Studies in Imperialism
1 total work
The writings of travellers in Africa during the Golden Age of Victorian exploration often tell us more about 19th-century Britain than about Africa. In this text, the author places these narratives in their historical and cultural context, and examines how racial images may be affected by social change and litarary form. Through detailed considerations of accounts of Africans' eating habits, of the reported effects of Africa upon the objects the travellers carried with them, and of Stanley's controversial Emin Pasha Relief Expedition, deep anxieties over British social change and cultural identity are exposed. The author argues that such concerns have to be recognized in any discussion on the construction and transmission of racial stereotypes. The book closes with a consideration of Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" as a travel narrative and contrasts Marlow's Congo with Stanley's.