Den primitiva kelten Den rasistiska bilden av den irländska kelten inom den viktorianska antropologin under 1850- och 1860-talen

Abstract

This thesis explores the racist assumptions pertaining to the Irish Celts during the Victorian era as it is expressed within the anthropological thought of the age. These assumptions are explored in The Races of Men (1850) by Robert Knox and in five essays published in the journals of the Anthropological Society of London during the 1860s. The racist assumptions of the Victorian anthropologists are made sense of through Dipesh Chakrabarty’s claim that the historicist thought of the 19th century was used to justify the colonial holdings of the European powers. Historicist thought claimed that some peoples were more modern and therefore more civilized than others, and while granting that the colonized peoples in theory could be modern and civilized in reality they never would be. Hence, European presence and sovereignty in these backward countries was of necessity. Although Ireland by no means was a British colony during this century, the history of the sister isles was one of colonial exploitation of Ireland by England. This thesis argues that the same colonial – and inherently racist – trope was applied when describing the Irish Celts as when describing non-European peoples. It is shown that the image of the Celt that shows forth deviates quite a lot from what (55) 3 was regarded as a civilized exterior and a civilized behavior, and instead approaches the image of primitive or uncivilized man. The Celt is depicted as prognathous and with a low facial angle, and thus as organically primitive. The exterior of the Celt conjures up the image of the negro. The Celt is described as lacking in reason, as lazy and turned backwards. The Celt is furthermore depicted as unsteady and volatile. In several of the essays it is explicitly argued that the Celt is unsuited for self-rule and free institutions.