On the Backs of Others: Rethinking the History of British Geographical Exploration

Armston-Sheret, Edward

ISBN 10: 1496230973 / ISBN 13: 9781496230973

Published by University of Nebraska Press, 2024

About this Item

Seller Inventory # I-9781496230973

Bibliographic Details

• Title: On the Backs of Others: Rethinking the History of British Geographical Exploration
• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
• Publication Date: 2024
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1496230973
• ISBN 13: 9781496230973
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: New

About this title

Synopsis

In the Victorian and Edwardian eras British explorers sought to become respected geographers and popular public figures, downplaying or reframing their reliance on others for survival. Far from being solitary heroes, these explorers were in reality dependent on the bodies, senses, curiosity, and labor of subaltern people and animals.

In On the Backs of Others Edward Armston-Sheret offers new perspectives on British exploration in this era by focusing on the contributions of the people and animals, ordinarily written out of the mainstream histories, who made these journeys possible. He explores several well-known case studies of enduring popular and academic interest, such as Richard Francis Burton and John Hanning Speke’s Nile expeditions (1856–59 and 1860–63); Isabella Bird’s travels in North America, Persia, and East Asia (1872–c. 1900); and Captain Robert Falcon Scott’s two Antarctic expeditions (1901–4 and 1911–13). Armston-Sheret argues that numerous previously ignored stories show the work and agency of subaltern groups. In rethinking the history of exploration On the Backs of Others offers the first book-length study of the relationship between exploration and empire and their legacies within academic geography.
 

About the Author

Edward Armston-Sheret is the Alan Pearsall Fellow in Naval and Maritime History at the Institute of Historical Research, School of Advanced Studies, University of London.