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History, Empire, and Islam

E. A. Freeman and Victorian Public Morality

Vicky Randall author

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Manchester University Press

Published:15th Feb '20

Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back

History, Empire, and Islam cover

This book offers the first comprehensive treatment of the historian and public moralist E. A. Freeman since the publication of W. R. W. Stephens’ Life and Letters of Edward A. Freeman (1895). While Freeman is often viewed by modern scholars as a panegyrist to English progress and a proponent of Aryan racial theory, this study suggests that his world-view was more complicated than it appears. Revisiting Freeman’s most important historical works, this book positions Thomas Arnold as a significant influence on Freeman’s view of world-historical development. Conceptualising the past as cyclical rather than unilinear, and defining race in terms of culture, rather than biology, Freeman’s narratives were pervaded by anxieties about recapitulation. Ultimately, this study shows that Freeman’s scheme of universal history was based on the idea of conflict between Euro-Christendom and the Judeo-Islamic Orient, and this shaped his engagement with contemporary issues.

ISBN: 9781526135810

Dimensions: 234mm x 156mm x 14mm

Weight: 503g

232 pages