Embodied colonialism: the cultural meaning of silver in a Swedish colonial context in the 17th century

Abstract

Silver had an emblematic position in the 17th-century Atlantic world. After the Spanish had discovered silver ores in America, the metal’s meaning became symbolic of colonial dominion, of great wealth and providential fortune. Sweden too initiated a colonial project to obtain silver in the mountainous regions of Lapland. Silver-works were founded in order to refine the metal, and the industry borrowed many ideas from the American plantation system as mediated through Dutch entrepreneurs. This process led to the increased importance of silver, seen in royal dress and furniture amongst other products associated with the colonial world.     

The civic zeitgeist: nationalism and liberal values in the European radical right

This article examines the relationship between nationalism and liberal values and, more specifically, the redefinition of boundaries between national communities and others in the rhetoric of radical right parties in Europe. The aim is to examine the tension between radical right party discourse and the increasing need to shape this discourse in liberal terms. We argue that the radical right parties that successfully operate within the democratic system tend to be those best able to tailor their discourse to the liberal and civic characteristics of national identity so as to present themselves and their ideologies as the true authentic defenders of the nation's unique reputation for democracy, diversity and tolerance. Comparing the success of a number of European radical right parties ranging from the most electorally successful Swiss People's Party, the Dutch Pim Fortuyn List and Party for Freedom to the more mixed French Front National, British National Party and National Democratic Party of Germany we show that the parties that effectively deploy the symbolic resources of national identity through a predominantly voluntaristic prism tend to be the ones that fare better within their respective political systems. In doing so, we challenge the conventional view in the study of nationalism that expects civic values to shield countries from radicalism and extremism.     

From Little Gidding to Virginia: the seventeenth century Ferrar family in the Atlantic colonial context

This article explores the significance of the seventeenth-century Ferrar family’s involvement in Atlantic colonialism, and their interest in compiling natural histories of the various flora and fauna in the Virginia colony, particularly the silkworm. I argue that the Ferrars’ involvement in colonial enterprises, in particular the Virginia Company, was underpinned by a theology which centred upon the idea of recovering man’s original dominion over the earth, bestowed by God upon Adam in Eden, but lost in the Fall. The Ferrars’ commitment to this theology of repairing the post-lapsarian world enables us to integrate our understanding of the family’s colonial interests with their religiosity. There was no disjunction between the worldliness of the family’s commercial and colonial dealings with the Virginia Company, and the ascetic period of retreat at Little Gidding. This article contributes to a broader scholarly effort to understand the development of seventeenth-century Anglicanism in a colonial context.     

First contact: colonial European preconceptions of tropical Queensland rainforest and its people

Northerly expansion of European settlement after Queensland became a colony in 1859 carried with it an inherited interpretation of rainforest ‘scrub’ or ‘jungle’ as nuisance vegetation to be removed because it harboured ‘miasmatic’ disease vapours and covered good agricultural soil. Similar rejection of rainforest dwellers as uncivilized ‘myalls’ reflected a wider ‘dispersal’ policy against all indigenous occupants of land claimed under British colonial entitlement. In terms of performance theory, this paper illustrates the influence of common conceptions held during initial European contact with an environment so different and so remote that for decades it was avoided. Eventually, land pacification with gun and axe brought this last Aboriginal refuge with its diminutive people into the framework of an exploitative economy.     

Freemasonry as a playground for civic nationalism

This article explores correspondences between the ideals of ‘civic nationalism’ (hereafter CN) and the practices of Freemasonry, a worldwide male fraternity. Freemasons practice an elitist stance of civilizing the self, translated into a collective mission of society‐building. Though not a national movement, Freemasonry shares conceptual similarities with CN and was implicated in civic‐national revolutions in the Americas and the Middle East. Drawing on ethnographic research on Israeli Freemasonry, the study explores Masonic sociability as a playgound for practicing civic friendship and negotiating the inherent tensions of CN. Freemasons straddle between particularist and universalist understandings of fraternity, virtue and charity, which carry over to questions of citizenship, patriotism and nationalism. This boundary work over collective attachments represents a pragmatic attempt, not to resolve universalist and particularist preferences, but to contain and incorporate both within exclusivist Masonic practices. Far from marking the failure of CN, Masonic sociability illustrates its political significance, envisioning the nation as a social club of chosen friends.     

Populism and nationalism in a comparative perspective: a scholarly exchange

The purpose of the Exchange feature is to publish discussions that engage, advance and initiate new debates in the study of nations and nationalism. This Exchange article is on the subject of ‘Populism and Nationalism’. Each contributor addresses the following four questions on the subject: (1) What is populism and what role does it play within the context of democratic politics? (2) Does populism cut across left–right lines? (3) What is the relationship between nationalism and populism? (4) Are contemporary populist movements across Europe and the West comparable? Our aim is to generate a thought‐provoking conversation with regard to the rise of populism in Europe and the West.     

To justify a nation: Inter-war soviet nationalism

In 1972 an anonymous author wrote in the Soviet journal Veche: Why during the Fatherland War, when mortal danger hung over the country and when extraordinary strength of spirit was needed did “Soviet patriotism” prove insufficient, and it was necessary urgently to call to remembrance the Church, Aleksandr Nevskii, Peter I, and Suvorov that is princes, tsars and reactionary generals? Why were not the cult of the heroes of the civil war and the cult of the heroes of the class struggle not enough? ¹