The Victorians and race - Shearer West

This is the first study to bring together history, history of art, literature and anthropology to reconsider the complex subject of race and its relationship with Victorian culture. Representations of race in art and literature are analysed for what they reveal about constructions of ?other? races during the Victorian period. The book also considers the problem of British ?races? and the conflicting ideas of Anglo-Saxonism and Celticism in the 19th century. - - The contributors seek not only to uncover the oppressions, misrepresentations and abuses of ?white? patriarchy, but also to examine the complexities of racial experience, including anti-racism and the relationships between feminism and colonialism. A number of theoretical and historical strategies are adopted and the book deals both with general considerations of imperialism, racial identity and Social Darwinism, and specific case studies of works by such writers as Dickens, Schreiner and Bulwer Lytton, and such artists as Mulready, Winterhalter and the Langham Place Group.