Imperial medicine and the ‘civilising mission’

HI269

Week 8

The White Man’s Burden

“Take up the White Man's burden--

Send forth the best ye breed-

Go, bind your sons to exileTo serve your captives'

need; To wait, in heavy harness,On fluttered folk and wild-- Your new-caught sullen

peoples, Half devil and half child.”Rudyard Kipling, ‘The White

Man’s Burden’, 1899

WHOSE burden?

"The White (?) Man’s Burden"The "white”colonial powers being carried as the burden of their "colored” subjects.First printed in Life, March 16, 1899.

Imperialism and ‘Progress’

Defining Characteristics of Imperial and Colonial Medicine

• universalising claims• creation/reproduction of race and gender stereotypes pathologizing

the bodies of colonial peoples• used as a source of political authority and social control, legitimation• profound role of environment in determining medical priorities,

interpretations, policies• medicine state-oriented, state-dependent, expressive of imperialist

ideologies• close links with military establishment• often enclavist, privileging European health over that of natives• sanitary and public health measures have strong component of

population control• aimed at creating and reinforcing European hegemony, cultural,

political and social

Case Study: Smallpox, Sitala, and the Civilising mission

From inoculation to vaccination

A case study in colonial medicine: chronology and context of vaccination in India

 Time frame -- This is by no means an exhaustive or definitive chronology, but merely aims to suggest the context and phases of colonial medicine in India.  1763 Britain defeats France in India1780s Indian Medical Service begins to expand (IMS)1784 India Act puts India under parliamentary control (administered by East India

Company [EIC]); Asiatic Society of Bengal founded1803 Mughal Emperor accepts British protection1804 First attempt to ban variolation, and impose vaccination (unenforced, unenforceable)1813 Charter Act forces EIC to accept responsibility for education of the Indian people, particularly in ‘Oriental and Occidental science,’ as counterpoise to missionary education1818 First vernacular newspaper started (by missionaries)1822 Native Medical Institution founded in Calcutta, to train Indians in w. med. for

army/civilian govt.1827 Calcutta Madrasa and Calcutta Sanskrit College offer classes in unani and ayurveda respectively1828 Brahmo Samaj, an org. supporting western-style education and the printing of Hindu works in vernacular, founded by native reformers;

1833 East India Company monopoly revoked1835 Official policy supporting Western-style education and westernization (esp in

languages, science and medicine); support withdrawn from Madrasa, Sanskrit College, NMI, and Calcutta Medical College founded instead, offering English-language medical training1836 first dissection in modern times performed by an Indian vaidya (formerly a medical instructor at Sanskrit College)1840s Conquest of Sind and Punjab1844 Calcutta Medical College founded1853 India loses dominance in cotton textiles and becomes importer of Lancashire

cotton cloth; first railway line opens1857 Universities established in the three Presidencies; two would subsequently exclude vernacular languages from their courses of study1857-8 ‘Mutiny’ or first Indian Uprising1860s Medical men calling for regulation of native Indian medical practitioners; Contagious diseases Act, just passed in Britain, swiftly enacted in India as well1864 Sanitation Boards established in each Presidency1865 Govt of Bengal prohibited variolation in Calcutta1868 Indian Pharmacopoeia published, aimed at IMS personnel1869 Suez opens, hugely facilitating trade and travel between Europe and India

1870-71 rumours of compulsory vaccination spark riots in Delhi1877 Govt. of Bombay passes Vaccination act, making vaccination compulsory for

infants1880 permissive legislation passed allowing local govts to mandate vaccination1885 1st Indian National Congress1890s plague epidemics1897 Plague Act granting Govt. draconian powers over people, property, trade, pilgrimage, sanitation, passed over heads of Indian local, regional governments, in order to suppress plague (which was threatening European trade with India). Legislation and subsequent actions provoked unprecedented civilian resistance and violent rioting (Chairman of Plague Committee assassinated)1905 1st mass agitation1909 Indian Councils Act, making majority of legislative council seats directly elective, w/ separate electorates for Muslims and Hindus. India representatives to viceroy’s council and to secretary’s council in UK.1917 policy promoting Indian self-government first announced; deemed inadequate

by Indian nationalists1919 ‘anti-sedition’ laws enabling detention without trial etc., for Indian nationalist activists; influenza epidemic and mass famines; sanitation and education matters transferred from Governor’s portfolio to Indian ministers1920 first non-cooperation campaign and boycott on British goods1935 Government of India Act1947 Independence and Partition.

Medical Mandates and Civilising Missions

• “In no country does the public health more urgently demand the aid of that science. But the ignorance, prejudice, and suspicions of the people on one hand, and the vast demands upon the revenues for more visibly and perhaps more urgently needed public works on the other, do not leave sanitation a chance.” India, 1872 (in response to epidemic cholera)

• “The basis of all sanitary achievement... must be a knowledge of the people and the conditions under which they live, their prejudices, their ways of life, their social customs, their habits, surroundings and financial means...” Sir Harcourt Butler, November 1911.

Letter of donation of a Tropical Medicine Laboratory to the Gordon Memorial College, Khartoum, Sudan. 1901, from Sir Henry Wellcome to General Sir Reginald Wingate KCMG, KCB, DSO etc. Governor General of the Sudan.  

September 28th,1901, London.

 Sir, I beg to offer for the acceptance of  the Gordon Memorial College, Khartoum , a complete equipment for Chemical and Bacteriological  Laboratories for Analytical and Research Work. The Laboratories would be designed:

• To promote technical education.• To undertake the testing and assaying of agricultural, mineral and other substances of practical interest

in the industrial development of the Sudan. • To carry out such tests in connection with waters, food stuffs and sanitary matters as may be found

desirable. • To aid in criminal investigation in poisoning cases (which are so frequent in Sudan) by detecting and

experimental determination of toxic agents , particularly those obscure potent substances employed by the natives.

• To study bacteriologically and physiologically tropical disorders especially the infective diseases of both man and beast peculiar to the Sudan, and to render assistance to the officers of health and the clinics of civil and military hospitals.…

It is anticipated that the work of the laboratories will prove beneficial to both the European and native population. It is my desire that the laboratories be made as far as practicable self-supporting, by the charging of such reasonable fees as will aid in covering the cost of maintaining them. …In the event of your doing me the honour of accepting my offer, I propose that the equipment shall be delivered either at Alexandria or Port Said, as you may prefer. I have the honour to be, Sir your obedient Servant. (signed) Henry S. Wellcome