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IRELAND, COLONIAL SCIENCE, AND THE GEOGRAPHICAL CONSTRUCTION OF BRITISH RULE IN INDIA, c. 1820–1870*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 November 2009

BARRY CROSBIE
BARRY CROSBIE*
Affiliation:
National University of Ireland, Galway
*
National University of Ireland, Galway[email protected]
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Abstract

This article examines the role that Ireland and Irish people played in the geographical construction of British colonial rule in India during the nineteenth century. It argues that as an important sub-imperial centre, Ireland not only supplied the empire with key personnel, but also functioned as an important reference point for scientific practice, new legislation, and systems of government. Occupying integral roles within the information systems of the colonial state, Irish people provided much of the intellectual capital around which British rule in India was constructed. These individuals were part of nineteenth-century Irish professional personnel networks that viewed the empire as a legitimate sphere for work and as an arena in which they could prosper. Through involvement and deployment of expertise in areas such as surveying and geological research in India, Irishmen and Irish institutions were able to act decisively in the development of colonial knowledge. The relationships mapped in this article centre the Irish within the imperial web of connections and global exchange of ideas, technologies, and practices during the long nineteenth century, thereby making a contribution towards uncovering Ireland's multi-directional involvement in the British empire and reassessing the challenges that this presents to existing British, Irish, and imperial historiography.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 52 , Issue 4 , December 2009 , pp. 963 - 987
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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Footnotes

*

This article is based on research supported by a Government of Ireland Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship provided by the Irish Research Council for Humanities and Social Sciences. The author is grateful to Professor C. A. Bayly, Professor Gearóid Ó Tuathaigh, and Dr Simon J. Potter for their helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article.

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