| Unit name | Race and Criminality (Level H Lecture Response Unit) |
|---|---|
| Unit code | HIST30015 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | H/6 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24) |
| Unit director | Dr. Saha |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | Department of History (Historical Studies) |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
Colonial states were not only maintained by military power but also by subtler methods of discipline and control: through legal codes, penal practices and criminological discourses. This unit examines the history of colonial criminality in South and Southeast Asia. As we will see, ideas of criminality and methods of disciplining criminals took distinctive forms in colonial contexts, in no small part because of notions of racial difference at the heart of the European imperial project. We will explore this interaction examining as we go the related histories of colonial prisons, police forces, courts, and gender ideologies. The unit will explore how historians have approached the history of crime, and the resulting historiographic debates. We will consider what crime meant under colonial rule. Was crime a form of resistance? How was crime interpreted and defined? What was the response to crimes committed by Europeans? And how were convicts treated?
Weekly 2-hour interactive lecture sessions
Tutorial feedback on essay
Access to tutorial consultation with unit tutor in consultation hours
A 3000 word essay (50%) and 2-hour unseen written examination (50%) will assess the student’s understanding of artistic developments in the field of study and of the ways in which art historians have interpreted developments in the field; test the student’s ability to think critically and develop their own views and interpretations; and test students’ understanding of the history of race and criminality in colonial polities.
Vicente L Rafael (eds) Figures of Criminality in Indonesia, the Philippines and Colonial Vietnam
Clare Anderson, Legible Bodies: Race, Criminality and Colonialism in South Asia
Peter Zinoman, The Colonial Bastille: A History of Imprisonment in Vietnam, 1862-1940
Elizabeth Kolsky, Colonial Justice in British India: White Violence and the Rule of Law
Satadru Sen, Disciplining Punishment: Colonialism and Convict Society in the Andaman Islands
