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Regulating Indian* and Chinese Civic Identities In British Columbia's “Colonial Contact Zone,”** 1858–1887

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2013

Reginald Good
Reginald Good
Affiliation:
rgood@hotmail.com
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Abstract

When British Columbia was founded in 1858, the colonial regime classified Indians as savage, on the anthropological scale of civilization, and then imposed on them civilizing tactics designed to create semi-civilized British subjects. By the 1860s the colonial regime feared that the growing presence of Chinese immigrants, whom they initially classified as semi-civilized on the anthropological scale of civilization, would subvert this objective. They therefore disempowered Chinese through the imposition of de-civilizing tactics designed to create barbarian aliens. By 1887 these combined civilizing and de-civilizing tactics had resulted in the reclassification of Indians as semi-civilized and of Chinese as barbarian.

Résumé

Au moment de la fondation de la Colombie-Britannique en 1858, le régime colonial classait les Amérindiens en tant que «sauvages» sur l'échelle anthropologique des civilisations, puis leur imposait des mesures prétendues civilisatrices dans le but de créer des sujets britanniques «demi-civilisés». Dès les années 1860, le régime colonial craignait qu'une présence accrue d'immigrants chinois, qualifiés aussi de «demicivilisés», vienne renverser ces objéctifs. Par conséquent, celui-ci posait des gestes destinés à déconsidérer les Chinois en les assimilant à des «étrangers barbares». Vers 1887, ces tactiques combinées, visant à assimiler et à abrutir, eurent pour conséquence le réclassement des Amérindiens au rang de «demi-civilisés» et celui des Chinois au rang de barbares.

Keywords

ChineseIndianscalecivilizationBritish ColumbiaChinoisAmérindienéchelledes civilisationsColombie-Britannique
Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Law and Society / La Revue Canadienne Droit et Société , Volume 26 , Issue 1 , April 2011 , pp. 69 - 88
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Law and Society Association 2011

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