scholarly journals Knowing savagery: Australia and the anatomy of race

2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 115-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce Buchan ◽  
Linda Andersson Burnett

When Australia was circumnavigated by Europeans in 1801–02, French and British natural historians were unsure how to describe the Indigenous peoples who inhabited the land they charted and catalogued. Ideas of race and of savagery were freely deployed by both British and French, but a discursive shift was underway. While the concept of savagery had long been understood to apply to categories of human populations deemed to be in want of more historically advanced ‘civilisation’, the application of this term in the late 18th and early 19th centuries was increasingly being correlated with the emerging terminology of racial characteristics. The terminology of race was still remarkably fluid, and did not always imply fixed physical or mental endowments or racial hierarchies. Nonetheless, by means of this concept, natural historians began to conceptualise humanity as subject not only to historical gradations, but also to the environmental and climatic variations thought to determine race. This in turn meant that the degree of savagery or civilisation of different peoples could be understood through new criteria that enabled physical classification, in particular by reference to skin colour, hair, facial characteristics, skull morphology, or physical stature: the archetypal criteria of race. While race did not replace the language of savagery, in the early years of the 19th century savagery was re-inscribed by race.

2020 ◽  
pp. 17-27
Author(s):  
D. Meshkov

The article presents some of the author’s research results that has got while elaboration of the theme “Everyday life in the mirror of conflicts: Germans and their neighbors on the Southern and South-West periphery of the Russian Empire 1861–1914”. The relationship between Germans and Jews is studied in the context of the growing confrontation in Southern cities that resulted in a wave of pogroms. Sources are information provided by the police and court archival funds. The German colonists Ludwig Koenig and Alexandra Kirchner (the resident of Odessa) were involved into Odessa pogrom (1871), in particular. While Koenig with other rioters was arrested by the police, Kirchner led a crowd of rioters to the shop of her Jewish neighbor, whom she had a conflict with. The second part of the article is devoted to the analyses of unty-Jewish violence causes and history in Ak-Kerman at the second half of the 19th and early years of 20th centuries. Akkerman was one of the southern Bessarabia cities, where multiethnic population, including the Jews, grew rapidly. It was one of the reasons of the pogroms in 1865 and 1905. The author uses criminal cases` papers to analyze the reasons of the Germans participation in the civilian squads that had been organized to protect the population and their property in Ackerman and Shabo in 1905.


BJHS Themes ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Marianne Sommer

Abstract This paper engages with a specific image: Darwin's tree of the primates. Although this diagram was sketched in ink on paper in 1868, it did not make it into the publication of The Descent of Man (1871). This may seem all the more in need of an explanation because, as Adrian Desmond and James Moore have shown, Darwin strongly relied on the notion of familial genealogy in the development of his theory of organismic evolution, or rather descent. However, Darwin expressed scepticism towards visualizations of phylogenies in correspondence with Ernst Haeckel and in fact also in Descent, considering such representations at once too speculative and too concrete. An abstraction such as a tree diagram left little room to ponder possibilities or demarcate hypotheses from evidence. I thus bring Darwin's primate tree into communication with his view on primate and human phylogeny as formulated in Descent, including his rejection of polygenism. I argue that considering the tree's inherent teleology, as well as its power to suggest species status of human populations and to reify ‘racial’ hierarchies, the absence of the diagram in The Descent of Man may be a significant statement.


Imafronte ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Jose Miguel Morales Folguera

Construidos por tres generaciones de los condes-duques de Benavente, entre 1499 y 1621, como instrumento de disfrute y de prestigio familiar de la villa ducal, los jardines de Benavente se convirtieron en uno de los jardines renacentistas más importantes de España. Desgraciadamente, los cambios en los gustos estéticos de los herederos, el paso de los ejércitos franceses de Napoleón y el abandono de una naturaleza necesitada de su continuo cuidado, hicieron que los jardines desaparecieran en los primeros años del siglo XIX. En este artículo nos proponemos hacer su reconstrucción ideal, con la utilización de los numerosos textos y de la documentación existente. Built for three generations of the count-dukes of Benavente, between 1499 and 1621, as an instrument of enjoyment and family prestige of the ducal town, the Benavente gardens became one of the most important Renaissance gardens in Spain. Unfortunately, the changes in the aesthetic tastes of the heirs, the destruction wrought by Napoleon's army and the abandonment of a nature in need of their continuous care, caused the gardens to disappear in the early years of the 19th century. In this article we propose to make its ideal reconstruction, with the use of the numerous texts and existing documentation.


Ritið ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 43-68
Author(s):  
Gunnar Tómas Kristófersson

The article addresses the early years of film in iceland, where the goal is to deepen our knowledge of the main participants in introducing and promoting cinema in iceland at the turn of the 19th century. Two years spanning a three-year period mark the beginnings of the age of film in iceland. The former is 1901 when the Dutch filmmaker F. A. Nöggerath came to film iceland and icelanders for an English film company. The latter year is 1903, when the Norwegian, Rasmus Hallseth and the Swede David Fernander, traveled around the country to screen films for the first time in iceland. These two visits mark the emergence of cinema in iceland. iceland-ers had little prior knowledge of the new medium, which was getting to be widely known around the world, apart from the coverage of newspapers and stories of lucky icelanders who had experienced film screenings abroad. Shows using a predecessor of film, the magic lantern, were held by Sigfús Eymundsson and Þorlákur ó. Jo-hnson in the 19th century. After the introduction of films in 1903, several people put together funds to buy Hallseth’s and Fernanders’ equipment and began to exhibit films on their own. However, daily performances did not happen until Reykjavik Biograftheater (later ,,Gamla Bíó”) was established in 1906. After several attempts by various parties to hold regular screenings in Reykjavik, one could say that cinema did not properly settle in iceland until the establishment of Nýja Bíó in 1913.


2019 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 1-1
Author(s):  
John J. Swab

<p><strong>Abstract.</strong> Fire insurance maps produced by the American firm the Sanborn Map Company have long served as cartographic guides to understanding the history of urban America. Primarily used by cultural and historical geographers, historians, historic preservationists, and environmental consultants; historians of cartography have little explored the history of this company. While this scholarship has addressed various facets of Sanborn’s history (Ristow, 1968), no scholarly piece has explored the lived experience of being a Sanborn surveyor. This lack of scholarship comes not from any significant oversight but rather from the fact that the contributions of most Sanborn surveyors were anonymous and little recorded on the maps themselves. Moreover, the company itself has done little to save its own history, thus little is known of their individual stories and experiences. The exception to this is perhaps the most famous Sanborn surveyor of all: Daniel Carter Beard.</p><p>Over the course of his nine-decade life, Daniel Carter Beard held several prominent positions including the co-founder of the Boy Scouts of America and the lead illustrator for many of Mark Twain’s novels. However, he got his start as a surveyor for the Sanborn Map Company in the 1870s, just a few years after its founding. His papers, housed at the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress, includes a variety of ephemera from his time with the Sanborn Map Company.</p><p>Trained in civil engineering, Beard got his start as a surveyor for the Cincinnati (Ohio) Office of Platting Commission, creating the first official plat map for the city. He was hired by Sanborn in 1874 and served as a surveyor until 1878, traveling extensively over the eastern half of the United States, parlaying his skills into creating fire insurance maps for Sanborn. Thus, this paper speaks to two main themes. The first theme traces the route of Beard during his early years with the company across the eastern half of the United States, documenting both the places he visited and the challenges he faced as a Sanborn surveyor. The second theme, interwoven through the paper, is an analysis of the innerworkings of Sanborn’s administrative structure and its relationship with the larger fire insurance market during the 1870s. Altogether, these documents present unique insight into the organization of the Sanborn Map Company and how it produced its maps during the second-half of the 19th century.</p>


Author(s):  
A.V. Zakharevich ◽  

The article is devoted to the history of the famous Kabardian Uzden (nobleman) and the Don Cossack hero of the Russian army of the era of the Napoleonic wars and the military history of the Don Cossacks of the late 18th - first half of the 19th century, General D.G. Begidov (1778-1838). The author researched the history of history and archival sources about the origin and early years of the biography of D.G. Begidov and paid the main attention to his participation in the Napoleonic wars among the Cossacks of the Ataman regi-ment under the command of the legendary Cossack hero of the Patriotic War of 1812 - Ataman M.I. Platov.


2016 ◽  
Vol 66 (2) ◽  
pp. 125
Author(s):  
Stuart A. Browning ◽  
Ian D. Goodwin

Subtropical maritime low-pressure systems are one of the most complex and destructive storm types to impact Australia’s eastern seaboard. This family of storms, commonly referred to as East Coast Cyclones (ECC), is most active during the late autumn and early winter period when baroclinicity increases in the Tasman Sea region. ECC have proven challenging to forecast at both event and seasonal timescales. Storm activity datasets, objectively determined from reanalyses using cyclone detection algorithms, have improved understanding of the drivers of ECC over the era of satellite data coverage. In this study we attempt to extend these datasets back to 1851 using the Twentieth Century Reanalysis version 2c (20CRv2c). However, uncertainty in the 20CRv2c increases back through time due to observational data scarcity, and individual cyclones counts tend to be underestimated during the 19th century. An alternative approach is explored whereby storm activity is estimated from seasonal atmosphere-ocean circulation patterns. Seasonal ECC frequency over the 1955 to 2014 period is significantly correlated to regional sea-level pressure and sea surface temperature (SST) patterns. These patterns are used to downscale the 20CRv2c during early years when individual events are not well simulated. The stormiest periods since 1851 appear to have been 1870 to the early 1890s, and 1950 to the early 1970s. Total storm activity has been below the long-term average for most winters since 1976. Conditions conducive to frequent ECC events tend to occur during periods of relatively warm SST in the southwest Pacific typical of negative Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO-ve). Extratropical cyclogenesis is associated with negative Southern Annular Mode (SAM-ve) and blocking in the southern Tasman Sea. Subtropical cyclogenesis is associated with SAM+ve and blocking in the central Tasman Sea. While the downscaling approach shows some skill at estimating seasonal storm activity from the large-scale circulation, it cannot overcome data scarcity based uncertainties in the 19th century when the 20CRv2c is effectively unconstrained throughout most of the southern hemisphere. Storm frequency estimates during the 19th century are difficult to verify and should be interpreted cautiously and with reference to available documentary evidence.


Author(s):  
Nataliia Kobryn

The paper seeks to develop new avenues for the study of the singing society «Lutna» (based in Lviv, late 19th century). There were several music associations with differing objectives in musical activities in the 80s of the 19th century in Lviv. Specifically, they were the Galician Musical Society, the Association «Harmony» and the Choir «Lutna». None of them was specifically the Ukrainian institution, but many Ukrainians were the members of the «Lutna». Therefore, the «Lutna» had the repertoire of the Ukrainian musical works and took part in the nationwide musical life of Ukrainians (specifically, in Lviv). The paper aims to study the participation of the «Lutna» in the Ukrainian concerts at the 1880s in Lviv as well as to outline the works of Ukrainian composers and its repertoire. Our research is based on the daily newspaper «Dilo». We used chronological, historiography, comparative and analytical methods to explore the content of publications concerning the «Lutna» and to form the concert chronicle of the choir among the Ukrainian residents of Lviv. Our findings show that the choral society «Lutna» was founded as the «Men Choir of Lviv» to be based on the multinational principles in 1881. The first concert of the renewed society as the mixed choir «Lutna» was held in 1883. The critics of «Dilo» followed the Choir at Ukrainian concerts, analyzed their performing of the Ukrainian music and observed every change of its repertoire. About 20 Ukrainians were indicated in the «Lutna» registry documents spanning 1880s, specifically, A. Vakhnianyn, M. Vitoshynsky, S. Fedak, V. Shukhevych and others. Traditionally, the «Lutna» with S. Cetvinsky’s con ducting participated at the Shevchenko concerts as well as the other national cultural events during the 1880s. The society was the most active in Ukrainian music life at its early years. The musical works by A. Vakhnianyn, M. Verbytskyi, S. Vorobkevych, M. Lysenko, P. Nishchyn skyi and others were in the repertoire of the «Lutna». The «Lutna»’s performing of M. Lysenko’s choral poem «Zapovit» and his cantata «Biut Porohy» and P. Nishchynskyi’s «Zakuvala ta syva zozulia» were the most significant art events of that time. We conclude that the annual concerts of the «Lutna» along with other Ukrainian organizations and the large Ukrainian repertoire of the choir had a significant influence on the revival of the Ukrainian musical life in Galicia at the end of the 19th century. Keywords: Ukrainian concert life, choir society «Lutna», Ukrainian musical critics, the newspaper «Dilo» («Work»), Lviv.


2019 ◽  
Vol 28 ◽  
pp. 323-340
Author(s):  
Katarzyna Milik

When the Kingdom of Poland was created in 1815, the educational matters were in the hands of the Government Commission for Religion and Public Education. In the early years, especially thanks to the activity of a minister Stanisław Kostka Potocki, the number of elementary schools grew. However, it did not last long as straight after him leaving service the situation changed. From the beginning of the 20s of the 19th century, elementary education was on the decline. This fact is confirmed by reports from the Częstochowa administrative unit, from the years 1817–1832. They clearly describe fundamental issues of the contemporary system of education. Above all, it lacked new school buildings and older buildings needed renovating urgently. In this situation, a rented room or a cottage frequently served as school premises. Accommodation conditions were rather poor. Additionally, there were not enough teachers. Not everyone wanted to teach in the country due to unfavourable circumstances. The teacher’s salary was low, often irregularly paid and sometimes not paid at all. Apart from this, it was difficult to work and expect any progress when parents did not send their children to school. As a result some schools were closed.


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