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Overview
"At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace throughout the world the savage races."—Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man
"Terra nullius"—no man's land—was the legal fiction employed to justify the white invasion of Australia. Aboriginal lands were declared "terra nullius" because, it was claimed, they were inhabited by people who would soon die out—and who could be helped on the way to extinction if they lingered.
Author of the acclaimed "Exterminate All the Brutes" and A History of Bombing, Sven Lindqvist is one of the most innovative writers and historians at work today. He brings his original sensibility to bear as he travels 12,000 kilometers through so-called no man's land in search of places where belief in the rights of the white man and the inevitable extinction of the "lower races" were put into practice. The world the Aborigines had known for centuries ended as young boys were kidnapped to dive for pearls, then whipped and abandoned when the bends ruined them for work; "half-caste" children were taken from their mothers; and natives were put in neck irons and sent to internment camps under false diagnoses of STDs.
Mining history, popular fiction, anthropology, and his own travels, Lindqvist brilliantly weaves together an illuminating and disturbing history of how "no man's land" became the province of the white man.
Synopsis
"At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace throughout the world the savage races."—Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man
"Terra nullius"—no man's land—was the legal fiction employed to justify the white invasion of Australia. Aboriginal lands were declared "terra nullius" because, it was claimed, they were inhabited by people who would soon die out—and who could be helped on the way to extinction if they lingered.
Author of the acclaimed "Exterminate All the Brutes" and A History of Bombing, Sven Lindqvist is one of the most innovative writers and historians at work today. He brings his original sensibility to bear as he travels 12,000 kilometers through so-called no man's land in search of places where belief in the rights of the white man and the inevitable extinction of the "lower races" were put into practice. The world the Aborigines had known for centuries ended as young boys were kidnapped to dive for pearls, then whipped and abandoned when the bends ruined them for work; "half-caste" children were taken from their mothers; and natives were put in neck irons and sent to internment camps under false diagnoses of STDs.
Mining history, popular fiction, anthropology, and his own travels, Lindqvist brilliantly weaves together an illuminating and disturbing history of how "no man's land" became the province of the white man.
Publishers Weekly
Swedish author Lindqvist ("Exterminate All the Brutes") has written a sobering chronicle of the attempted genocide of aborigines in 19th-century Australia. White settlers arrived and declared whole swaths of countryside terra nullius no one's land ignoring the people who had lived there for centuries. By the early 20th century, Lindqvist writes, white Australians recognized that the aboriginals existed, but assumed they were inferior and would one day die out. Indeed, whites massacred the darker-skinned indigenous people, claiming they were only helping the inevitable Darwinian march of progress. Marrying social, political and intellectual history, Lindqvist goes far beyond a predictable history of colonial destruction, violence and exploitation. He shows that many European theorists turned to aboriginals as a case study of the question of when humans became human, and notes that Durkheim and Freud both made crucial assumptions about human development based on their readings of aboriginal cultures. Malinowski criticized Australian aborigines for raising their children liberally; he believed that discipline by beating was a necessary part of parenting. Lindqvist calls for those who have benefited from the oppression of aboriginals to "do penance and mend our ways." Thus, "even the past can be changed." (May)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business InformationEditorials
Publishers Weekly
Swedish author Lindqvist ("Exterminate All the Brutes") has written a sobering chronicle of the attempted genocide of aborigines in 19th-century Australia. White settlers arrived and declared whole swaths of countryside terra nullius—no one's land—ignoring the people who had lived there for centuries. By the early 20th century, Lindqvist writes, white Australians recognized that the aboriginals existed, but assumed they were inferior and would one day die out. Indeed, whites massacred the darker-skinned indigenous people, claiming they were only helping the inevitable Darwinian march of progress. Marrying social, political and intellectual history, Lindqvist goes far beyond a predictable history of colonial destruction, violence and exploitation. He shows that many European theorists turned to aboriginals as a case study of the question of when humans became human, and notes that Durkheim and Freud both made crucial assumptions about human development based on their readings of aboriginal cultures. Malinowski criticized Australian aborigines for raising their children liberally; he believed that discipline by beating was a necessary part of parenting. Lindqvist calls for those who have benefited from the oppression of aboriginals to "do penance and mend our ways." Thus, "even the past can be changed." (May)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information