Archaeology of Colonisation: From Aesthetics to Biopolitics

Description

This book rethinks the history of colonisation by focusing on the formation of the European aesthetic ideas of indigeneity and blackness in the Caribbean, and how these ideas were deployed as markers of biopolitical governance. Using Foucault’s philosophical archaeology as method, this work argues that the European formation of indigeneity and blackness was based on aesthetically casting Aboriginal and African peoples in the Caribbean as monsters yet with a similar degree of Western civilisation and ‘culture’. By focusing on the aesthetics of the first racial imageries that produced indigeneity and blackness this work takes a radical departure from the current Social Darwinian theorisations of race and racism. It reveals a new connection between the global origins of colonisation and local post-Enlightenment histories. Contents List of Figures Acknowledgements Disclaimer 1 Introduction Part 1: Origins: Colonial Aesthetics (The Caribbean) 2 Aesthetics of Ugliness 3 Monstrous Anthropology 4 Blackness Part 2: Command (Queensland, Australia) 5 Biopolitics in Colonisation 6 The Blanket Approach 7 State of Exception in Australia 8 Conclusion References Index About the Author