Overview
Chosen peoples demonstrates how biblical themes, ideas and metaphors shaped racial, national and imperial identities in the long nineteenth century. Even as radical new ideas challenged the historicity of the Bible, biblical notions of lineage, descent and inheritance continued to inform understandings of race, nation and empire. European settler movements portrayed 'new' territories across the seas as lands of Canaan, but if many colonised and conquered peoples resisted the imposition of biblical narratives, they also appropriated biblical tropes to their own ends. These innovative case-studies throw new light on familiar areas such as slavery, colonialism and the missionary project, while forging exciting cross-comparisons between race, identity and the politics of biblical translation and interpretation in South Africa, Egypt, Australia, America and Ireland.
Full Product Details
Author: Gareth Atkins ,
Shinjini Das ,
Brian Murray
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Imprint: Manchester University Press
Dimensions:
Width: 15.60cm
, Height: 1.70cm
, Length: 23.40cm
Weight: 0.553kg
ISBN: 9781526143044
ISBN 10: 1526143046
Pages: 240
Publication Date: 11 February 2020
Audience:
General/trade
,
General
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: Manufactured on demand
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.
Reviews
'The flag follows the cross and in this case reaffirms it. The received understanding is that the Age of Enlightenment put to rest the dominance of religion in modern Western cultures. This collection proves Christianity and its political avatar nationalism truly underscored the age of empires. The impact was as profound on indigenous nationalisms, with subordinated societies discovering their distinct identities in the wake of first contact with colonizing Christians. Among the many case studies is Khoisan national renewal in the Cape Colony: Jared McDonald examines Christian liberation as a means to racial equality (albeit short-lived) in British South Africa. The Bible as 19th-century political testament echoed the late medieval struggle between an imperial, all-powerful church and the desire for national congregations to access the word of God in their national languages. Centralization was at odds with dissemination, a conflict the Russian czarist confessional state experienced rather keenly. Atkins (history, Queens' College, Cambridge, UK), Das (modern extra-European history, Univ. of East Anglia, UK), and Murray (19th-century literature, King's College London, UK) clearly establish that the Bible was alive and well in the long 19th century.' --J. L. Meriwether, Roger Williams University Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty. Reprinted with permission from Choice Reviews. All rights reserved. Copyright by the American Library Association. -- .
'The flag follows the cross and in this case reaffirms it. The received understanding is that the Age of Enlightenment put to rest the dominance of religion in modern Western cultures. This collection proves Christianity and its political avatar nationalism truly underscored the age of empires. The impact was as profound on indigenous nationalisms, with subordinated societies discovering their distinct identities in the wake of first contact with colonizing Christians. Among the many case studies is Khoisan national renewal in the Cape Colony: Jared McDonald examines Christian liberation as a means to racial equality (albeit short-lived) in British South Africa. The Bible as 19th-century political testament echoed the late medieval struggle between an imperial, all-powerful church and the desire for national congregations to access the word of God in their national languages. Centralization was at odds with dissemination, a conflict the Russian czarist confessional state experienced rather keenly. Atkins (history, Queens' College, Cambridge, UK), Das (modern extra-European history, Univ. of East Anglia, UK), and Murray (19th-century literature, King's College London, UK) clearly establish that the Bible was alive and well in the long 19th century.' --J. L. Meriwether, Roger Williams University Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty. Reprinted with permission from Choice Reviews. All rights reserved. Copyright by the American Library Association. -- .
Author Information
Gareth Atkins is Bye-Fellow and College Lecturer in History at Queens' College, Cambridge Shinjini Das is a Lecturer in Modern Extra-European History at the University of East Anglia Brian Murray is Lecturer in Nineteenth-Century Literature at King's College London
