A New Dutch Imperial History?: Perambulations in a Prospective Field

Abstract

Perambulations in a Prospective Field 1 remco raben This article discusses the recent developments in imperial history in Great Britain and France and analyses the state of Dutch research in the light of these new approaches. Raben concentrates on three broadly defined topics-the webbed character of colonial spaces, the impact of empire on metropolitan societies and the moral ramifications of colonial empires. The way imperial histories are written is determined by the experiences with 'empire' in the metropolitan countries. Despite essential differences in imperial circumstances in and of the Netherlands, Dutch historiography could be inspired by the British and French developments to explore the spatial, cultural and moral relationships between the various parts of the Dutch colonial world. Colonial history is a contentious field. This has not always been so. Until about forty years ago historians of empire were mostly concerned with the faits et gestes of the colonial elites and the history of the colonised world was mainly narrated, in the famous words of Dutch historian J.C. van Leur, as seen 'from the deck of the ship, the ramparts of the fortress, the high gallery of the trading-house'. 2 However, since the end of colonial rule and the arrival of postcolonial migrants in the former metropolises, colonial history has lost much of its innocence and political logic. 3 The initial reaction to the old imperial histories, in answer to Van Leur's call, was to concentrate on the autonomous histories of the indigenous peoples in the colonies and on the pernicious effects of colonial rule. This 'going native' hardly affected perspectives on the relationships between empire and the metropolitan societies proper. It is only since the 1990s that historians in and of the West have been looking for new ways to write imperial histories. Faced with the changing character of their home societies and influenced by the emerging field of postcolonial studies, some started to question the foundations of their national histories.

Decolonizing colonial heritage: New Agendas, actors and practices in and beyond Europe

“…Just as Anglophone scholars were long at the vanguard of postcolonial studies, so too were historians of Britain and the British empire prominent in the early stages of mapping what ultimately became widely known as the 'new imperial history' (Burton 2003;Hall and Rose 2006;Kennedy 2018;MacKenzie 1986;Ward 2001;Wilson 2004). Britain-focused work long remained strongly represented (particularly focused on its 'jewel in the crown' in India, settler colonies, and the West Indies), even as Portugal's entanglements with Brazil and Africa, France's with its vast empire, and the Dutch presence in and beyond the East and West Indies became the subjects of new research approaches (Koekkoek et al 2017;Raben 2013). Not only was Britain's history explored as inseparable from that of its empire (and later the Commonwealth) and France's from la plus grande France ('Greater France') beyond the seas: empires were equally important (and perhaps more so) to smaller and less powerful nations on the international stage (Blanchard et al 2008;Conklin et al 2011;Stovall 2015;Wilder 2003).…”

Enticed to settle elsewhere: Magic lantern slides and the transnational creation of European colonial citizens

“…The NZAV’s transnational engagement with South Africa supported the project of Afrikaner nationalism, leading the South African newspaper, Cape Times , to quip in 1921 that the NZAV was perhaps a branch of the Afrikaner-led National Party in the Netherlands (Bradlow, 1978: 521). Driving this ideological support was the incorporation of a colonial history of White settlement in South Africa into a twentieth-century discourse of ethnic and cultural kinship contained in the notion of stamverwantschap (Henkes, 2020; Kuitenbrouwer, 2012; Raben, 2013). Although stamverwantschap literally means tribal affiliation, its meaning ranges from denoting cultural traits (including language and religion) between the Dutch and Afrikaners to genealogical, and racial kinship denoting a transnational, ethnic community (Henkes, 2020: 125–6; Jurg and Kuitenbrouwer, 2021: 168).…”

How Generations Matter

“…53 For other authors as Remco Raben, de-imperialisation thus means to understand the connectivity of the centres in a web-like manner, without prioritising one centre over the other. 54 The third category of articles, which emphasise a mutual existence of both communities and material objects of the colonial past, shows a postcolonial hybrid identity as a result of an intermingled relationship between the European and the colonial societies. Some articles in bmgn suggest the integration of colonial identities and the birth of a post-colonial identity, which carries important legacies up to today.…”