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When Garibaldi went to Azerbaijan: A Study of British Perceptions of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution, Part I, 1906–07

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Savka Andic
Savka Andic*
Affiliation:
Modern Middle Eastern Studies, St. Antony's College, University of Oxford
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Abstract

In the early years of the twentieth century, a wave of constitutional revolutions swept over the developing world, attracting the attention of European observers. One of these was the Iranian Constitutional Revolution of 1906–11. British perceptions of this “brave new world” in Iran were more nuanced and diverse than one would expect for this era, commonly portrayed as a time of jingoism and rampant “Orientalist” racism. This study identifies four broad perspectives which shaped British perceptions: the imperialist, Europeanist, liberal idealist and local pragmatist. Within the context of these perspectives, British perceptions were further shaped by different understandings of Iran—influenced by a specifically Iranian-flavored literary Orientalism, Aryanism and history—and by understandings of what constituted an authentic reform or revolutionary movement.

Type
Articles
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 45 , Issue 5 , September 2012 , pp. 597 - 618
Copyright
Copyright © The International Society for Iranian Studies 2012

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Footnotes

In October 2012, Dr Mansour Bonakdarian brought charges of academic misconduct against the author of this article. For full details of the report into these allegations by the Ad Hoc Committee of the International Society for Iranian Studies, and a response to the report by Savka Andic, see http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00210862.2013.780803.

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