European University Institute Library

The Americas in Early Modern Political Theory, States of Nature and Aboriginality, by Stephanie B. Martens

eng

0

non fiction

The Americas in Early Modern Political Theory

electronic resource

951028447

by Stephanie B. Martens

States of Nature and Aboriginality

This book examines early modern social contract theories within European representations of the Americas in the 16th and 17th century. Despite addressing the Americas only marginally, social contract theories transformed American social imaginaries prevalent at the time into Aboriginality, allowing for the emergence of the idea of civilization and the possibility for diverse discourses of Aboriginalism leading to excluding and discriminatory forms of subjectivity, citizenship, and politics. What appears then is a form of Aboriginalism pitting the American/Aboriginal other against the nascent idea of civilization. The legacy of this political construction of difference is essential to contemporary politics in settler societies. The author shows the intellectual processes behind this assignation and its role in modern political theory, still bearing consequences today. The way one conceives of citizenship and sovereignty underlies some of the difficulties settler societies have in accommodating Indigenous claims for recognition and self-government--, Provided by publisher

Discovering and Inventing the New Continent: Post-Columbian Literature -- The Americas in 16th and 17th Century Literature: From Apprehension To Appropriation -- The Invention Of The Natural Man In Political Theory: Hobbes’s Leviathan -- The zInconveniencey Of America: Locke’s State Of Nature -- Aboriginalism: The construction of Indigenous Peoples as "un-civil" and "un-civilized"