Imperial Landscapes of Health: Place, Plants and People between India and Australia, 1800s–1900s

Abstract

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Climate and colonialism

“…Recent work in the Americas has highlighted how the city of Jauja in Peru served a similar function, and “was one of the most acclaimed places to cure the disease through climate therapy” (Carey 2014, p. 796). As Carey (, p. 798) shows, “various constructions of climate were appropriated and used by various groups‐ not only physicians promoting the health benefits of high elevation Andean climate ‐ but also politicians, entrepreneurs, the Lima elite and economic developers seeking scientific justification for their endeavours in the Andes.” Recent research, however, has also highlighted the importance of health in motivating European emigration from colony to colony, for example, from the unhealthy tropical plains of India to Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa (Beattie, ). Hill stations across Australia and New Zealand in particular became places where the public health of British administrators and military personnel could be restored through seasonal furlough and, as Beattie (, p. 105) notes, “officials in Australia's fledgling colonies, along with those in New Zealand and South Africa, clamoured to attract wealthy white settlers from India,” commonly sounding “a note of alarm by playing on the dangers of India's climate while reassuring migrants of their own colony's salubrity.”…”

“…The olfactory benefits addressed concerns over noxious miasmas while providing, as Flikke (, p. 25) notes, “airborne ‘paths’ which promised physical restoration, health and wellbeing as settlers negotiated the treacherous alien terrain with an eye to the ground and nose to the air” (see also Ingold, ). Not surprisingly, eucalyptus trees were “a ubiquitous presence on many southern Indian hill stations,” but were also introduced to hill stations elsewhere in New Zealand and Australia as a result of their health giving properties (Beattie, , p. 114). Towards the end of the 19th century, scientific forestry and forest conservation policies were emerging across the European empires, supported by a range of ideological rationales.…”

Histories of climate, science, and colonization in Australia and New Zealand, 1800–1945

“…[66][67][68] In addition, because of belief in diseases' environmental origins, many settlers believed that a knowledge of climate and its effects on health was vitally important. 69,70 Settlers did not necessarily agree, however, on how it either affected health, agriculture, or human society.…”

“…Research in this area has offered new perspectives, for example, on how climate became a commodity in health, as suggested by James Beattie in India and Australia, through its role in promoting 19th-and 20th-century migration. 70 In an increasingly polluted world, to what extent do concerns about health continue to motivate migration?…”

“…Settler economies depended on regular inputs of water and sunshine to provide conditions necessary to sustain newly established primary productive economies, based on grain growing, sheep farming, and cattle raising, as well as fruit and vegetable production . In addition, because of belief in diseases’ environmental origins, many settlers believed that a knowledge of climate and its effects on health was vitally important . Settlers did not necessarily agree, however, on how it either affected health, agriculture, or human society.…”