In The Shadows Of The Tropics: Climate, Race And Biopower In Nineteenth Century Ceylon (re-materialising Cultural Geography)
by James S. Duncan /
2007 / English / PDF
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In this original work James Duncan explores the transformation of
Ceylon during the mid-nineteenth century into one of the most
important coffee growing regions of the world and investigates the
consequent ecological disaster which erased coffee from the island.
Using this fascinating case study by way of illustration, In the
Shadows of the Tropics reveals the spatial unevenness and
fragmentation of modernity through a focus on modern
governmentality and biopower. It argues that the practices of
colonial power, and the differences that race and tropical climates
were thought to make, were central to the working out of modern
governmental rationalities. In this context, the usefulness of
Foucault's notions of biopower, discipline and governmentality are
examined. The work contributes an important rural focus to current
work on studies of governmentality in geography and offers a
welcome non-state dimension by considering the role of the
plantation economy and individual capitalists in the lives and
deaths of labourers, the destabilization of subsistence farming and
the aggressive re-territorialization of populations from India to
Ceylon.
In this original work James Duncan explores the transformation of
Ceylon during the mid-nineteenth century into one of the most
important coffee growing regions of the world and investigates the
consequent ecological disaster which erased coffee from the island.
Using this fascinating case study by way of illustration, In the
Shadows of the Tropics reveals the spatial unevenness and
fragmentation of modernity through a focus on modern
governmentality and biopower. It argues that the practices of
colonial power, and the differences that race and tropical climates
were thought to make, were central to the working out of modern
governmental rationalities. In this context, the usefulness of
Foucault's notions of biopower, discipline and governmentality are
examined. The work contributes an important rural focus to current
work on studies of governmentality in geography and offers a
welcome non-state dimension by considering the role of the
plantation economy and individual capitalists in the lives and
deaths of labourers, the destabilization of subsistence farming and
the aggressive re-territorialization of populations from India to
Ceylon.
