General readers hoping for a plot-driven narrative or a light reading experience
Readers sensitive to nineteenth-century racist language to the point of being unable to read it critically

Reading tips

Read the introduction or opening chapter first to grasp the author's motive for writing and the subject of the argument, then move on to the main text.
While reading, mark racial and civilizational statements that carry the prejudices of the age as material for critical analysis.
Read it alongside secondary studies of the abolitionist movement or British colonial policy from the same period.
If using it for an essay, excerpt passages by theme first and verify the original page numbers and edition information.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book suitable as an introductory text on colonial history?

Not really as a sole starting point. It is a primary polemical source rather than a modern scholarly survey, and its racial classifications and value judgments carry a strong nineteenth-century Eurocentric colouring. Beginners would do best to acquire a basic background in British imperial history and the abolitionist movement first, then read it as a historical source; otherwise they may mistake the author's prejudices of the age for historical conclusions.

What historical limitations should readers pay particular attention to?

Classifications such as "native races" are themselves products of nineteenth-century European discourse, and the argument often blends moral reform, religious mission and colonial realities together. Readers should distinguish the author's factual statements from value judgments, note which material comes from first-hand observation and which from second-hand accounts, and compare modern scholarship on colonial violence in the same period, so as to avoid quoting without analysis.

How can the edition information of this eBook be confirmed?

The book was released by Project Gutenberg; the records show that the original English text went online on December 8, 2004, with related electronic edition records in 2019, and the author is Josephine Butler. When citing, it is advisable to note the Project Gutenberg eBook source, the online date and the author, and to verify the chapter in which a given passage appears, since the paragraphing of public-domain electronic texts may differ slightly across reposting platforms.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Butler, Josephine Elizabeth Grey, 1828-1906 Author

Josephine Elizabeth Grey Butler (1828–1906) was a British social reformer and writer, though the library's records and publicly available information about her life remain limited. The two works held here reveal two strands of her writing. An Autobiographical Memoir looks back on her personal experience and social activity in the first person, in the plain, earnest style characteristic of Victorian memoir, with its introspection and moral concern. Native Races and the War turns to the fate of colonized peoples and the ethics of war, with argumentation marked by a strong sense of public responsibility. Different as their subjects are, both works show an author who used writing to engage with social questions: the one as personal testimony, the other as public commentary. Since the library provides no information on her nationality, dates, or common classification, no inferences are made here; the note confines itself to the subjects and style of her works.