James B. Griffin
Judith N. McArthur and Orville Vernon Burton (eds)
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195093124
- eISBN:
- 9780199853915
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195093124.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 19th Century
In 1861, James B. Griffin left Edgefield, South Carolina, and rode off to Virginia to take up duty with the Confederate Army. He was thirty-five years old, a wealthy planter, and the owner of ...
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In 1861, James B. Griffin left Edgefield, South Carolina, and rode off to Virginia to take up duty with the Confederate Army. He was thirty-five years old, a wealthy planter, and the owner of sixty-one slaves when he joined Wade Hampton's elite Legion as a major of cavalry. This book features eighty of Griffin's letters written at the Virginia front, and during later postings on the South Carolina coast, to his wife Leila Burt Griffin. The letters encompass Griffin's entire Civil War service, detailing living conditions and military maneuvers, the jockeying for position among officers, and the different ways in which officers and enlisted men interacted. The letters shed light on the life of a middle officer—a life of extreme military hardship, complicated further by the need for reassurance about personal valor and status common to men of the southern gentry. Griffin describes secret troop movements, such as the Hampton Legion's role in the Peninsula Campaign. Here he relates the march from Manassas to Fredricksburg, the siege of Yorktown and the retreat to Richmond, and the fighting at Eltham's landing and Seven Pines, where Griffin commanded the Legion after Hampton was wounded. Griffin recounts day-to-day issues, from the weather to gossip. Monumental historical events sent Griffin off to war but his heartfelt considerations were about his family, his community, and his own personal pride. Griffin's letters present the Civil War as the ordeal by fire that tested and verified—or modified—Southern upperclass values.Less
In 1861, James B. Griffin left Edgefield, South Carolina, and rode off to Virginia to take up duty with the Confederate Army. He was thirty-five years old, a wealthy planter, and the owner of sixty-one slaves when he joined Wade Hampton's elite Legion as a major of cavalry. This book features eighty of Griffin's letters written at the Virginia front, and during later postings on the South Carolina coast, to his wife Leila Burt Griffin. The letters encompass Griffin's entire Civil War service, detailing living conditions and military maneuvers, the jockeying for position among officers, and the different ways in which officers and enlisted men interacted. The letters shed light on the life of a middle officer—a life of extreme military hardship, complicated further by the need for reassurance about personal valor and status common to men of the southern gentry. Griffin describes secret troop movements, such as the Hampton Legion's role in the Peninsula Campaign. Here he relates the march from Manassas to Fredricksburg, the siege of Yorktown and the retreat to Richmond, and the fighting at Eltham's landing and Seven Pines, where Griffin commanded the Legion after Hampton was wounded. Griffin recounts day-to-day issues, from the weather to gossip. Monumental historical events sent Griffin off to war but his heartfelt considerations were about his family, his community, and his own personal pride. Griffin's letters present the Civil War as the ordeal by fire that tested and verified—or modified—Southern upperclass values.
Donal A. Kerr
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198207375
- eISBN:
- 9780191677649
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198207375.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Modern History
This is the first full account of the role of the Irish Catholic Church in the Great Famine of 1846 and its aftermath. The author shows how the Famine and the subsequent evictions led to rural ...
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This is the first full account of the role of the Irish Catholic Church in the Great Famine of 1846 and its aftermath. The author shows how the Famine and the subsequent evictions led to rural violence and a spate of assassinations culminating in the murder of Major Mahon, which the local parish priest was accused of inciting. Savage denunciations followed in press and parliament. In conjunction with the belief that Pope Pius IX had blessed the struggle of oppressed nationalities, many priests became involved in the run-up to the Young Ireland Rebellion. These years also saw a sharpening of religious tension as Protestant Evangelicals made an all-out effort to Protestantine Ireland. The author has charted how the Famine and the violence soured relations between the Church and State and ultimately destroyed Lord John Russell’s dream of bringing a golden age to Ireland.Less
This is the first full account of the role of the Irish Catholic Church in the Great Famine of 1846 and its aftermath. The author shows how the Famine and the subsequent evictions led to rural violence and a spate of assassinations culminating in the murder of Major Mahon, which the local parish priest was accused of inciting. Savage denunciations followed in press and parliament. In conjunction with the belief that Pope Pius IX had blessed the struggle of oppressed nationalities, many priests became involved in the run-up to the Young Ireland Rebellion. These years also saw a sharpening of religious tension as Protestant Evangelicals made an all-out effort to Protestantine Ireland. The author has charted how the Famine and the violence soured relations between the Church and State and ultimately destroyed Lord John Russell’s dream of bringing a golden age to Ireland.
Albert Casullo and Joshua C. Thurow (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199695331
- eISBN:
- 9780191758218
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199695331.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Metaphysics/Epistemology
The chapters in this volume aim to advance the discussion of the role of the a priori in philosophy by addressing four sets of issues. The first is whether intuitions provide evidence for ...
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The chapters in this volume aim to advance the discussion of the role of the a priori in philosophy by addressing four sets of issues. The first is whether intuitions provide evidence for philosophical theories, whether that evidence is a priori, and whether the results of experimental philosophy affect the evidential or a priori status of intuitions. The second is whether there are explanations of the a priori and what range of propositions can be justified and known a priori. The third is whether a priori justified beliefs are needed in order to avoid some skeptical worries. The fourth is whether certain recent challenges to the existence or significance of the a priori are successful.Less
The chapters in this volume aim to advance the discussion of the role of the a priori in philosophy by addressing four sets of issues. The first is whether intuitions provide evidence for philosophical theories, whether that evidence is a priori, and whether the results of experimental philosophy affect the evidential or a priori status of intuitions. The second is whether there are explanations of the a priori and what range of propositions can be justified and known a priori. The third is whether a priori justified beliefs are needed in order to avoid some skeptical worries. The fourth is whether certain recent challenges to the existence or significance of the a priori are successful.
Brian Philip Dunn
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- December 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780198791416
- eISBN:
- 9780191833885
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198791416.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Theology
This book is a comparative study exploring the writings of an Indian Christian theologian named Ayadurai Jesudason Appasamy (1891–1975) and his comparative theological interaction with the ...
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This book is a comparative study exploring the writings of an Indian Christian theologian named Ayadurai Jesudason Appasamy (1891–1975) and his comparative theological interaction with the twelfth-century Śrivaiṣṇava reformer, Rāmānuja. The doctrinal focus is Appasamy’s four-fold Johannine application of the ‘Body of God’ analogy—the ‘Universe’, ‘Incarnation’, ‘Eucharist’, and ‘Church’ being his four divine embodiments. Critics in Appasamy’s day described his theological project as ‘bold heresies’, a ‘synthesis of Christianity and Vedānta’ that has ‘shifted the axis’ from Christianity to ‘Hindu religion’. By reading Appasamy in the context of his devotional tradition, however, this study demonstrates that his application of the embodiment analogy is rooted, rather, in the sacramental theology of early twentieth-century Anglicanism. His embodiment theology, in fact, closely reflects the theological developments that took place in Anglican scholarship between the time of Charles Gore and William Temple. Methodologically, what is being argued for is the need to understand theological discourse as being already semiotically and traditionally situated. In doing so it is further argued that, just as Appasamy’s detractors have failed to read him in his devotional context, so too has Appasamy done with Rāmānuja. Reading Rāmānuja more as a Vedāntic philosophical theologian than as a Śrivaiṣṇava sectarian practitioner, the Ācārya has been abstracted from his temple-based devotional practice. On this basis, challenging Appasamy’s use of Rāmānuja’s analogy, a better reading of John’s Gospel is proposed, a temple Christology that emerges from the narrative shape of the text itself.Less
This book is a comparative study exploring the writings of an Indian Christian theologian named Ayadurai Jesudason Appasamy (1891–1975) and his comparative theological interaction with the twelfth-century Śrivaiṣṇava reformer, Rāmānuja. The doctrinal focus is Appasamy’s four-fold Johannine application of the ‘Body of God’ analogy—the ‘Universe’, ‘Incarnation’, ‘Eucharist’, and ‘Church’ being his four divine embodiments. Critics in Appasamy’s day described his theological project as ‘bold heresies’, a ‘synthesis of Christianity and Vedānta’ that has ‘shifted the axis’ from Christianity to ‘Hindu religion’. By reading Appasamy in the context of his devotional tradition, however, this study demonstrates that his application of the embodiment analogy is rooted, rather, in the sacramental theology of early twentieth-century Anglicanism. His embodiment theology, in fact, closely reflects the theological developments that took place in Anglican scholarship between the time of Charles Gore and William Temple. Methodologically, what is being argued for is the need to understand theological discourse as being already semiotically and traditionally situated. In doing so it is further argued that, just as Appasamy’s detractors have failed to read him in his devotional context, so too has Appasamy done with Rāmānuja. Reading Rāmānuja more as a Vedāntic philosophical theologian than as a Śrivaiṣṇava sectarian practitioner, the Ācārya has been abstracted from his temple-based devotional practice. On this basis, challenging Appasamy’s use of Rāmānuja’s analogy, a better reading of John’s Gospel is proposed, a temple Christology that emerges from the narrative shape of the text itself.
Roger Glenn Robins
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- April 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195165913
- eISBN:
- 9780199835454
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195165918.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, History of Christianity
This book explores the life of Ambrose Jessup Tomlinson, chronicling his childhood and family life, spiritual journey, missionary work, and his role in establishing the Church of God. Its main ...
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This book explores the life of Ambrose Jessup Tomlinson, chronicling his childhood and family life, spiritual journey, missionary work, and his role in establishing the Church of God. Its main objective is to reconcile the holiness-pentecostal tradition to its origins, and the trajectory of its subsequent history. The term “plainfolk modernist” is coined, to suggest that both Tomlinson and the world he inhabited expressed a vibrant strain of modernism, though voiced in the idioms of American plainfolk culture.Less
This book explores the life of Ambrose Jessup Tomlinson, chronicling his childhood and family life, spiritual journey, missionary work, and his role in establishing the Church of God. Its main objective is to reconcile the holiness-pentecostal tradition to its origins, and the trajectory of its subsequent history. The term “plainfolk modernist” is coined, to suggest that both Tomlinson and the world he inhabited expressed a vibrant strain of modernism, though voiced in the idioms of American plainfolk culture.
Christine Gerrard
- Published in print:
- 2003
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780198183884
- eISBN:
- 9780191714122
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198183884.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 18th-century Literature
During his lifetime Aaron Hill was one of the most lively cultural patrons and brokers on the London literary scene — an image hard to square with the company of undistinguished scribblers to which ...
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During his lifetime Aaron Hill was one of the most lively cultural patrons and brokers on the London literary scene — an image hard to square with the company of undistinguished scribblers to which Pope relegated him in the Dunciad. This book aims to correct the distorted picture of the Augustan cultural scene which Pope passed down to posterity. Hill deliberately confronted Pope in his attempt to free poetry's sublime and visionary potential from the stale platitudes of neo-classical convention. An early champion of women poets, he also enjoyed close relationships with Eliza Haywood and Martha Fowke, and brought his three writing daughters Urania, Astrea, and Minerva into close contact with his lifelong friend the novelist Samuel Richardson. In 1711 Hill, as stage manager and librettist, introduced Handel to the English stage, as well as lobbying tirelessly for innovation in the 18th-century theatre. His entrepreneurial energies, directed at both commercial and cultural projects, mirror the zeitgeist of early Hanoverian Britain.Less
During his lifetime Aaron Hill was one of the most lively cultural patrons and brokers on the London literary scene — an image hard to square with the company of undistinguished scribblers to which Pope relegated him in the Dunciad. This book aims to correct the distorted picture of the Augustan cultural scene which Pope passed down to posterity. Hill deliberately confronted Pope in his attempt to free poetry's sublime and visionary potential from the stale platitudes of neo-classical convention. An early champion of women poets, he also enjoyed close relationships with Eliza Haywood and Martha Fowke, and brought his three writing daughters Urania, Astrea, and Minerva into close contact with his lifelong friend the novelist Samuel Richardson. In 1711 Hill, as stage manager and librettist, introduced Handel to the English stage, as well as lobbying tirelessly for innovation in the 18th-century theatre. His entrepreneurial energies, directed at both commercial and cultural projects, mirror the zeitgeist of early Hanoverian Britain.
Robert Welch
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198121879
- eISBN:
- 9780191671364
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198121879.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Drama, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
A century ago this year, productions of W. B. Yeats' The Countess Cathleen and Edward Martyn's The Heather Field inaugurated the Irish Literary Theatre, which was to take its name from its home in ...
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A century ago this year, productions of W. B. Yeats' The Countess Cathleen and Edward Martyn's The Heather Field inaugurated the Irish Literary Theatre, which was to take its name from its home in Abbey Street, Dublin. Despite riot, fire, and critical controversy, the Abbey Theatre has housed Ireland's National Theatre ever since. This is the first history of the Abbey to discuss the plays and the personalities in their underlying historical and political context, to give due weight to the theatre's work in Irish, and to take stock of its artistic and financial development up to the present. The research for the book draws extensively on archive sources, especially the manuscript holdings on the Abbey at the National Library of Ireland. Many outstanding plays are examined, with detailed analysis of their form and their affective and emotional content; and persistent themes in the Abbey's output are identified — visions of an ideal community; the revival of Irish; the hunger for land and money; the restrictions of a society undergoing profound change. But these are integrated with accounts of the Abbey's people, from Yeats, Martyn, and Lady Gregory, whose brainchild it was, to the actors, playwrights, directors, and managers who have followed — among them the Fays, Synge, O'Casey, Murray, Robinson, Shiels, Johnston, Murphy, Molloy, Friel, McGuiness, Deevy, Carr, and many others. The role of directors and policy-makers, and the struggle for financial security, subsidy, and new-style ‘partnerships’, is discussed as a crucial part of the theatre's continuing evolution.Less
A century ago this year, productions of W. B. Yeats' The Countess Cathleen and Edward Martyn's The Heather Field inaugurated the Irish Literary Theatre, which was to take its name from its home in Abbey Street, Dublin. Despite riot, fire, and critical controversy, the Abbey Theatre has housed Ireland's National Theatre ever since. This is the first history of the Abbey to discuss the plays and the personalities in their underlying historical and political context, to give due weight to the theatre's work in Irish, and to take stock of its artistic and financial development up to the present. The research for the book draws extensively on archive sources, especially the manuscript holdings on the Abbey at the National Library of Ireland. Many outstanding plays are examined, with detailed analysis of their form and their affective and emotional content; and persistent themes in the Abbey's output are identified — visions of an ideal community; the revival of Irish; the hunger for land and money; the restrictions of a society undergoing profound change. But these are integrated with accounts of the Abbey's people, from Yeats, Martyn, and Lady Gregory, whose brainchild it was, to the actors, playwrights, directors, and managers who have followed — among them the Fays, Synge, O'Casey, Murray, Robinson, Shiels, Johnston, Murphy, Molloy, Friel, McGuiness, Deevy, Carr, and many others. The role of directors and policy-makers, and the struggle for financial security, subsidy, and new-style ‘partnerships’, is discussed as a crucial part of the theatre's continuing evolution.
Martin Heale
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- October 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780198702535
- eISBN:
- 9780191772221
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198702535.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Early Modern History, History of Religion
The importance of the medieval abbot needs no particular emphasis. The monastic superiors of late medieval England ruled over thousands of monks and canons, who swore to them vows of obedience; they ...
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The importance of the medieval abbot needs no particular emphasis. The monastic superiors of late medieval England ruled over thousands of monks and canons, who swore to them vows of obedience; they were prominent figures in royal and church government; and collectively they controlled properties worth around double the Crown’s annual ordinary income. As guardians of regular observance and the primary interface between their monastery and the wider world, abbots and priors were pivotal to the effective functioning and well-being of the monastic order. This book provides the first detailed study of English monastic superiors, exploring their evolving role and reputation between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries. Individual chapters examine the election of late medieval monastic heads; the internal functions of the superior as the father of the community; the head of house as administrator; abbatial living standards and modes of display; monastic superiors’ public role in service of the Church and Crown; their external relations and reputation; the interaction between monastic heads and the government in Henry VIII’s England; the Dissolution of the monasteries; and the afterlives of abbots and priors following the suppression of their houses. This study of monastic leadership sheds much valuable light on the religious houses of late medieval England, including their spiritual life, administration, spending priorities, and their multi-faceted relations with the outside world. It also elucidates the crucial part played by monastic superiors in the dramatic events of the 1530s, when many heads surrendered their monasteries into the hands of Henry VIII.Less
The importance of the medieval abbot needs no particular emphasis. The monastic superiors of late medieval England ruled over thousands of monks and canons, who swore to them vows of obedience; they were prominent figures in royal and church government; and collectively they controlled properties worth around double the Crown’s annual ordinary income. As guardians of regular observance and the primary interface between their monastery and the wider world, abbots and priors were pivotal to the effective functioning and well-being of the monastic order. This book provides the first detailed study of English monastic superiors, exploring their evolving role and reputation between the fourteenth and sixteenth centuries. Individual chapters examine the election of late medieval monastic heads; the internal functions of the superior as the father of the community; the head of house as administrator; abbatial living standards and modes of display; monastic superiors’ public role in service of the Church and Crown; their external relations and reputation; the interaction between monastic heads and the government in Henry VIII’s England; the Dissolution of the monasteries; and the afterlives of abbots and priors following the suppression of their houses. This study of monastic leadership sheds much valuable light on the religious houses of late medieval England, including their spiritual life, administration, spending priorities, and their multi-faceted relations with the outside world. It also elucidates the crucial part played by monastic superiors in the dramatic events of the 1530s, when many heads surrendered their monasteries into the hands of Henry VIII.
Constant J. Mews
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- April 2005
- ISBN:
- 9780195156881
- eISBN:
- 9780199835423
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195156889.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, History of Christianity
In Abelard and Heloise, a dual intellectual biography of Peter Abelard (1079–1142) and Heloise (d. 1164), I argue that there is a fundamental continuity to the evolution of Abelard’s thought from his ...
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In Abelard and Heloise, a dual intellectual biography of Peter Abelard (1079–1142) and Heloise (d. 1164), I argue that there is a fundamental continuity to the evolution of Abelard’s thought from his early concern with dialectic, to his growing interest in theology in the 1120s and in ethical questions in the 1130s. Heloise was much more than the disciple and lover of Abelard. She emerges as a distinct thinker in her own right, deeply versed in classical ideals of friendship and ethics, which she wished to apply to her relationship to Abelard. While they have both functioned as mythic figures in the western imagination, I argue that both participated in a broader 12th-century renewal of interest in both classical literature and in religious reform. I examine Abelard’s dialectic as a theory not just about universals, but about language as a whole. Tracing the maturing of his dialectic from his earliest glosses to the Logica ‘Ingredientibus’, written after his early affair with Heloise (1115–17), I argue that Abelard was initially unable to come to terms with the ethical questions presented by Heloise in her side of messages (Epistolae duorum amantium) they exchanged during those years. After Abelard became a monk at St Denis, he started to write about theology. I trace the evolution of his theological interests, from his early concern with linguistic concerns to increasing preoccupation with the Holy Spirit and divine goodness, as manifest in Jesus. After Heloise, abbess of the Paraclete from 1129, responded to his Historia calamitatum and demanded he pay greater attention to the community he had founded, Abelard started to devote much more attention to commenting on Scripture and to reflecting on the ethical questions with which she had always been concerned. Accusations spread by St Bernard that Abelard promoted heresy distort the true character of his contribution to theology, on which Heloise exercised a profound influence.Less
In Abelard and Heloise, a dual intellectual biography of Peter Abelard (1079–1142) and Heloise (d. 1164), I argue that there is a fundamental continuity to the evolution of Abelard’s thought from his early concern with dialectic, to his growing interest in theology in the 1120s and in ethical questions in the 1130s. Heloise was much more than the disciple and lover of Abelard. She emerges as a distinct thinker in her own right, deeply versed in classical ideals of friendship and ethics, which she wished to apply to her relationship to Abelard. While they have both functioned as mythic figures in the western imagination, I argue that both participated in a broader 12th-century renewal of interest in both classical literature and in religious reform. I examine Abelard’s dialectic as a theory not just about universals, but about language as a whole. Tracing the maturing of his dialectic from his earliest glosses to the Logica ‘Ingredientibus’, written after his early affair with Heloise (1115–17), I argue that Abelard was initially unable to come to terms with the ethical questions presented by Heloise in her side of messages (Epistolae duorum amantium) they exchanged during those years. After Abelard became a monk at St Denis, he started to write about theology. I trace the evolution of his theological interests, from his early concern with linguistic concerns to increasing preoccupation with the Holy Spirit and divine goodness, as manifest in Jesus. After Heloise, abbess of the Paraclete from 1129, responded to his Historia calamitatum and demanded he pay greater attention to the community he had founded, Abelard started to devote much more attention to commenting on Scripture and to reflecting on the ethical questions with which she had always been concerned. Accusations spread by St Bernard that Abelard promoted heresy distort the true character of his contribution to theology, on which Heloise exercised a profound influence.
P.G. McHugh
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780198252481
- eISBN:
- 9780191710438
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198252481.001.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Philosophy of Law, Legal History
This book describes the encounter between the common law legal system and the tribal peoples of North America and Australasia. It is a history of the role of anglophone law in managing relations ...
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This book describes the encounter between the common law legal system and the tribal peoples of North America and Australasia. It is a history of the role of anglophone law in managing relations between the British settlers and indigenous peoples. That history runs from the plantation of Ireland and settlement of the New World to the end of the 20th century. The book begins by looking at the nature of British imperialism and the position of non-Christian peoples at large in the 17th and 18th centuries. It then focuses on North America and Australasia from their early national periods in the 19th century to the modern era. The historical basis of relations is described through the key, enduring, but constantly shifting questions of sovereignty, status and, more latterly, self-determination. Throughout the history of engagement with common law legalism, questions surrounding the settler-state's recognition — or otherwise — of the integrity of the tribe have recurred. These issues were addressed in many and varied imperial and colonial contexts, but all jurisdictions have shared remarkable historical parallels which have been accentuated by their common legal heritage. The same questioning continues today in the renewed and controversial claims of the tribal societies to a distinct constitutional position and associated rights of self-determination. The author examines the political resurgence of aboriginal peoples in the last quarter of the 20th century. A period of ‘rights-recognition’ was transformed into a second-generation jurisprudence of rights-management and rights-integration. From the 1990s onwards, aboriginal affairs have been driven by an increasingly rampant legalism.Less
This book describes the encounter between the common law legal system and the tribal peoples of North America and Australasia. It is a history of the role of anglophone law in managing relations between the British settlers and indigenous peoples. That history runs from the plantation of Ireland and settlement of the New World to the end of the 20th century. The book begins by looking at the nature of British imperialism and the position of non-Christian peoples at large in the 17th and 18th centuries. It then focuses on North America and Australasia from their early national periods in the 19th century to the modern era. The historical basis of relations is described through the key, enduring, but constantly shifting questions of sovereignty, status and, more latterly, self-determination. Throughout the history of engagement with common law legalism, questions surrounding the settler-state's recognition — or otherwise — of the integrity of the tribe have recurred. These issues were addressed in many and varied imperial and colonial contexts, but all jurisdictions have shared remarkable historical parallels which have been accentuated by their common legal heritage. The same questioning continues today in the renewed and controversial claims of the tribal societies to a distinct constitutional position and associated rights of self-determination. The author examines the political resurgence of aboriginal peoples in the last quarter of the 20th century. A period of ‘rights-recognition’ was transformed into a second-generation jurisprudence of rights-management and rights-integration. From the 1990s onwards, aboriginal affairs have been driven by an increasingly rampant legalism.